The Theater of Attractions*

SERGEI TRETIAKOV
OCTOBER 118, Fall 2006, pp. 1926. 2006 October Magazine, Ltd. and Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Although the attraction achieved its fame as a component of Sergei Eisensteins cine-
matic montage practice, it should not be forgotten that its origins lie in the collaborative
theater work of Eisenstein and Tretiakov from 1923.
1
Inuenced by the reexology of Ivan
Pavlov and the biomechanical labor science of Aleksei Gastev, the two proposed the theory of
the attraction in an attempt to establish rational norms for evaluating the affective content
of the theatrical event. As Eisenstein would later state, the attraction was a unit for measur-
ing the force of art. The basic idea of an aesthetic action that stimulates the organism of the
spectator was not in and of itself a noteworthy innovation at the time; in fact, the Russian
art journals of the day were ooded with articles focused on advancing the eld of research
that Mayakovsky designated as physiological criticism, a discipline whose object of study
was the art works use-value as an instrument to organize the neural responses of the specta-
tor.
2
Rather, Tretiakovs particular contribution in The Theater of Attractions was to
mobilize these experiments with the psychophysiology of spectatorial processes for the project of
dismantling aesthetic illusion tout court.
If conventional theater addressed the audience as an abstract and universalized sub-
ject, the theater of attractions stipulated that the productions must be tailored according to
the variable ideological and physical composition of different audiences. And if narrative
theater contained the intrigue within the stages visual proscenium, the actor in the theater
* Teatr attraktsionov, Oktiabr mysli, no. 1 (1924), pp. 5357. Translator Kristin Romberg is grate-
ful to Dmitri Gutov and Aleksei Penzin for clarifying aspects of the Russian text, and to Devin Fore for
editorial advice.
1. In 1923 and 1924 Tretiakov worked closely with Eisenstein in the First Workers Theater of the
Moscow Proletkult, where together they produced the rst plays designated as montages of attractions:
an adaptation of Ostrovskiis Even a Wise Man Stumbles and two plays by Tretiakov, Are You Listening,
Moscow? and Gasmasks. Their close collaboration would, moreover, continue after Eisenstein left the the-
ater to work as a lmmaker. Eisenstein discusses the attraction in The Montage of Attractions (1923)
and the Montage of Film Attractions (1924), both of which are translated in Writings 19221934, vol. 1
of S. M. Eisenstein: Selected Works, ed. and trans. Richard Taylor (London: BFI, 1988).
2. Between 1923 and 1925, numerous articles that appeared in Lef, Zhizn iskusstva, and Sovetskoe
iskusstvo proposed a variety of techniques for quantifying and standardizing the reactions of the specta-
tor in the theater and cinema.

20 OCTOBER
of attractions faced the spectator as a physical presence in the auditorium. The theater of
attractions focused attention not on the spectacle but on the audience as a concrete and tangi-
ble entity to be affected. For this reason Tretiakov proposed that the theater of attractions could
be likened to a surgical theater whose object was the spectator, although he insisted that this
patient must be one who is starkly sober: he must be operated upon without anesthesia, with-
out the haze of aesthetic semblance or the prophylaxis of representation.
3
The spectator must be
made aware of the fact that his own body was the object of this theatrical procedure. By con-
cret izing the audience and incorporat ing this embodied subject as an element of the
performance, the theater of attractions breached the epistemological barrier that created the
spectacles illusion. It thereby disabled a contemplative mode of aesthetic consumption.
The evolution of this theatrical experiment culminated with Tretiakovs 1926 I Want
a Baby.
4
Continuing to eschew densely plotted narrative forms, Tretiakov designed this nal
montage of attractions to be constantly interrupted by discussions and seminars on various
topics germane to the plays subject matter, eugenics, and even concluded by inviting the
audience to come on stage and view an actual exhibition of genetically exemplary children.
In the process, it perforated the score of the play, the source of its integrity as an autonomous
art object. In the last montage of attractions, then, the spectator steps into an open-ended
work. So while theater critics speculated about various methods for acquiring audience feed-
backquestionnaires, hidden cameras, etc.
