ESPRIT DE CORPS

Esprit de corps is a military term which refers to the ‘spirit of the company’ and is predicated on the assumption that in order for a congregation of soldiers to operate efficiently and effectively, it is necessary for them to be inspired with a pride in their collective identity and proceed with a common purpose.

It is generally assumed that it is part of the director’s role to provide this stimulus and maintain it throughout the rehearsal period. Different directors use different means to accomplish this task. With some, it takes the form of constantly building up actors’ confidence, whether justified or not, on the dubious assumption that ‘confident’ actors will perform better than insecure ones. But viewed objectively, false confidence is a form of deception, or child psychology on (usually) discerning adults, and should be resisted. Any actor worth his salt knows when he is being pumped up with false confidence – just as he or she knows when their work is in trouble and in need of genuine help. The arguments against ‘false confidence’ are manifold. Not only is it an insult to an actor’s intelligence but it is very likely to backfire when a production, buoyed up with unjustified praise, turns out to be a hopeless turkey. This utterly destroys a director’s credibility and gives him the reputation of being either dishonest or stupid or both.

But a sense of communal identity collectively shared (i.e. esprit de corps) is an invaluable tool in drawing the best out of actors. Rehearsals always have a common purpose: the realization of a playwright’s work by that particular confederation of artists. But it is more likely to be achieved through the palpable interaction of the actors involved than it is being ‘handed down’ from above by a wobbly or insecure director. When a director resorts to false confidence, it is an admission that true confidence is not possible, and since only true confidence can be truly beneficial, the aim of the exercise is defeated.

When a company of actors jointly perceive the meaning of their play and develop the artistic means of realizing it, a ‘communal purpose’ organically arises. And how does this salutary state of affairs come about? It happens when actors discover individual truths which are jointly pursued out of a common quest to achieve shared objectives. Or to put it more simply: when actors feel that the directions into which they are being led coincide with their own understanding of the material at hand; when the director’s conception and the actor’s conception of that conception are one and indivisible. When everything is ‘making sense’ because there are no contradictions between what the actor is being asked to do and what he or she instinctively wants to be doing. When everything ‘feels right’ and directorial suggestions are intuited by the actor before they are even given and a director can honestly say: ‘I was just about to tell you to do that the moment before you did it.’
In short, esprit de corps cannot be imposed from without. If it happens, it happens because there is an artistic continuity and an esthetic harmony between all the members of the company.

Let’s look at it from the other angle.

When an actor feels he is being asked to do something that his nature instinctively rejects, which goes against his understanding of both the role and the play, friction is inevitable. It may be overt or covert but it will be there, and if it is, harmony and ‘confidence’ become impossible to achieve. That’s when one runs up against those ‘artistic differences of opinion” which so often precede cast-replacements, postponements or cancellations; when some unquenchable virus has worked its way into the artistic process and corrupted everything with which it has come into contact. The opposite of ‘esprit de corps’, what one might call the ‘contamination de corps’.

True esprit de corps springs from artistic terrain being cultivated by artists who are in tune with one another. It cannot be grown in a hothouse and then transplanted into alien soil. But one also has to be wary of too great a sense of bonhomie.
It is pleasant to have warm social relations between all the members of a company, but it is not a requisite to good work. Often social harmony works against the objectivity that all rehearsals demand. After you become bosom buddies with your leading actors and regularly go out for a pint with them after every rehearsal, it will become harder and harder to criticize them openly, expunge a misconception of a scene or a confusion about their character’s objectives. Meyerhold, a dictatorial director who was often insensitive to his actors and treated them merely as pawns in his ‘master plan’, produced astounding results in the ‘20s and ‘30s in the Soviet Union. Stanislavsky often had very strained relations with the actors in the Moscow Arts Theatre. John Dexter was a monster to work with; Elia Kazan deliberately sowed dissension between his actors when he felt it would produce the effects he was after. In all of these cases, esprit de corps was not a high priority.

One director I know put it this way: “I am there to collaborate with an actor’s talent, not to become their confessor, their lover, their drinking-companion or even their friend. When workmen are building a house together, they want to make sure the carpenters, the bricklayers, the plumbers, the electricians really know their jobs so they can do theirs. I want equality of craftsmanship, not emotional ties.”

The theatre is a place where temperament and conflict preside; where egos collide with egos; where tempers flare and strong feelings constantly well up and often erupt. But it is also a place where conflicts resolve and mutual affection flourishes. It is the Palace of Ambivalence. It always has been. It always will be. If one cannot come to terms with emotional contradictions of that sort, it is probably no place for you.