Phillip Hochmair is a young, successful actor with engagements at big theatres in Vienna and Hamburg. His life is marked by learning new texts by heart, rehearsals, and performances, thus gradually losing contact with the reality of everyday life. Only when he meets his uncle Walter, whom he didn't know about before and establishes an ambiguous friendship with, and also faces his neighbour Victor's destiny, he discovers with full force how cruel the daily battle for survival can be.