A TEAR ON THE CHEEK: IN SEARCH OF EDUARDS PĀVULS’SJ151 ACTING CODE

Abstract

Eduards Pāvuls (1929–2006) is one of the most beloved Latvian theatre and cinema actors, a charismatic player of common people. Starting with the 1950s, Pāvuls becomes a messenger of a new age in the art of acting. In his characters he rejects the histrionically encoded style of acting that is characterised by theatrical signs canonised over centuries. Instead, he uses expression codes taken from real life. Pāvuls succeeds in conveying, what can be called Zeitgeist in the art of acting. In the cinema it is represented by the influence of Method Theatre in Hollywood and by acting based in improvisation in the forms of New Wave films at the turning of the 1950s and the 1960s in the world. However, the essential changes do not so much proceed from acting techniques, but from change in public opinion about what a character should be like in a work of art.