Review of Tom Stern (ed.), The Philosophy of Theatre, Drama and Acting. London/New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 2017. 209 pages

Part 3 of 5: Theatre and Life (as such)

If the essays on the relation of philosophy and theatre may for those who do not believe to be philosophers remain somewhat unrewarding, the collection also contains essays that could be interesting for non-philosophers.

Lior Levy from the university of Haifa examines Jean-Paul Sartre’s concept of theatre ¹ Sartre’s lecture „Epic and dramatic theatre“ of 1960 is usually understood as an attempt to find a middle ground between Brecht’s epic theatre and bourgeois theatre, i.e. as a justification of Sartre’s own type of drama. But Levy places this seemingly garrulous lecture in the context of Sartre’s systematic philosophy. He starts with explaining the difference between an „image“ and an „analogue“, as Sartre stated it in his early work „L’imaginaire“ (1940). As material objects, works of art are representing analogues . Images are, on the contrary, ideas which do not have any material existence. Levy applies this distinction to actors:

„Actors, as analogues, are present. Characters remain absent as images.“ ²

But in the theatre there are two analogues: the words of the play (or the events on stage) and the actor. The actors create images of the characters they represent for themselves. And they are analogues themselves for the audience who create images from these analogues for themselves. Theatre results from this overlapping of images ³.  ⁴

For Sartre, action is the essence of theatre ⁵, not in the sense that some kind of plot must be narrated, but that the work of art which comes into existence on stage results from the action of human beings. In order to be able to act a person needs a project of himself ⁶. This project is not a certain aim, which a person sets himself or herself consciously, but an original act of choosing which is not directly accessible for the person acting. This original act of choosing oneself is the precondition of all particular acts of choosing. The actor also develops such a project without being able to say what it consists of when he creates an image of the character for himself ⁷. He does something that we also do in our lives. He enables us to recognize how we live ⁸ Theatre is a means of self-knowledge ⁹. We come to understand that the project of our life is lived by action, that we are not something or somebody before we act, but that we act first and then and therefore are something or somebody, because we are free in our actions. That is what theatre reminds us of, explains Levy.

From Tzachi Zamir’s reflections on acting we learn something else about our lives ¹⁰. He starts from a technique in acting which he calls „giving focus“. This means creating attention for another actor, diverting attention, playing down oneself. Every actor must learn that at some time. For Zamir this is a basic characteristic of all acting, not only because several actors cooperate on stage, but also because every single actor shows something, a character, a process – not himself. Contrary to the general opinion about actors – vain, hollow creatures wafted through by every breeze – and contrary to the ongoing change from actor to performer, who uses all means of increasing attention for himself ¹¹, Zamir sees generosity as a basic virtue of acting, the ability to give attention away generously ¹². He does not claim that every actor possesses this virtue, but he maintains that it necessarily results as an aim from the analysis of what acting is.

In addition Zamir refers to the function which artists have as ideal examples of shaping one’s life. Since Nietzsche the relation of the subject to his or her life is analogous to the relation of the artist to his work ¹³. We create and judge our lives according to aesthetic criteria. Life should be beautiful and not boring. Zamir also holds on to this analogy between artistic creation and authentic conduct of life ¹⁴. Proceeding from his analysis of the art of acting he sees other possibilities of creative self-design. Subordinating one’s own decisions to an effect which can only be achieved by a common effort can also be authentic. Thereby Zamir arrives at statements which are quite contrary to what guidebooks for leading an authentic life recommend (or the current fashion of theatre studies):

„I can choose to be a minor character in another’s life story, for example, and this decision can become a treasured part of what makes some aspects of my own life story meaningful and unique to me.“ ¹⁵

A further result of Zamir’s analysis of the deployment of attention by minor characters on stage is that empathy in theatre works in two directions. The audience feels with the characters on stage, but the actors also feel with the audience. Actors who direct the attention of the audience to another actor thereby often preempt reactions of the audience or make reactions visible which are suppressed or only half conscious in the members of the audience. As backward as this analysis might seem to defendants of the „aesthetics of the performative“, it is not naïve, it results from the close observation of actors on stage or in movies ¹⁶

It was promised we could learn something for our lives from these essays. Here it is:

„The actor’s selflessness can enrich the aesthetics of self-creation“ ¹⁷.

Learning from theatre means learning beautiful modesty. That is really good news ¹⁸.