Test your basic knowledge |

Acting Basics

Subject : performing-arts
Instructions:
  • Answer 50 questions in 15 minutes.
  • If you are not ready to take this test, you can study here.
  • Match each statement with the correct term.
  • Don't refresh. All questions and answers are randomly picked and ordered every time you load a test.

This is a study tool. The 3 wrong answers for each question are randomly chosen from answers to other questions. So, you might find at times the answers obvious, but you will see it re-enforces your understanding as you take the test each time.
1. The key to almost everything in acting. For an actor - _______ is not a reduction of energy but rather a freeing of energy and a readiness to react. AKA Restful Alertness. The first step in Letting Go. Awareness is at a high level.






2. The goal of a character pursues through action to satisfy a need. It is best identified using a transitive verb such as - 'to persuade him to give me a territory in town.'






3. This occurs when: Everything the actor does as the character should grow directly out of the needs of the character - so that the 'inner' world of the character and the 'outer' world of the performance are unified.






4. Male choir groups began competing against one another reciting poems at religious festivals in Ancient Greece. Gradually the choir leader began to speak as an individual character and acting was born. As a second actor was added - dialogue emerged -






5. Immediate and urgent needs cause actions in the pursuit of objectives within given circumstances.






6. German word for power. The actor's physical and vocal tools.






7. An actor's ability to put himself in the place of another person - both for purposes of observation and for applying the Magic If to a role. It is possible to empathize with someone without sympathizing with that person.






8. Relinquishing too much effort - chronic physical tension - a false voice - preconceptions about the work - personal fear - and most importantly who you already are.






9. Finding in the character's situation some need or objective that has true personal significance.






10. Something a character lacks or wants that drives him to pursue an action to satisfy that lack or desire.






11. Immediate and urgent needs cause actions in the pursuit of objectives within given circumstances.






12. Meyerhold. The fusion of mind and body; teaching the 'body how to think'.






13. Our relationship to ______ implies internal states to the audience. Ex: Willie Loman with a bent back is hopeless and defeated and losing his battle with _____. In musical theatre it is convention that lovers actually defy _______ by skipping - as if






14. The acceptance of responsibility for your own development through systematic effort.






15. Showing the audience something about the character instead of simply doing what the character does.






16. Stanislavski's classic question. If I were in the situation of the character - and if I wanted what the character wants - what would I do?






17. Won an acting competition in Athens - Greece in 534 B.C. Considered the first actor.






18. The condition of relaxed playfulness that some psychologists say allows for maximum creativity. When the inner parent allows the inner child to come out and play.






19. Heightening the drama of an action or scene by making it more significant or urgent.






20. Although it has a literal - physical dimension - being in a state of________ implies a unified sense of self that allows actions to involve the whole body and be well focused.






21. The quality of an action or performance that makes it seem to be happening right now - before our eyes - as if for the first time.






22. A person fully committed to an important objective.






23. A unit of action with it's own specific conflict and crisis. In each one a character has a single objective. They are formed of interactions and flow to create the underlying structure of a scene.






24. Stanislavski's physical approach to acting.






25. All parts of the actor--body - voice - and mind--work together in an integrated way.






26. _____ causes an _____ directed toward an __________






27. The physical form of the action of the scene expressed in changing spatial relationships between the characters and their environment.






28. German word for power. The actor's physical and vocal tools.






29. Recalling a significant moment in your past to fit a character. WARNING: Must be appropriate for the character.






30. Stanislavski's physical approach to acting.






31. Everything an actor does in a performance has to be _______ by the character's internal need.






32. The key to almost everything in acting. For an actor - _______ is not a reduction of energy but rather a freeing of energy and a readiness to react. AKA Restful Alertness. The first step in Letting Go. Awareness is at a high level.






33. The ability to function on more than one level of awareness at a time. Ex: A character pursuing his or her objective simultaneously observing and adjusting the performance for the sake of the spectators.






34. Male choir groups began competing against one another reciting poems at religious festivals in Ancient Greece. Gradually the choir leader began to speak as an individual character and acting was born. As a second actor was added - dialogue emerged -






35. Actresses began to appear on stage.






36. The reduction of self-consciousness from the total engrossment in a role.






37. Stanislavski's classic question. If I were in the situation of the character - and if I wanted what the character wants - what would I do?






38. The event itself. It is not 'about' something.






39. He developed a presentational and overtly theatrical style of acting.






40. Recalling a significant moment in your past to fit a character. WARNING: Must be appropriate for the character.






41. The event itself. It is not 'about' something.






42. An actor's ability to put himself in the place of another person - both for purposes of observation and for applying the Magic If to a role. It is possible to empathize with someone without sympathizing with that person.






43. A person fully committed to an important objective.






44. Three finger widths below your navel. The origin of breath and therefore your voice - as well as all large motions of the body. The undistorted source from which our work begins in order to develop the unique ways of using our bodies and voice requir






45. Three finger widths below your navel. The origin of breath and therefore your voice - as well as all large motions of the body. The undistorted source from which our work begins in order to develop the unique ways of using our bodies and voice requir






46. This occurs when: Everything the actor does as the character should grow directly out of the needs of the character - so that the 'inner' world of the character and the 'outer' world of the performance are unified.






47. Something a character lacks or wants that drives him to pursue an action to satisfy that lack or desire.






48. Bertolt Brecht's idea that the actor does not become the character completely - but rather demonstrates the character's behavior for the audience while still expressing some attitude about it.






49. The quality of an action or performance that makes it seem to be happening right now - before our eyes - as if for the first time.






50. The goal of a character pursues through action to satisfy a need. It is best identified using a transitive verb such as - 'to persuade him to give me a territory in town.'