THE MANAGER (_jumping up in a rage_). Ridiculous? Ridiculous? Is it my fault if France won't send us any more good comedies, and we are reduced to putting on Pirandello's works, where nobody understands anything, and where the author plays the fool with us all? (_The actors grin. The Manager goes to Leading Man and shouts_). Yes sir, you put on the cook's cap and beat eggs. Do you suppose that with all this egg-beating business you are on an ordinary stage? Get that out of your head. You represent the shell of the eggs you are beating! (_Laughter and comments among the actors_). Silence! and listen to my explanations, please! (_To Leading Man_): "The empty form of reason without the fullness of instinct, which is blind."--You stand for reason, your wife is instinct. It's a mixing up of the parts, according to which you who act your own part become the puppet of yourself. Do you understand? LEADING MAN. I'm hanged if I do. THE MANAGER. Neither do I. But let's get on with it. It's sure to be a glorious failure anyway. (_Confidentially_): But I say, please face three-quarters. Otherwise, what with the abstruseness of the dialogue, and the public that won't be able to hear you, the whole thing will go to hell. Come on! come on! PROMPTER. Pardon sir, may I get into my box? There's a bit of a draught. THE MANAGER. Yes, yes, of course! _At this point, the door-keeper has entered from the stage door and advances towards the manager's table, taking off his braided cap. During this manoeuvre, the Six Characters enter, and stop by the door at back of stage, so that when the door-keeper is about to announce their coming to the Manager, they are already on the stage. A tenuous light surrounds them, almost as if irradiated by them--the faint breath of their fantastic reality._ _This light will disappear when they come forward towards the actors. They preserve, however, something of the dream lightness in which they seem almost suspended; but this does not detract from the essential reality of their forms and expressions._ _He who is known as_ THE FATHER _is a man of about_ 50: _hair, reddish in colour, thin at the temples; he is not bald, however; thick moustaches, falling over his still fresh mouth, which often opens in an empty and uncertain smile. He is fattish, pale; with an especially wide forehead. He has blue, oval-shaped eyes, very clear and piercing. Wears light trousers and a dark jacket. He is alternatively mellifluous and violent in his manner._