5
Tretiakov built this feedback mechanism into
the text of the play itself. Perhaps we could thus characterize I Want a Baby as a precursor to
the happening; or perhaps a closer relative, both genealogically and sociopolitically, would be
Bertolt Brechts Great Pedagogy. In either case, the director of I Want a Baby, Vsevolod
Meyerhold, had clearly drawn the logical conclusion when he insisted that the publicity for
the play should not announce rst, second, and third show [spektakl], but rst, second,
and third discussion.
6
*
The recent history of Russian theater has shown close parallels with other
forms of art, particularly literature and painting. Once subjective impressionism and
symbolist stylization had done away with any sense of reality in art, once art had
withdrawn beyond the boundaries of reality into a realm of illusion where there
abides not sickness, nor sadness, and especially no class war, there came a period
3. Sergei Tretiakov, Rabochii teatr, Oktiabr mysli, nos. 56 (1924), p. 56.
4. While the montage of attractions would live on in Eisensteins lm work, it nevertheless contin-
ued in its cinematic afterlife to be a device that was intrinsically theatrical. Thus Annette Michelson has
suggested that even Eisensteins lm work belonged to a general critique of representation effected
through theater. See Michelsons Introduction, in Kino-Eye: The Writings of Dziga Vertov, ed. Annette
Michelson (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984), p. l.
5. See, for example, M. Zagorskii, Kak reagiruet zritel?, Lef, no. 6 (1924), pp. 14153; and A. P.
Borodin, O razlichnykh priemakh izucheniia teatralnogo zritelia, Sovetskoe iskusstvo, no. 9 (1925),
pp. 3037.
6. Vsevolod Meyerhold quoted in a stenographic record from a meeting on the production of I
Want a Baby, reprinted in Sovremennaia dramaturgiia, no. 2 (1982), p. 242.
when art turned to explore a space that had been forfeited to a set of utilitarian
industries. It is utterly characteristic of this return that it did not begin by subordi-
nating the object to a clearly dened, socially useful job; it did not follow a specic
material forms clear-cut social function (thus, aestheticism, psychologism, and the
discrepancy between the aesthetic tradition and economics remained rmly in
place).
7
This return took the opposite approach: it began by becoming conscious of
the material and formal elements of the art at hand. In the way that they studied
their arts materials, the principles of its support structure and combination [skrepy
i kombinirovaniia], Cubism and nonobjectivity (with their problem of faktura), and
transrationalism and the theory of the self-made word in literature, correspond to
the theory of biomechanics in theater. The theory of biomechanics offers an
organically based and calculated type of movement to replace the decaying wood of
the MKhATs autohypnosis, the aesthetic plastic pretensions of the Kamernyi
Theater, and the Malyi Theaters muscular narcosis.
8
It provides for expressive
movement the same scientic foundation that the Scientic Organization of Labor
and scientically based sport brought to labor movement.
Yet I must emphasize that despite the tremendous importance of biomechan-
ics as a new and purposive method of constructing movement, it far from resolves
the problem of theater as an instrument for class inuence. This is why two essen-
tially incompatible functions for the new theater have appeared at different times
in the press (indeed, at times simultaneously, for example, in my own work while I
was developing my theses on Meyerholds theater). On the one hand, we see an
agit- or advert-theater proposed, and on the other, a theater of illustrative demon-
stration and the presentation of everyday life. Completely overlooked is the fact
that the spectacle that acts upon the emotions and that which addresses the intel-
lect are, according to their own devices, absolute opposites.
Historically, the path from form to social prescription, rather than the reverse,
turned out to be the right one. Those who took the opposite route, ignoring the
material and its properties in an effort to build the things necessary for the current
plan, quickly fell into old aesthetic molds and produced work that was not only use-
less, but also actually harmful (e.g., the Forges prolet-poetry, the painting of
AKhKhR,
9
MGSPSs [Moscow City Council of Trade Unions] theater, and even the
Theater of the Revolution, to the extent that it remained unaffected by Meyerholds
work, or where Meyerhold ran up against the obviously unsuitable material of an
obsolete type of acting that could not be adapted).
