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Acting History Test 1

© Jon Blackstock

This test is based on the acting notes from the first week, and most of the questions are based on these sources:

Acting Before Stanislavski
and
Stanislavski Biography

Some of the notes may not pull up right if you do not have Microsoft Word. I will fix this error in future installments.

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Part 1—Matching—Write the capital letter for the person at the end of his or her description. Of course, some people will have many descriptions, so some of the letters will be used more than once. Each question counts three points, so this section counts sixty-nine points.

1. Stanislavski
2. Spolin
3. Quintilian
4. Steele MacKay
5. Aaron Hill
6. Thespian
7. François Delsarte
8. Thespis
9. Dionysus
10. Polis Dionysia
11. Paul Sills
12. Danchenko
13. Checkov

1. He/She wrote books on improvisation and revolutionized theatre games with books like Improvisation for the Theatre. _____
2. He was a Roman Rhetoric teacher whose methods were used to instruct orators who worked for lawyers. _____
3. He/She wrote An Actor Prepares. _____
4. This is a modern word that means “actor.” _____
5. He/She wanted to be a great singer, but lost his voice. _____
6. He/She wanted to be a great singer, but decided very young that he was simply not very good. _____
7. He/She was the Greek god of wine and revelry. _____
8. He/She is known for bringing the work of Delsarte to America. _____
9. He/She is considered the Western World’s first actor. _____
10. This term describes a theatre festival that was held in Athens, Greece. _____
11. He/She was one of the best-known playwrights to emerge from the Moscow Art Theatre. _____
12. His/Her techniques were used from Roman times until the early European Renaissance. _____
13. He/She wrote The Sea Gull, which was the first highly successful play produced by the Moscow Art Theatre. _____
14. He/She worked with Stanislavski in creating the Moscow Art Theatre. _____
15. He/She believed that, while natural emotions are sincere, they are not artistic. _____
16. He/She proposed that there are only ten dramatic passions. _____
17. He/She is known for saying, “Nothing is more deplorable than a gesture without a motive.” _____
18. Although He/She still believed in stylized gestures, the action became less audience-directed and became more character-directed. _____
19. Since He/She believed that exterior motion effects emotion, his/her stylized gestures were designed to bring about emotion rather than to fake emotion. _____
20. He/She founded the American Academy of Dramatic Art. _____
21. He/She set out to observe people and every possible emotion. _____
22. His mother revolutionized improvisation in America and he continues this work today. _____
23. His early credits include performing with the Alexeyev Circle, a family-run theatre group. _____

Part Two—Short Answer—Fill in the blank or completely answer the question. Each of these counts five points, so the section counts twenty points.

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