Rawlins to lecture on method acting and mental health as part of Cameron University’s Festival series

University of Tulsa professor and author Justin Rawlins will present a lecture on method acting as it relates to mental health Thursday at Cameron University.

The Method and the Madness: Mental Health in America’s Most Significant Acting Style, will begin at 7 p.m. in the McCasland Ballroom of the McMahon Centennial Complex on Cameron, 2800 W. Gore. The lecture is free and open to the public.

Rawlins will discuss the popular reputation of method acting, which has, almost since its emergence in the early 1950s, hinged on a misunderstanding of what “the Method” entails and what its relationship to mental health is, according to a press release.

A technique of acting which encourages sincere and expressive performances through identifying with, understanding and experiencing a character’s inner motivation and emotions, method acting is based on the system developed by Russian actor and director Konstantin Stanislavsky. Three teachers are associated with formulating The Method, each emphasizing different aspects of the approach: Lee Strasberg (psychological aspects), Stella Adler (sociological aspects), and Sanford Meisner (behavioral aspects). The approach was first developed when they worked together at the Group Theatre in New York and later at the Actors Studio.

“The result has been a long-encrusted misperception of method actors such as Marlon Brando, Montgomery Clift, James Dean, Dustin Hoffman, Meryl Streep and others as overly neurotic, chemically unbalanced and mentally ill to an extent that underwrites praise for some performers, the shaming of others, and excuses for certain performer conduct that are much more about bad behavior than mental health,” Rawlins said.

Rawlins, an associate professor of media studies and film studies in the Henry Kendall College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Tulsa, is the author of a series of articles and book chapters about film. His book “Imagining the Method: Reception, Identity, and American Screen Performance,” will be published by the University of Texas Press later this year.

His lecture is funded by the Holmes, Morris and Newell Endowed Lectureship for Classic Film.