The Enemy on Trial: Early Soviet Courts on Stage and Screen

Attempting to indoctrinate the public into a new society, the Bolsheviks staged show trials—legal trials that incorporated theatrical elements such as coached defendants, memorized scripts for confession, and grueling interrogatory rehearsals. The genre of legal spectacle, whose origins lay in Soviet theater and cinema of the 1920s, moved from mass public spectacles to the courtroom, as the Bolsheviks sought to effect ever- greater social change.

In this intriguing interdisciplinary study, literature scholar Cassiday shows how Soviet show trials deliberately used avant-garde drama and cinema to educate the citizenry about the new social order. She examines how elements of theater and film were incorporated into Soviet courtrooms, turning public trials into vehicles for propaganda. Drawing on a variety of popular media from the 1920s, she reveals the origins of the show trials.