The Theater of Attractions 21
7. This may be explained by the fact that the idea of introducing art into industry arose from the very
group of artists who had broken away from easel painting and stood as far removed from the questions of
the reorganization of the socioeconomic base as economists and politicians from questions of art. [-S. T.]
8. Tretiakov refers to the three most prominent theaters in Moscow, each known for different
styles and acting methods: Stanislavskys Moscow Art Theater (MKhAT), well known as the cradle of
method acting; Tairovs Kamernyi Theater, known at that time for an aestheticized use of European
and Asian theatrical traditions like pantomime and commedia; and the Malyi Theater, the oldest and
most traditional dramatic theater in Moscow.
9. Presumably Tretiakov is referring to AKhRR, the Association of Artists of Revolutionary Russia.
Of course one must also consider those groups who did work with the mater-
ial, but who stopped halfway. Unable to apply their knowledge of the materials
properties to the days urgent problems, they squandered their energies on aes-
thetic knick-knacks, displays of pure self-indulgence, and a shamanism in the
service of rened pastimes. Literary transrationalism is one example. With no
desire to become a factory or laboratory of exact methods, it moved entirely into
handcrafting verbal decoration, the justication of which required the most elabo-
rately concocted rationalizations based entirely on psychology.
10
In the visual arts,
the nonobjectivists took a similar path, contenting themselves with decorating
porcelain teacups with squares and other geometrical forms or with converting
those teacups into constructions so at that they ceased to be t for practical use.
In theater, this trend produced an aestheticization of the machine (Foreggers
dances) and the self-indulgent theatrical eccentrism that, tainted by the aesthetic
idolization of every Americanism, created a sort of American skyscraper exotica
(an example is the dying Petersburg FEKS).
Work on stage materialthat is, its transformation into a machine that helps
make the actors job as broad and multifaceted as possiblebecomes socially justi-
fiable only at the point when the machine is not only firing its pistons and
sustaining a denite workload, but also carrying out useful work in response to
actual problems of the revolutionary day. Without this useful and emphatically util-
itarian function, all the achievements of the new theater very easily begin to serve
the opposition. The reactionary theatrical front regarded constructivism and
eccentrism as a source of little tricks [priemchikami ] to spice up the performances
of theaters of the right front, a dash of red pepper to satisfy petty-bourgeois
tastes. Needless to say, the majority of theaters, so obviously hostile to the new the-
aters basic revolutionary tendency, did not have Cuckolds interests in mind when
they replaced their pavilions and backdrops with ladders and planks.
11
Now, when
a production uses these sorts of constructions, it is actually considered a sign of
good taste. In Meyerholds theater, by contrast, Cuckold represented only one
phase in the mastery of material, a phase without which the production of The
Earth in Turmoil would have been inconceivable.
12
OCTOBER
10. Even if the transrationalists dont mention it themselves, one cant help but think of the task of
creating name-days (for saints). The names that emerge todayfor example, Oktiabrinaare made
from the same sufxes that in principle also construct names like Evelina, Georgina, Frina, and Irina,
and carry the unbearable scent of confectionary philistinism, which kills the whole explosive expres-
siveness of the names origin. Tendencies to found name-monuments must be opposed, as must be
name-projects, name-tendencies, and names connected to industry. Rapit (a type of especially hard
steel) is an example of one of these names. [-S. T.]
11. Meyerholds production of The Magnanimous Cuckold in April 1922 employed Liubov Popovas
Constructivist stage design, which was composed of wooden scaffolding and ladders.
12. The Earth in Turmoil was also written by Tretiakov. Meyerholds 1923 production used a number
of contemporary real-life objects, including a car, motorcycles, eld telephones, machine guns, a
mobile army kitchen, and a combine harvester.
