Friday, January 17, 2025

Speaking in Tongues



Katz's Tongue Sandwich

Stanislavski, who was Chekhov's great interpreter, was the champion of using one’s own psychology to bring the role to life. In America Lee Strasberg and the Actors Studio followed suit. When you see Marlon Brando i
n Elia Kazan’s On the Waterfront, it’s the Moscow Art Theater at work--despite Brando's claims to the contrary. Meyerhold on the other extreme was a director who believed in working from the outside in. You brought the mask to life. Which raises the question of learning a language. A lot of newcomers fumble around. They're afraid to jump into their role, which is to act the part of a creature, gesturing frantically like an Italian or feigning a mixture of insouciance and indifference in the manner of the French. Curiously, though they’re enemies Ukrainians and Russians can sound alike. Not only because Russian and Ukrainian are Cyrillic languages but also by virtue of the fact both languages possess an intrinsic braggadocio. For instance one irate Ukrainian recently completed his critique of Russia, which he described as the new guy in the block, historically, by saying Russians couldn’t write. That included Tolstoy and Dostoevsky too-- which brings back Tolstoy's famously remarking to Chekhov that he was almost as bad as Shakespeare. No mind. If you want to speak Swedish imitate Max von Sydow inThe Seventh Seal. If you're a woman your role models would be either Bibi Andersson or Liv Ullmann in Persona.


listen to Allen Ginsberg reading "Howl" (1995)

read "An Incident of Defenestration" by Francis Levy, Vol. 1 Brooklyn

listen to James Brown and Luciano Pavarotti singing "It's a Man's World"

and listen to "I Love to Love (But My Baby Just Wants to Dance)" by Tina Charles (1975)

and listen to "Band of Gold" by Freda Payne with Belinda Carlisle

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