Kean (1921)
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Directors
Cast
Heinrich George, Carola Toelle, Olga Limburg, Alphons Fryland, Fritz Junkermann, Felix Norfolk, Wilhelm Diegelmann, Margarete Schlegel, Rudolf Biebrach, Ernst Behmer, Guido Herzfeld
A celebrated actor’s casual flirtation with a young admirer grows complicated by his secret affair and her turn toward the theatre.
The story
In early-19th-century England, celebrated theatre actor Edmund Kean is applauded by audiences and admired by the young Anna Danby. Kean is secretly having an affair with the married Countess Helena Coefeld, whose jealousy is stirred by his willingness to accept Anna’s admiration. Anna, meanwhile, is expected to marry a suitable match at the insistence of her powerful uncle, Lord Melville, but resists her family’s wishes and turns toward the theatre. Kean, who has so far regarded her as little more than a flirtation, helps her make the stage her world. His private entanglement and Anna’s ambitions set their story in motion.
Full plot (contains spoilers)
England, at the beginning of the 19th century. The theatre actor Edmund Kean, adored by his fans and the critics, has once again given a dazzling performance. The audience cheers him, and the young Anna Danby hangs on his every word. But great stagecraft is only one of two passions for the egocentric actor, who loves to “bathe” in his admirers’ adulation. What hardly anyone knows is that Kean is having an affair with a married woman, Countess Helena Coefeld, who is rather possessive and jealous. She dislikes the fact that Kean is quite happy to be admired by Miss Danby, who, at the behest of her powerful uncle, Lord Melville, is soon to be married to a suitable match. For Kean, who is also beset by serious financial worries, the “young thing” has so far been little more than a flirtation. While Anna now rebels against her family’s wishes that she finally marry, turning to the theatre instead of her prospective groom, Kean helps her conquer the stage as her world. In the process, he exposes Anna’s future husband for forging letters and attempting to abduct her. Before long, Kean has made trouble for himself on several fronts: his Countess Helena starts causing trouble over Anna Danby, while at the same time allowing the powerful heir to the throne, the Prince of Wales, to court her. This brings the prince and Kean into serious romantic rivalry. When Kean sees the Prince of Wales courting his lover at a benefit performance, he is extremely tense and loses control, verbally attacking the heir to the throne in a fit of jealousy. The scandal, along with the accusation that he stole a valuable fan, nearly lands the star actor in prison. Kean chooses exile abroad instead. But Anna, who owes him so much for the help he has given her and offers him both her love and her love of the (theatrical) arts, becomes Kean’s salvation, and from then on he binds his life to hers.
Genres
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