22
Even in The Earth in Turmoil, the construction is already nothing but a purely
auxiliary structure enabling future performances to be staged in any preexisting
setting, e.g., the square, the factory, the arsenal, the courtyard (similar to those of
the Meyerhold theaters summer tours).
Thus the logical course in the search for the new theater begins by mastering
the material properties of theatrical activity on a scientic basis and then proceeds to
address the precise social tasks that convert theater into a tool for class action. The
theatrical demonstration is replaced by the theatrical commission [prikazom], by a
process of direct work with the audience [priamoi obrabotkoi auditorii ]. Indeed, here
we have located our next task: to integrate the audience as an element in the perfor-
mance and to develop methods for calculating the particular effects and emotional
charge that theater seeks to provoke in its audience.
The Theater of Attractions is exploring this territory. The director of the
Proletkult Theater, Sergei Eisenstein, considers an attraction to be any calculated pres-
sure on the spectators attention and emotions, any combination of staged elements that
is able to focus the emotion of the spectator in the direction that the performance
requires. From this point of view, the performance is not at all a demonstration of
The Theater of Attractions 23
Eisenstein and Tretiakovs production of
Even a Wise Man Stumbles. 1923.
OCTOBER
events, characters, or plastic combi-
nations, more or less true to life. It is
a site for the construct ion of a
sequence of theatrical situations that
work on an audience according to a
given task. The attraction seizes the
audiences attention, compresses its
emotion, and discharges it. In the
end, the performance has delivered
the requisite charging of the specta-
tor. Of course, Comrade Eisensteins
work in the First Workers Theater
thus far represents only the rst step
toward the conscious calculation of
theatrical perception. Yet this first
step is already significant : first ,
because it demands that the perfor-
mance calculate attractions in ac-
cordance with a definite audience
(otherwise an effect could be falsied
or inaccurate); and second, because it
converts what was formerly an artistic
theatrical demonstration into pro-
ductive work based upon experiment
and calculation.
The attraction is not to be regarded as a new invention in theater. Theater
always employed the attraction, but unconsciously. Think of all the particularly
affecting parts of a performance, those climactic moments that are intended to
provoke applause and ovation, all those dramatic nal exits. These are all attrac-
tions. But their position in the old theater is secondary and subordinated to the
psychological logic of the plot. The Art Theaters chirping cricket is also an attrac-
tion. An attraction always requires an estimation of habitual viewer psychology,
and then, against this baseline, it can work on the nerves to produce a moment of
alarm. In the Theater of Attractions, creating a performance entails rst nding
the form that most sharply provokes the viewers emotions (i.e., the attraction).
These attractions, then, are deployed in a sequence of mounting intensity, which
secures the nal discharge of the viewers emotion in the desired direction (the
montage of attractions).
A montage of attractions may either result from mere contiguity or be moti-
vated by the plot. The rst type of montage shows up in the music hall, the variety
show, and the circus program (although there they are directed toward a self-
indulgent and aesthetic form of emotion); the second type of performance is
composed as a play with a plot. In the production of Even a Wise Man Stumbles, we
24
Rehearsal for Eisensteins production of
Tretiakovs Gasmasks. 1924.
The Theater of Attractions 25
nd the rst type of montage of attractions. Its attractions are above all based on
acrobatic tricks and stunts and on parodies of canonical theatrical constructions
taken from the circus and the musical. The acrobatic demonstrations provoke
audience reexes that are almost entirely objective [absoliutnye] and that are con-
nected to motor structures that are difcult and unfamiliar for the spectator. The
connection between the attractions is provided by the plot, which on the whole
plays a very minimal role, serving only to guarantee continuity of attention. It
should be noted that several very effective attractions (for example, the balancing
act) are linked to the plot in a completely articial way, through arbitrary motiva-
tions (in this case through the words go out on a limb). Yet none of the power of
this performance relies on the motivating text. Far more crucial is the way that
groups of attractions operate as partial agit-tasks. For example, there are attrac-
tions of political satire (e.g., Joffre and Curzon), satire of everyday life (in the
fourth and fth acts), topical buffoonery (in the fth act), and theatrical parody
(e.g., the fascists movements stylized in the mode of the Kamernyi Theater, the re-
creations of MKhATs repertoire parodied by Turusina and Ryzhii, or the series of
exits that provoke cries of Bravo! Just like in the Bolshoi Theater!). The perfor-
mances effect on the audience is expressed in statements such as What a shame
that I cant control my movements like that, If only I could do cartwheels, and
so on.
