{"id":5565,"date":"2025-05-15T21:04:20","date_gmt":"2025-05-15T19:04:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.unil.ch\/musemagazine\/?p=5565"},"modified":"2025-05-15T21:04:20","modified_gmt":"2025-05-15T19:04:20","slug":"the-paper-call","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.unil.ch\/musemagazine\/2025\/05\/the-paper-call\/","title":{"rendered":"The Paper Call"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Image: <\/strong>\u00a9 Kathleen Mez\u00f6<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Author: <\/strong>Andreia Abreu Remigio<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For many years, Diana Marko had collected magazines, clippings of casting calls, and interviews with actors she admired. She liked watching the pile grow, the towering stack and its lignin scent a quiet measure of how long she\u2019d been chasing this dream.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The personal archive\u2014which made up half of her belongings\u2014moved with her from a small town in Switzerland to Paris a few years ago, when she left all the people she knew to do the only thing she knew how to do: pretend. Granted, Diana was only 26 years old, but she had been a theater girl ever since she could walk and talk; smiling to the camera, dressing up and setting up props to tell a story (but whose?). Acting was a new way of seeing old things: you could narrow down the human condition into a self-contained story on a self-contained stage and focus on one emotion at a time. Hiding behind the character, feeling protected by the big red expensive curtain\u2014that was and had always been her calling up until that point.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finding a studio hadn\u2019t been easy, being broke and not having a French guarantor didn\u2019t help either. But now she was settled in in her cozy 9m2<\/sup> apartment in the 15th<\/sup> arrondissement. She liked to tell everyone she met that she had a view of the Eiffel Tower, when in reality she could only see the very tip of it from her bathroom if she sat at a weird angle on the toilet. She didn\u2019t tell anyone about her hoarding tendencies though. If she had known then how one particular item among this paper trail would change her life, she might have thrown it into the Seine, letting the evidence mix with the garbage leftover from the Olympic games.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Like every single morning, it was the first thing she saw when she opened her eyes. But that morning was important. It finally felt like her big break. This time the stakes were high\u2014her reputation, more than her wallet, was on the line. Not getting this role wasn\u2019t an option. Diana had just spent weeks brushing up on her Hungarian and German for this audition and she knew, with absolute certainty, that she was perfect for this role. It wasn\u2019t just a matter of skill\u2014it was in her blood. Her mother\u2019s family had once been part of Hungary\u2019s elite, though their wealth had never trickled down to her because of her mother\u2019s choices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The two-minute walk to the caf\u00e9 was fraught with difficulties. Deliveries blocked the sidewalk, road work, a flock of pigeons eating an old croissant on the ground and the feathers flying everywhere; again, if she had known that these obstacles were trying to protect her, she would have backtracked. She was wearing slightly torn black tights, second-hand black heels that she\u2019d owned since she was fourteen, and a brown dress hidden under a faux fur maroon coat. Casting directors would probably ask people to change into appropriate costumes anyway, as the audition was for a historical Netflix series. But Diana knew she had to make a good impression, even if only for a matter of seconds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She knew this caf\u00e9 all too well. The one where all the waiters knew her name and smuggled free cappuccinos to her while she\u2019d learn her lines. The one where she and her boyfriend had broken things off in a public ceremony of hugs and tears. She daydreamed that in the future the owners would hang a picture of her with her first C\u00e9sar Award, on the wall right where she usually sat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019ve put on some weight,\u201d she said to Ivan across the booth, who always helped her learn her lines. Ivan Degri was one of Diana\u2019s best friends from school. Inspired by her courageous drive, he had followed her to the capital to pursue his studies in History of Art. Life was going quite well for him too, as he had just been accepted for an internship at the Louvre.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou look fine.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019m being serious Ivan. You know I can\u2019t start being cast as the fat girl. Especially not right now.\u201d Her career was going too well to be stuck in a trope this early.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The waiter suddenly appeared out of nowhere with the two pieces of chocolate cake that Diana had ordered, which he awkwardly tried to set on the table without messing with the innumerous pages of script laying there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI haven\u2019t had breakfast.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ivan just nodded.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Diana frowned. Ivan said nothing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After rehearsing for about 45 minutes, Diana said bye to Ivan. She liked arriving early to unfamiliar places: she enjoyed exploring, smelling, thinking\u2026 and mapping out the exits. In the metro, Diana held a tight grasp on the rolled-up script, her moist hands probably soaking up the ink. She had meant to read them over one last time, but the urge to people-watch while on public transportation was too much. That was her favorite way of preparing for an audition\u2014observing real dynamics, analyzing facial expressions. Getting her mind off the character for a moment and taking a step back into the real world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ten stations across two metro lines, three dead rats and one harassing drunkard later, she\u2019d made it to the theater. Before pushing the old door open, she bit her bottom lip hard. The sharp iron taste meant business.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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