Heute spielen wir den Boß (1981)

Konrad Reichenstein and Fritz Paulig have one thing in common: their great love for film. You dream of stepping into the spotlight. Because they are extras, small actors who somehow muddle through from film to film and yet never get the chance to become a star themselves. Reichenstein, the madman and yet somehow also sympathetic, crawls deep into dreamed-of film roles and builds his illusory world in which he becomes a role, a portrayed figure, so that soon he can no longer distinguish his actual identity from the hoped-for speaking role. For him, all of life is a film, and of course he has nothing else in mind than the main role in it. Paulig, on the other hand, a sedate, clumsy guy with good manners but bizarre qualities, only resembles the antipode Reichenstein in his fascination with the celluloid industry. Despite constant setbacks, the two diminutive mimes have not given up their dream of being in the center of the filmic events. Over the years, each of them developed their own quirks and ticks. Reichenstein walks around in different disguises, sometimes as a historical personality, sometimes as a fantasy figure. In these moments he becomes one with the character portrayed. Paulig is cultivating a cult with newspapers, on the margins of which he insists on taking notes everywhere and which he then carefully keeps in his small room, which he always keeps locked. Paulig is a mess, his middle name is disorder. Here Reichenstein is completely the opposite: a pedant and fanatic of neatness.