ABSTRACT
The unified scream was characteristic of the uniform and disciplined treatment of groups under Karl Heinz Martin's direction, which was therefore primitivistic in its effects rather than in its methods. A strong primitivist element of the production and its significant features was ecstatic acting of the central figure, Fritz Kortner. Kortner, who on his own admission had alterations with all the leading theatre directors of Berlin, was soon to become under Jessner the famous Expressionist actor of all. It was his performance as Friedrich that turned him into a star. The ideological division in acting styles between the abstractionist style of the minor characters and the primitivist self-release of the main performer, together with individualism at the root of Expressionism, furthered the star system in a manner embarrassing to the idealistically democratic claims of Expressionism. This chapter discusses the nightmarish distortions in Caligari represent but one of the styles, and by no means the most predominant, in Expressionist scenic design.
