Children have the right instincts: they know that life is not serious, and treat it is a game..." In the following issue he published Die Lehrmittel and Das schwarze Buch, which was co-authored with Peter Altenberg. Then followed by Zwei Skizzen: Der Panamahut & Die Bolette (issue 193), Pilatus (issue 201) and Ein Schmerzensschrei (issue 202). After these texts were published, he and Kraus fell out with each other. In 1906, Friedell began kabarett performances at venues called Cabaret Nachtlicht and . In 1907 he directed at Intimes Theater in Vienna, which was run by his brother, Oskar Friedmann. There, he staged plays by August Strindberg, Frank Wedekind and Maurice Maeterlinck and brought them to the audience in Vienna for the first time. Friedell was doing lighting, acting and directing. Between 1908 and 1910 Friedell worked as the artistic director of the , named after the Johann Strauss operetta. Most pieces were written either by Peter Altenberg or jointly by Friedell and Alfred Polgar, who were nicknamed the "Polfried AG". He also was acting there. Other people involved were Oscar Straus, Hermann Bahr, Franz Blei, Erich Mühsam, Hanns Heinz Ewers, Alexander Roda Roda and Frank Wedekind. Fritz Lang described his impressions of the Fledermaus: "There, amid Jugendstil decor, Kokoschka mounted his Indian fairy tale "Des getupfte Ei" ["The Dotted Egg"] on slides, writer Alfred Polgar [...] read his short prose and caustic commentary, and Friedell and other authors of rising repute presented their sketches and short plays." During this time, Friedell continued to publish essays and one-act plays. His first literary effort was Der Petroleumkönig (Petrol king) in 1908. The parody Goethe im Examen, written jointly Alfred Polgar, in which he also played the leading role, made him famous in German speaking countries and got mentioned in the Sunday Times. He played this role repeatedly until 1938. Also in that time he wrote Soldatenleben im Frieden. In 1910, Friedell was commissioned by publisher Samuel Fischer to write a biography of the poet Peter Altenberg. Fischer, who had expected something light, was unsatisfied with Friedell's analysis and critique of culture titled Ecce poeta, and the book was not promoted in any way. Hence, the book was a commercial failure, but served to mark the beginning of Friedell's interest in cultural history. He frequented the so called "literary cafés" among the Viennese coffee houses, notably the Café Central, where many notable people