Nous, les héros

The actors were won over by the richness of the text and the humanity of the characters.

"Acting, just, nothing else, pretending or living our lives."

The scene takes place backstage at a theater, in the center of Europe.

After the performance, when they leave the stage, the actors in the troupe begin their lives, their real lives. They leave the costumes of the show they've just performed for the umpteenth time and are themselves again, or so they want to believe.

But tonight, the eldest daughter of the troupe's patrons becomes engaged to the young leading man. And what the father of the family believes is that they will later live the life he lived with his wife, and that his parents lived before him.

After the performance, everyone does "their number", it's theater and it's life, with the war in the background, which comes and goes, and which they'd like to ignore.

"Tomorrow we'll run away, but tonight again, we're pretending since we don't know how to do anything else."