Body as a Machine: Meyerhold Between Politics and Theory

Abstract

There might be many explanations for why Meyerhold’s theatre did not survive Stalinist Russia and why Stanislavsky’s did. Meyerhold’s theatre of biomechanics differed significantly from Stanislavsky’s method. If Stanislavsky’s psychological theatre of the truth presented no ambiguities and surprises, Meyerhold’s theatre of the hidden, of the invisible manipulations, put forth a number of problems. On one hand, Meyerhold’s idea that man is in control of himself was very much in tune with Soviet propaganda; on the other hand, Meyerhold’s actor was fundamentally split, a condition that presented no problems within the space of theatre, but which involuntarily put into question basic premises of Soviet ideology. Although in theatre the theoretical discrepancies and paradoxes did not present a major problem, in Soviet Russia caught in the grip of history and ideology, any discrepancy signaled a danger for a newly evolving fragile system based on nothing but blind power and illusory promises.

Keywords

• Meyerhold
• biomechanics
• Soviet theatre
• machine body
• abstract theatre

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