Max Schreck

Max Schreck
File:Max schreck.jpg
Born	Maximilian Schreck
Height	6' 2½" (1.89 m)
Spouse	Fanny Normann (1910 - 1936)

Maximilian "Max" Schreck (September 6, 1879 – February 19, 1936) was a German actor. He is most often remembered today for his lead role in the film Nosferatu.

Biography

There is some confusion as to Schreck's actual date of birth and date of death. Some sources state his date of birth as September 6, 1879, while others claim it to be June 11 of that same year.

Schreck received his training at the Staatstheater in Berlin. He made his stage debut in Messeritz and Speyer, and then toured Germany for two years appearing at theatres in Zittau, Erfurt, Bremen, Lucerne, Gera, and Frankfurt am Main. Schreck then joined Max Reinhardt's celebrated company of performers back in Berlin. Many of Reinhardt's troupe made a huge contribution to the cinema.

Max Schreck in Nosferatu (1922).

The 6 foot 1 inch Schreck served in World War I from 1915 to 1918. For three years between 1919 and 1922, Schreck appeared at the Munich Kammerspiele, including a role in the expressionist production of Bertolt Brecht's debut, Drums in the Night (in which he played the "freakshow landlord" Glubb). During this time he also worked on his first film Der Richter von Zalamea, adapted from a six-act play, for Decla Bioscop. In 1922, he was hired by Prana Film for their first and only production, Nosferatu. The company declared themselves bankrupt after the film's release to avoid paying copyright infringement costs to an irate Florence Stoker, the widow of Dracula author Bram Stoker. Schreck's Count Orlok, with his bald, rat-shaped head and long spidery fingers, remains a haunting character.

In 1923, while still in Munich, Schreck appeared in a 16-minute (one-reeler) slapstick, "surreal comedy" written by Bertolt Brecht with cabaret and stage actors Karl Valentin, Liesl Karlstadt, Erwin Faber, and Blandine Ebinger, entitled Mysterien eines Friseursalons (Mysteries of a Barbershop), directed by Erich Engel. The same year, Schreck appeared as a blind man in the acclaimed film Die Straße.

Schreck's second collaboration with Nosferatu director F.W. Murnau was decidedly less successful with the ill-conceived 1924 comedy Die Finanzen des Grossherzogs. Even Murnau did not hesitate to declare his contempt for the picture.

In 1926, Schreck returned to the Kammerspiele in Munich and continued to act in films right through the advent of sound until his death in 1936 of heart failure. He was married to actress Fanny Normann, who appeared in a few films, often credited as Fanny Schreck. Schreck had at least one brother named Augustin Schreck, who also fathered Max Schreck's niece, actress Gisela Uhlen (born Gisela Friedhilde Schreck).

Max Schreck in Die Straße (1923).

Curiously, the word schreck is also the German word for fright, or terror. It comes from the Middle High German word schrecken: to frighten, or terrify. Because of this, many authors who were unaware of Schreck's on-stage credits (and ignorant of the rather sparse details of his personal life) speculated that there was really no such person, and that Schreck was, in fact, some well-known actor who had chosen to adopt a pseudonym for his role in Nosferatu. One of the prime "suspects" was Alfred Abel; however, a careful examination of the photographs of these two actors is sufficient to dispel such notions. Schreck died 19 February 1936 of a heart attack.

Cultural References

• Schreck is portrayed by actor Willem Dafoe in E. Elias Merhige's Shadow of the Vampire. In a sort of secret history, Shadow posits that Schreck gave such a terrifying performance as Orlok because Schreck actually was a vampire.
• In the 1992 film Batman Returns, the character Max Shreck was named as an in-joke by director Tim Burton. The part was played by Christopher Walken.
• A vampire character in the film Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter is named Maxine Schreck, as an homage to the actor.

Literature

• Stefan Eickhoff: Max Schreck - Gespenstertheater (2007), ISBN 3-936298-54-8

Works cited

• Willett, John and Ralph Manheim. 1970. Introduction. In Collected Plays: One by Bertolt Brecht. Ed. John Willett and Ralph Manheim. Bertolt Brecht: Plays, Poetry and Prose Ser. London: Methuen. ISBN 041603280X. p.vii-xvii.

External links

• Max Schreck at IMDb
• Max Schreck Tribute
• Filmography at Filmhistoriker.de