The article deals with the work of a Viennese modernist Arthur Schnitzler in the context of the phenomenon of theatricalization in city-space. The author attempts to define the civilizational and cultural reasons for theatrical behaviours and the results of living modern life a la spectacle. She believes that Arthur Schnitzler, incorporating into literature one of the most important scientific discoveries of his time – psychoanalysis, showed the relationship between the city and mental diseases but also between the latter and the phenomenon of theatricalization.