up a Formalistic approach, and demanded they reject it and adopt a Socialist realist line. During 1952, Bredel's and Tschesno-Hell's script was again subject to revisions and had to be rewritten. In July, State Secretary of Press and Agitation Hermann Axen told the Thälmann committee that the main problem to be solved was "The authors' primitive depiction of Thälmann", which failed to present his "grand revolutionary instinct". Later, committee member Hermann Lauter demanded the inclusion of historical events that had no direct connection with Thälmann's life, such as the October Revolution. Approval During late 1952, the writers accepted most of the demands. Their final draft was approved by the managerial committee and the Ministry of Culture only on 13 March 1953. The work on the screenplay of Leader of his Class began in summer 1953. Russel Lemmons claimed that this time, the writers "knew what was expected of them". The script was completed on 8 September, and later accepted with only minor changes. A demonstration of the materials to the first film was held for the State Committee of Cinema on 17 November. The chief of the Soviet commission in East Germany, Vladimir Semyonov, and director Sergei Gerasimov were present as well. Semionov personally made an adjustment to the script; he requested that a scene in which Thälmann appeared to be concerning doubt would be removed, since it was not in accordance with the principles of the proletarian struggle. In general, however, he approved of the presentation; the script also introduced elements fitting the atmosphere of the Cold War, in the form of the films' main villain, the American capitalist Mr. McFuller. The final version was modeled after Mikheil Chiaureli's 1946 film The Vow and his 1950 The Fall of Berlin, with a color scheme dominated by red. In early 1954, two years after the original deadline, Son of his Class was ready for screening. After the release of the first part, the principal photography of the second was carried out in the summer of 1954. As many as 150 servicemen of the Barracked People's Police were daily used throughout the shooting in the roles of extras. Reception Contemporary response Ernst Thälmann - Son of his Class premiered in the Friedrichstadt Palast, on 9 March 1954; over 3,000 people attended, including Wilhelm Pieck and Walter Ulbricht. In a speech he carried after the screening, Pieck called the film a "message