the theatre would ever present works of quality. And, fourth, he held in disdain ham acting or cabotinage, so common in the commercial theatre. He proposed eventually a school for young actors in order to create a new cohort of actors whose taste and instincts would remain above compromise. Lastly, he proposed a simple stage freed from the overworked scenic machinery that had become commonplace: "Pour l'œuvre nouvelle, qu'on nous laisse un plateau nu" ("For our new undertaking, just give us a bare platform"), he wrote (Registres I, p. 32). At the beginning of October, there appeared on the kiosks of Paris a poster announcing Copeau's appeal to the youth to reject the commercial theatre, to a literate public who wanted to see preserved the classic master pieces of both the French and foreign theatre and to all those who wanted to support a theatre that would excel through its fair prices, variety, and quality of its interpretations and staging. Many years of hard work preceded his Appel, but the "Old Dove-cote" theatre was now ready to open. During the first season, Copeau kept his promises. He staged plays from the classics, fairly recent works of quality, and the offerings of new playwrights from outside the theatre such as Jean Schlumberger and Roger Martin du Gard. The Théâtre du Vieux-Colombier was inaugurated with a little ceremony on 22 October 1913 and opened with its first public performance on the next evening with Heywood's A Woman Killed By Kindness ("Une femme tuée par la douceur"), but the Elizabethan melodrama did not impress the critics and the public remained indifferent. Molière's Amour médecin, however, received a more promising reception. The Schlumberger offering, Les Fils Louverné ("The Louverné Sons"), a rather austere drama about sibling conflict, was followed by Alfred de Musset's Barberine, a delightfully poetic piece that charmed the public and showed off the talents of the young company on a bare stage. Dullin triumphed in his signature interpretation of Harpagon in Molière's L’Avare ("The Miser") and the troupe showed its physical dexterity in Molière's farce, La Jalousie du Barbouillé ("The Jealousy of Barbouillé"). They performed Paul Claudel's L’Échange ("The Exchange"); dating from 1894 when he was in "exile" as a diplomat in Boston, the play deals in a poetic way with the relationship between spouses. Again Dullin showed his talent for character creation and Copeau too took a major role bringing