Some facts about Mr Sanford Meisner:
* Sanford Meisner was gay although did marry two women earlier in his life.
* Meisner died in his sleep at his home in California in 1997.
* Meisner has worked with and taught: Sandra Bullock and Grace Kelly.
* In 1983, Meisner and his life partner James Carville set up the Meisner/Carville School of acting on the Caribbean Island of Bequia.
Meisner Technique:
The Meisner Technique is the teachings of Sanford Meisner who was one of the original members of the Group Theatre in New Work.
Meisner believed that acting was "living truthfully under imaginary circumstances".
The main focus that Meisner's branch of Method Acting emphasised was reacting off of the other person or the environment.
Meisner's technique was created to get actors out of their heads so they won't think but do. Meisner wanted to create the simplest task so that the actors would not have to think and could focus more on the doing of the exercise.
With the word repetition exercise the most important thing is to wait for the natural instinct to change the word, feel the "itch" to do it, don't change the word just because your tired of saying it, wait truthfully even if it consists of you saying that words for hours. You will feel when it is right but until then keep going and pushing forward. (It's okay to mess up). The word repetition is the foundation of the Meisner technique, it makes you listen as an actor which is hard to do but can only come naturally and cannot be taught. As Sanford Meisner said "Don't create change wait for a pinch it's about your instinct". This repetition game keeps the text interesting and new and creates a large change for when you do the scene not using this exercise as a sudden flow comes with doing it.