This resultthese platonic sighs over physical ineptitude that nonetheless
remain sighsdemonstrates exactly the same aesthetic that every Ivan Ivanovich
carries in his soul as he exits a performance of Brand, depressed from all Brands
thrashing about. The advantage in the Theater of Attractions is that people do
not leave the performance regretting the absence of personal inner turmoil or the
decadent renement of Chekhovian heroes, but rather their own existing physical
shortcomings. Nevertheless, a fact is a fact, and as an attempt to develop the mon-
tage of attractions, Wise Man is only of formal, experimental signicance. In this
regard, Wise Man is just as nonobjective as Cuckold.
The production of Moscow, Do You Hear Me? is somewhat different. This play
was created for and adapted to the tasks of the period when the German revolu-
tion was unfolding. Its function was the condensation of a victory- directed
[pobedoustremitelnuiu] revolutionary energy in the masses who would very possibly
end up replenishing Germanys armed front, and who in any case would have had
to provide active material support [aktivnym tylom] for the revolution. The play
was staged on the same principle as Wise Man: no emotional experience on the
stage, no psychological or historical veracity, but rather an efcacy in accumulat-
ing emotions of class sympathy and class hatred. The performance had to
function as a precise tool for accumulating this kind of emotion in the audience.
Quantitatively it contained few attractions: the scene with the whip and spit in the
rst act, the unmasking of the provocateur in the second, the openly staged mur-
der of Kurt in the third, and the portrait of Lenin in the fourth. The directors use
of attractions to build an ever-increasing and alarming nervous tension employed
OCTOBER 26
a variety of techniques: both naturalistic devices (blood, chattering teeth, a rie
shot) and a technique of supercharging emotion through the extensive use of
pauses (for some critics this called to mind MKhATs use of pauses). The entire
structure of the movement relied on the simplest organic movements, decom-
posed into their elementary parts and then recomposed into sometimes highly
complicated gures (e.g., the murder of the provocateur). This movementcon-
structed not on the basis of feeling, but just the opposite, on a study of the way
that it works in realityproduced the desired effect. Viewers typically remarked
that performing a role in this way requires complete habituation. No less interest-
ing was their amazement when the same movement was demonstrated in its
decomposed form, which claried the nature of a performance that is constructed
on the basis of calculations of the emotional intensity, tempo, and movement of
the actor (not to be confused with inspiration or conversion into the character on
stage, or with penetration into the characters psyche). This emotional tension is
absolutely identical to the efciency and readiness that is familiar to anyone who has
ever executed any sort of work in a serious way.
Preliminary calculation can be said to account for 70 percent of the produc-
tions effect. This is not the full 100 percent, because 1) as historical events marched
on, the play lost the context for which it was intended; and 2) the audience had
nowehere near the homogeneous class composition that is necessary for the
Theater of Attractions to calculate and deliver a maximally productive effect.
To summarize in conclusion:
Sergei Eisensteins Theater of Attractions is the latest stage of work on a pro-
ductive theater that is effective in terms of class [klassovo-deistvennogo teatra] and
that treats the performance as a series of pressures on the audiences psyche to be
brought about by theatrical means. The Theater of Attractions requires an audi-
ence with a homogeneous class composition, and it understands this audience as a
material that can be worked using a set of established techniques. First taking into
account the audiences psyche and the concrete tasks of contemporary social real-
ity, the Theater of Attractions organizes the material of the stage by creating
attractions from every means that has an expressive inuence on the spectator. It
uses every means, because the Theater of Attractions is not a theater with a n-
ished style, but a theater of expedient class action and conscious utilitarian aims.