Biografie

An oft-told legend is that Schreck's otherworldly performance as Nosferatu was due to the fact that he was in reality a vampire. Actor Willem Dafoe portrayed him as such, playing the vampire Count Orlok in Shadow of the Vampire (2000).

"Schreck" is German for "terror".

In the film Batmans Rückkehr (1992), Christopher Walken played a villain named Max Shreck.

In "Nosferatu" (1922) directed by Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau he impersonated the terrifying Count Orlak, a vampire who ambuscades his victims. Because of legal disputes with the descendants of Bram Stoker the director Murnau did not use the name Dracula but changed it to Count Orlok.

In the middle of his creative period Max Schreck died at the age of 56 in 1936.