18 Macgowan s review of the theatrical machines of the German theatre appears somewhat disenchanted. Reinhardt, for him, turned out to have feet of clay. He felt that stage machinery could be eliminated from the theatre, if the playwright worked with the r gisseur and the artist to make machinery unnecessary. For all this they need imagination in setting, not actuality. Form carries the spirit up and out.
Indications speak to it louder than actualities.
Design, which is of the spirit, drives out mechanism, which is of the brain. 19 Macgowan acknowledged that plays of the expressionist theatre might be written without the aid of a r gisseur or artist, but he doubted that they could be produced without close and detailed collaboration. Certainly acting appropriate to expressionism would never come without a presentational ensemble to banish representational acting. The need clearly was for a theatre, essentially simple in its means, dedicated to the principles of the highest theatrical vision and evolved and energized through the collaboration of great dramatic artists. Kenneth Macgowan was a man who had the courage of his vision.