It is also because he was independently wealthy, and because Russia in the twilight of the Romanovs hungered for a kind of truth that the State refused to provide. Stanislavski likely would never have seen the necessity of the “system” if Russia hadn’t had a far longer and more robust tradition of realist art than other nations, or if censorship hadn’t severely limited which plays could be performed, or if theaters weren’t getting smaller and more brightly lit.
