LIVING THE PART

Evening Star, Issue 19841, 14 April 1928, Page 18

LIVING THE PART

A question was raised in London lately ; “Should an actor feel the part lie is playing or live it?” It always holds a. certain fascination for earnest plavgocrs, and ihev speculate at large on ‘the virtues of the two methods. More arc a lew opinions from actois well up in the theatrical scale: — Connie Ediss says: “I certainly think to be success! u! on the stage one should feel the emolmns ol one’s part, lor the telepathy between actors and audience is wonderinl. I have boon all over the world and have tried playing to an audience, knowing they were there, and I have played to them_ entirely forgetting they were there, winch is host, I hud. In my younger days in America Charles Frohman said to me; ‘Connie, you're to conscious ot the audience. Forget them! the play’s the thing.’ And 1 found ho was rmiit. We are the picture the audience come to see, the plot of the pmywe happen to bo a lavonlo, and the} like our personality or perhaps our looks, thev comment on ns. lint the plav’.s the' thing. So it behoves ns to bo and to feel what wo really arc supposed to led.' 1 Robert Lorraine, London picturesque sta ir e hero, says; “My own idea is that tlic player, in expressing a dimactor, employs a dual personality. Ono reads at times ol an actor completely identifying himself with u cluuatteij hut that is an exaggeration, or wo should liiid Othello actually strangling Desdemona. it is absurd, in my opinion to maintain that an actor should actually icel the emotions he is icpie.senUiig. But that they should be actually present in his mind during las study of the part and during Ins actual performance is, I think, unquestionMorace Modgos, a sound chaructei actor, who was out here twice, remarks that “ the more J. play the less I seem to know about acting. One must go through, in a measure, the ! emotions one is attempting .to cxpioss. In mi' cun, case it is particularly distressing, for .1. seen; to pass most of my time in a condition of slight intoxication.’’ , , .. Which reminds one ot the dear old lady who stayed at Charlton Morton’s hoarding house when lie was playing the happy inebriate in ‘Lady, Bo Good!’ “Oh, Mr Morton, she said sympathetically after seeing the play, “you must have to start drinking very early in the day to reach the condition necessary for yon to play your part at night.' 1 Charlton Morton played up nobly. “ it’s not s<> bad on ordinary days,’ lie told her, “but 1 have a great deal of difficulty in getting enough in on matinee days.”