The initial euphoria soon gave way to sobriety. Anyone honest with him—or herself could already ascertain whether he merely believed in the immensity of his talent or whether he really possessed it. It was not difficult to see in oneself and in others who was burning with passion for acting and who only had a flickering talent—because for three years one was preoccupied with nothing but oneself, with one’s feelings, voice, body, and the inner barriers which some could surmount and others not. But it was easy to deceive oneself to begin with since for a while passion can be a good substitute for lack of talent.
What has become of us—thirty dreams and seventeen years later？ A long story, above all. No, thirty stories. Some of us are well-known, almost famous. Andrea and April for instance. One has played in a TV opera for years, and the other is the only woman in the actors’ team in Saturday’s quiz show. Some of us have vanished, like Mafia and Mathias. Mafia, who could dance and play the piano so beautifully, simply didn’t return after the vacation in the first year. Mathias, now running a sound studio in Vienna, finally realized that “my ambitions were perhaps a little excessive.” By saying this, he preserved himself from a life-lie with which too many bad actors console themselves: that they are unlucky to be unrecognized, and that if the right director turned up, their immense talent would be appreciated.