This Prologue was written for the opening of the “Jeux Forains” (Fairground Games) organised in the Montansier venue in Paris, on October 20, 1810. This venue (which must not be confused with that built in 1793 on Rue de Richelieu, at the instigation of Mademoiselle Montansier, and which was the home of the Paris Opera) then stood where the Théâtre du Palais-Royal is today. Before the French Revolution, the puppets of S. A. S. Monseigneur le Comte de Beaujolais’s Théâtre des Petits Comédiens de Bois (Theatre of Small Wooden Actors, created in 1784) performed there. It then became famous under the name Théâtre des Variétés (literally: Theatre of Varieties).

No longer authorised to perform plays with actors, the Montansier venue put on a troupe of Italian puppeteers in May 1810—the “Pupi Napolitani” (sic). It then programmed a pantomime performed by trained dogs. In the autumn of 1810, human actors progressively came back, in pantomimes such as La Roche du diable (The devil’s Rock) and Arlequin partout (Arlequin everywhere), which finished off the evenings after Martainville’s Prologue.

35 years later, Mademoiselle Flore, an actress at the Théâtre des Variétés, wrote about the prologue: “This prologue was performed by the former wooden actors of Monseigneur le comte de Beaujolais, which had been sleeping in the attic of the theatre for twenty years and were finally dusted.

Nothing came close to the ridicule of these old automated figures as tall as eight-year-old children; they were dressed Pompadour-style and moved awkwardly while loud voices spoke for them from the wings of the theatre.

Every century comes with different tastes and innovations: the recollection of Brioché, who was fashionable when he performed on the Pont-Neuf in the days of Louis XIV, was too literary for Mademoiselle Montansier’s audience, and the wooden actors were soon put back in the attic.” (Le Globe, 17 June 1845).

Momus, the god of mockery, arrives on Pegasus’s back at the grave of the puppeteer Brioché. Jupiter gave him the power to resuscitate the dead, and he chose Brioché, who thus comes back to life; Momus instructs him to open a theatre. Polichinelle comes out of an old tree; then Pierrot and Arlequin appear. The latter asks Momus to also bring Colombine back to life; she is followed by Beau Léandre, Isabelle and Cassandre. After lauding the puppets, they try to decide on the repertoire they will put on and they introduce the troupe of actors that will perform the pantomimes.