Misfitting in America: Paul Leni, Conrad Veidt, and The Man Who Laughs

“Misfitting in America” offers an analysis of The Man Who Laughs that suggests the film’s importance in four key areas: (1) as a transitional piece between silent cinema and the talkies, (2) as the last instalment of the Universal super productions, (3) as a thematic precursor to Universal’s famous horror cycle, and (4) as one of the most complete Hollywood attempts to adopt and co-opt German filmmaking practices and personnel. Moreover, this chapter focuses on the star of The Man Who Laughs, Conrad Veidt, as representative of an exilic body. Analysing Veidt’s physicality, performance, makeup, and costuming as Gwynplaine, this contribution looks at the corporeal inscription of the character’s permanent disfiguration, which underpins Gwynplaine’s understanding of himself and his peripheral position in society. With its intrinsic linking of disfigurement and dislocation in an endless cycle where one leads seamlessly into the other, the film becomes a way to understand how Hollywood studios situated their European émigré stars in the years following World War I.