An opera singer, who is a substitute for the primo uomo, has to spend the time of a performance routinely behind the scenes. He has yet no knowing that it will be his turn on that particular day to appear on the stage and replace an Italian singer who had fallen ill.  To kill the time, the substitute singer takes too huge a sniff of drugs and gets lost in visionary hallucinations. Down in the subconscious, he meets his old acquaintances from the theatre, who appear to have turned criminals, and attempts to square with them on moral accounts. He finally faces himself and becomes aware of his own complexes, fears and desires unfulfilled. When the moment approaches for the substitute singer to appear on the stage, he is virtually incapable to tell vision from reality.

Photo by Mirjam Wirtz