Practical Aesthetics Handout
Practical Aesthetics Handout
Practical Aesthetics Handout
What is Practical Aesthetics? An approach to acting devised by writer David Mamet and actor William H Macy in the
early 1980s to counter the self-indulgent and self-centred training and performance that was being witnessed in the
USA as a result of Method Acting techniques.
The four questions for the Think Before You Act portion of the approach are:
Scene – Script Analysis to Think before you Act – apply the questions to the scene below.
Boyfriend / Girlfriend
Girl is talking to boy about how to Go on sign the form Write down in cosi script
solve his problem
Girl
- What is character doing
This isn’t my problem - What does character
The concept of what the want
character wants the other Boy - What is actor doing
character wants them to do onstage to achieve this
You know I can’t afford this
allows the actor to disassociate - As if
themselves with the character, so Girl
that they do not bring themselves
into the character Take some responsibility
Boy
Boy wants girl to take
responsibility for his problem I swear it won’t happen again