Notes on a part. Stanislavski’s influences as detected on Dimitris Kataleifos’s theatrical notebooks on David Mamet’s plays

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article presents the acting method that the important Greek actor Dimitris Kataleifos uses when approaching a role by presenting and analysing his work process as it is presented in the theatrical notebooks that he keeps. These notebooks concentrate the way that he analyses, synthesizes and approaches each character. They comprise notes on the role’s history, his background, his habits and so on. They follow Stanislavski’s key concepts, such as, “who”, “why”, “what”, “for what reason”, and notions, such as, “fantasy” and “imagination”. The notebooks will be reviewed in relation to the five David Mamet plays in which Kataleifos has appeared, namely, American Buffalo (1992), The Cryptogram (1996), A Life in the Theatre (1999), Glengarry Glen Ross (2001) and Oleanna (2013).