About the Book

Originally published in 1969, this was the first book of its kind: an attempt to describe the different approaches that the actor needs to make to different media – theatre, film and television – and to show how the art of acting, which never stops evolving had entered into a new phase of growth in the sixties. Ronald Hayman examines questions which are basic, but had often been ignored: What exactly goes on inside the actor’s mind while (s)he is preparing a part? How much do actors vary in their approach? Where does personality stop and technique begin? This wide-ranging study of the actor at work is based partly on what outstanding actors have said about their methods but chiefly on close analysis of actual performances in plays, films and on television. Laurence Olivier, Helene Weigel, Jeanne Moreau and many others are both examined in close-up and viewed in perspective against the giants of the past like Bernhardt and Salvini.