Group Theatre is the legendary New York City theater troupe of the 1930s, which greatly influenced the course of American acting technique and training. Inspired by the revolutionary theories of Russian director Konstantin Stanislavsky, the Group Theatre sought to create an ensemble of American theater practitioners whose work spoke to the needs of its society. Although its declared mission was never directly political, the Group Theatre had a major impact on socially conscious theater, producing the left-wing plays of American dramatists Clifford Odets, John Howard Lawson, and Irwin Shaw.
Founded in 1931 by directors Lee Strasberg and Harold Clurman and producer Cheryl Crawford, the Group Theatre was one of many new theatrical enterprises that appeared in the United States around that time. Modeling itself on the heralded Moscow Art Theater, the Group spent months each year in preparation for productions, thereby developing a unified system of acting. Led by Strasberg, Group actors practiced exercises in improvisation, physical and vocal conditioning, and sensory work, which schooled them in reexperiencing past memories. Strasberg’s emotion-based training, later called the Method, was built on the belief that actors should internally share the feelings of their characters.
The Group’s first production, The House of Connelly, brought immediate renown to the ensemble. Few American companies had ever been identified or promoted primarily through a specialized acting technique or rehearsal process, and journalists and reviewers were fascinated. Group Theatre productions that followed over the next two years, however, proved less successful with critics and audiences.
In 1933 Strasberg mounted Men in White, a desperately needed commercial breakthrough for the impoverished troupe. This melodramatic play set in a hospital blended the Group’s trademark emotional realism with genuine humor and exciting theatrical display. During the climactic scene, which showed a surgical abortion in silhouette, some spectators fainted.
Clurman, the Group’s intellectual spokesman, replaced Strasberg as artistic head in 1936 and energized the organization’s final years with provocative plays that imitated the pace of motion pictures. Clurman’s direction and the Group’s association with Odets culminated with the huge success of Golden Boy (1937). Ironically, these last triumphs brought about the Group’s dissolution in 1941, as the core membership departed to pursue opportunities in the more lucrative motion-picture industry.
While the Group Theatre was never able to achieve financial stability, its acting practices and theatrical ideals became widely disseminated. Many of the company’s featured performers—notably Stella Adler, Sanford Meisner, Robert Lewis, and Morris Carnovsky—taught their own variations on the Group’s basic acting regimen. Others, especially Elia Kazan, stunned the film industry with their emphasis on truthful behavior and real emotion.
