The Al Pacino thriller 88 Minutes opened today, and though I have not seen the film, the trailer is currently unavoidable. The fleeting face of one of the film’s stars reminded me of one of the many alternate lives I might have led, this particular one the parallel universe that would have been created had I made the decision to focus on becoming an actor instead of a writer.

Back in high school, I enjoyed both acting and writing, and attacked each with equal enthusiasm, though writing was always the first among equals. I was submitting (and getting rejected by) all of the science-fiction magazines then extant, while at the same time acting in school plays. As a result of the latter activity, I was picked to take part in a summer program offered by the New York City public school system—TAPAW, or the Teen Age Performing Arts Workshop. Kids were chosen from all of the city schools one summer to join together to put on the play Fiorello. I was cast as one of the political cronies who sing the songs “Politics and Poker” and “A Little Tin Box.” One of the others cast as a crony was a kid named Bill Forsythe, who I’d never met before, since he’d been attending a different school.

(You can see us both a little more clearly if you click through on the image above right. I’m the tallest person in the back row. William Forsythe is in the back row with his head turned to the right and his hair partially obscuring his face.)

The show was a success, and once the summer was over, Bill transferred to my high school, South Shore High School, for his senior year. After graduation, Bill took off and I didn’t hear of him again until almost a decade later, only as William Forsythe. If you recognize that name, you can already guess how and why.

Watching Hill Street Blues one night in 1983, I saw a killer with a very familiar face. It was Bill, who I hadn’t seen since graduation. He had taken off for the opposite coast almost immediately after getting out of high school, and I was pleased to see that he had gotten a break after all. Then came his other roles, in films such as Once Upon a Time in America, Raising Arizona, and The Waterdance, and in numerous other TV shows.

I managed to track him down and speak with him again when he starred in the 2002 TV series John Doe. Since it was a science-fiction series, I was able to interview him for SCI FI magazine. I not only printed the interview there, but I also repurposed our high-school yearbook photos for the sidebar below.

And now, here it is, decades later, and Bill has opened in 88 Minutes, starring opposite Al Pacino. And though the film is getting savaged by the critics, hey, he’s getting a chance to act opposite Al Freakin’ Pacino!

As I think about his success, I also think—regardless of my talent (or lack thereof), why did I not even try to follow the path at which Bill succeeded? Because I certainly had the enthusiasm.

I guess it comes down to the fact that I was unwilling to put my future into the hands of others. Editors and publishers are one thing, but to my mind, casting agents and directors were an entirely different story.

This is how I saw it back then—

When I graduated high school and realized I needed to decide which of the two careers I would pursue, I felt that in writing, the art could come before the business, whereas in acting, the business had to come before the art. What I mean by this is that to act, an actor needs a venue, a director, lights, etc., in place, and would not be allowed to act until all those things fell together and you passed an audition. Doing a monologue alone in a room wasn’t acting. In order to perform your art, you needed to wait to be given permission.

But to write, no permission was necessary. The art could come first. All I needed was a ream of paper and (back then) a typewriter. Whether or not I would be successful in the business side of publishing that followed, I could still create a finished product. The art would exist whether the story sold in months, years, decades, after my death, or not at all. Following where my writing muse rather than my acting muse led meant that I would not be putting my fate so much in the hands of others.

If I failed to sell any of my writing for a decade, I would still have many completed stories of which I could be proud. But if I failed to be cast in a role for those same ten years, I’d have nothing. I wasn’t prepared to wait for permission to create.

Does that make sense to anyone else but me?

In any case, I congratulate Bill for working out his own risk assessment all those years ago and following and nailing his dream.