Paradigms of Education in the Art of Acting

Authors

  • Cătălin CODREANU Faculty of Theater and Film, Babeș-Bolyai University, actor at the “Lucian Blaga” National Theatre, Cluj-Napoca, Romania. catalin.codreanu@ubbcluj.ro

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.24193/subbdrama.2022.2.01

Keywords:

interculturality, art of acting, Zen, Nō theater, martial arts, holism, body-mind, imagination.

Abstract

Embedded in interculturality and transculturality, this paper focuses on the actor’s training, on facing, understanding and assimilating the theater lessons of the Far East, especially those of the Nō theater, based on the constructive encounters with them by practicing the Tadashi Suzuki (b. 1939) method, Japanese martial arts, researching Zen philosophy and the writings of Zeami Motokiyo (1363-1443). This article points out the similarity between certain paradigms of the Western theatricality with those of the Far Eastern one (holism, body-mind, here and now, flow, imaginary) as well as their fusion with other paradigms due to the interdisciplinary transfer existing between martial arts (aikidō and iaidō), Japanese culture, and the art of acting (shin-waza-tai, shoshin, ichigo ichie). The way in which fixed forms relate to imagination (kata), specific to both Far Eastern theater and martial arts (aikidō and iaidō), is also very important. This research highlights the essential nature of the fixed form for the impulses of imagination and creative freedom.

Author Biography

Cătălin CODREANU, Faculty of Theater and Film, Babeș-Bolyai University, actor at the “Lucian Blaga” National Theatre, Cluj-Napoca, Romania. catalin.codreanu@ubbcluj.ro

CĂTĂLIN CODREANU is an actor at the “Lucian Blaga” National Theatre and a professor specialized in acting, martial arts, fencing. His area of research focuses on interculturality, transculturality, Eurasian theater. He is interested in both traditional Japanese theatrical forms, especially Nō theater, but also contemporary ones, like the Tadashi Suzuki method. He is a practitioner of the Japanese martial arts aikidō and iaidō. These concerns are reflected in his doctoral dissertation Influența teatrului japonez Nō asupra metodelor și tehnicilor de antrenament în arta actorului/The influence of the Japanese Nō theater on the training methods and techniques in the art of acting. The paradigms of his teaching practice were first and foremost Zeami’s poetics and poetry, the Tadashi Suzuki method, and the interdisciplinary transfer between Japanese martial arts (aikidō and iaidō) and the art of acting.

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STUDIA UBB DRAMATICA, Volume 67 (LXVII), No. 2, October 2022

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Published

2022-11-30

How to Cite

CODREANU, C. (2022). Paradigms of Education in the Art of Acting. Studia Universitatis Babeș-Bolyai Dramatica, 67(2), 9–28. https://doi.org/10.24193/subbdrama.2022.2.01

Issue

Volume 67, No. 2, October 2022

Section

Articles

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