Respect for Acting (Hardcover)

by Uta Hagen (Author), David Hyde Pierce (Foreword), Haskel Frankel (Contributor)
Key Phrases: cliché image, conditioning forces, inner attention, Streetcar Named Desire, Frank Elgin, The Country Girl (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review
In her introduction to Respect for Acting, actress and teacher Uta Hagen talks about a time when she herself had no respect for the art of acting. "I used to accept opinions such as: 'You're just born to be an actor'; 'Actors don't really know what they're doing on stage'; 'Acting is just instinct--it can't be taught.'" But this attitude of "you got it or you don't" is fundamentally one that denigrates the craft, as she points out. Great actors do not perform effortlessly, or merely through learning the appropriate tricks and cheats to manipulate an audience. Great acting is about the difficult fusion of intellect and action--about sincerely and truthfully connecting to the moment, your fellow actors, and the audience--and Hagen's thoughtful and profound book contains a series of observations and exercises to help an actor do just that. Her prose style is admirably clear and filled with examples from her own lengthy career both as a performer and in the classroom. While her exercises in sense memory and basic objects skirt close to the sort of self-absorption that followers of "the Method" are routinely accused of, they are presented clearly and with a focus on practical results. And in such places as her chapter "Practical Problems," which includes discussions of stage nerves and how to stay fresh in a long run, her straightforward advice is invaluable. --John Longenbaugh --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Product Description
Respect for Acting

"This fascinating and detailed book about acting is Miss Hagen's credo, the accumulated wisdom of her years spent in intimate communion with her art. It is at once the voicing of her exacting standards for herself and those she [taught], and an explanation of the means to the end."
--Publishers Weekly

"Hagen adds to the large corpus of titles on acting with vivid dicta drawn from experience, skill, and a sense of personal and professional worth. Her principal asset in this treatment is her truly significant imagination. Her 'object exercises' display a wealth of detail with which to stimulate the student preparing a scene for presentation."
--Library Journal

"Uta Hagen's Respect for Acting . . . is a relatively small book. But within it, Miss Hagen tells the young actor about as much as can be conveyed in print of his craft."
--Los Angeles Times

"There are almost no American actors uninfluenced by Uta Hagen."
--Fritz Weaver

"This is a textbook for aspiring actors, but working thespians can profit much by it. Anyone with just a casual interest in the theater should also enjoy its behind-the-scenes flavor."
--King Features Syndicate

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 240 pages
• Publisher: Wiley; 2 edition (July 8, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0470228482
• ISBN-13: 978-0470228487
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.7 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (29 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #24,628 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

21 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A BLUEPRINT FOR ACTORS, July 27, 2001

By	MOVIE MAVEN (New York, NY USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)

This review is from: Respect for Acting (Hardcover)

I have had the great pleasure and privilege of seeing Uta Hagen perform in plays by Edward Albee, Donald Margulies and George Bernard Shaw. She is surely one of the finest actors of our time. I have also had the great pleasure and privilege of studying for four years with Uta in the school she helped create with her late husband, Herbert Berghof (the famous HB Studio in New York City). I can assure you that she is one of the finest teachers of our time. It is a very rare actor who can actually communicate as a fine teacher. Uta is one of those very few who do just that.

In this, her first book, she lays out a "blueprint" for actors which, as surely as a blueprint by an architect, can be followed by those actors who are novices or those who have great experience. No, she cannot give you talent, but she can (and does) show you the how and why to use your talent to serve the playwright.

She believes in acting as an Art and this "how-to book" is invested with the love and respect of its title. It can be read and enjoyed and actually used by actors. It can also be read and enjoyed and relished by lovers of fine theatre who do not happen to be actors. It would make a terrific gift for any young actor along with the only books I would rate as its equal: Constantin Stanislavski's "An Actor Prepares" and his "Building A Character." It is HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.

21 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An absolute must for any theatre enthusiast!, August 24, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Respect for Acting (Hardcover)

Uta Hagen has long been considered one of "our" best. Here she examines what makes a human being "tick" and how an actor can use this to enhance his/her performance. Too many times books on acting tend to be very bland, and uninformative. Or even worse, they tend to take an almost clinical approach to our art, making it impossible to enjoy, and almost equally impossible to learn.

Having read many books on technique, I would consider this one of the best. Unlike Stanislavski's trilogy, which to me is like reading a science textbook, it doesn't bore the reader while trying to teach him, but rather inspires the artist to a greater understanding of his art and himself as an artist. In the book, she challenges us to work to achieve a higher form of theatre, one that works collaboratively, not individually. In summation, all I can say is that, for me, she speaks to my soul.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One of the Actor's Bibles, March 30, 2003

By	ISABEL CARDENAS (GRAND CAYMAN, CAYMAN ISLANDS Cayman Islands) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Respect for Acting (Hardcover)

An amazing overview as well as in depth book on acting. Her exercises, expiriences and teachings are incredibly usefull for an actor of any age and any level. An absolute classic. I am currently enrolled at Julliard as a drama major and this book is my Acting Bible.