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Articles, continued
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cont. from page 2:
Rix, Roxane.
"Alba Emoting: A Revolution in Emotion for the Actor"
in _Performer Training: Developments Across Cultures_ (Ian Watson, ed.), Routledge Harwood Academic Publishers, 2001/2002
ISBN 9057551519
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Next I discuss my continued discoveries in further work with the technique, in beginning to teach it to others:
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The paradox of approaching emotion through physical patterning is that it is at once safer than psychological techniques, in that it does not ask the actor to mine personal experiences, and at the same time potentially more volatile, because it goes directly to the core of physiological experience. I placed great and constant emphasis on discipline, safety, and self-care; students always had permission to step out at will if an experience became too intense or frightening for them--and also had to agree to step out on my command whether they felt like it or not; both the students and I needed the security of my unquestioned responsibility and authority to guide them either toward release, or to step out of the experience. Release is a necessary step in the process, whether "intended" through the pattern or not; but, sometimes, there arises a sort of "body fear" of strong feeling of which the students themselves are not necessarily aware. When the latter takes hold, it can be impossible to release in the moment, and tends, instead, to escalate into hysteria. My experience to date suggests that this fear is often a product of past experiences connected to a particular emotion. For most, the fear dissolves through a gradual, gentle approach to whatever pattern is producing it; I strongly suspect, however, that this applies only to past experiences which have been psychologically resolved, i.e., in which the reaction stems from buried body memory rather than a failure to have adequately worked through the life experience.6 Resolution of feelings from life experiences is, of course, necessary for any actor in order to achieve full emotional expressiveness; the only difference in working with Alba Emoting is that the directness of the technique renders awareness and confrontation of such feelings unavoidable.
The initial experience of learning Alba Emoting seems, for most, to fall roughly into four parts: the first quarter generates awareness, enthusiasm, and some instant breakthroughs; the second, frustration, confusion, and fatigue; the third, induction, which involves both (for lack f a better word) epiphany, and, for many, a transition through unsettling feelings of emptiness; and the fourth, satisfaction and a feeling of well- being. Experience suggests to me that the initial basic training, for Americans, at least, largely involves "clearing the channels": flushing out old tensions and returning the body, in a very real sense, to its pre-socialized ability to recognize and express emotion purely and directly. I have perceived the same effects in my students as I observed in Chile: lines dropping out of people's faces, eyes becoming brighter and clearer, etc. Long before developing technical expertise, such basic skills as concentration, awareness, centering, and psychophysical integration also show visible improvement.
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Finally – not the end of the article, but the last excerpt here:
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Alba Emoting in Performance
Application of the work in performance is, of course, the final question. "If some actors in a play were using Alba," a student asked me, , and some weren't, would I be able to tell which were which?" The answer is "Only if they were doing it poorly!" Like any other basic technique, Alba Emoting done properly is invisible--one might only notice, as in any case, that some actors are more vibrant and expressive than others. Alba only 'shows" in the early, awkward attempts to apply it--just as the actor still focusing on iambic pentameter isn't likely to render a believable Hamlet. In practice, I discourage my students from beginning with direct application in performance after just one course of training, but, rather, to work as they had before, and simply allow the awareness and clarity of expression developed through the work to emerge on its own. Characters (just as people in life) most often experience mixed emotions: jealousy, for example, might involve fear in the breath, angry eyes, and the muscle tonus of erotic love; conscious application of Alba Emoting to create this believably requires a sophisticated skill level. Even with tentative mastery, however, an actor may apply emotional effector patterns effectively in selected moments he or she finds particularly emotionally challenging, to sustain an emotional reaction (e.g., laughing), and, certainly, to develop the desired psychoemotional state in preparation for entering the dramatic action. Conscious application with text through every moment of a performance takes considerable technical skill, and is not necessarily the goal: while it can be done, this becomes largely a matter of the actor's individual
inclination. I would compare it to scoring for actions: when first learning that skill, I require student actors to identify an action verb for every moment they are on stage; in practice, I know that, eventually, most will employ such specific scoring only for the moments which they find especially difficult--because playing actions will have become so ingrained that it will happen without conscious decision.
Once the body has learned to express emotion freely, expression can come on its own through actions and concentration on given circumstances; however, even an actor who chooses to apply the work only to this extent is inescapably aware of any tensions that warp the intended effect.
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 roxanerix@albaemotingna.org
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