Madame Antoine, the young Marie Antoinette, sits on a swing beside a peach tree. Beyond the garden wall a Boy (Honest Bird) watches and listens whilst perched in the branches of a spreading oak. Madame Antoine daydreams about her future life as a Queen, imagining all its splendors. Her mother (Marie Therese) calls her in from a window overlooking the garden. Before Madame Antoine leaves her swing, Honest Bird, provoked by all that he has just heard, drops into the garden and challenges her. In no uncertain terms he tells Madame Antoine that her life of privilege and indulgence is made possible only by the privations and suffering of the mass of ordinary people. Unmoved, she dismisses him.
RINGMASTER Within our humble sawdust ring The players are arraigned The powerful and puny The saintly and deranged
The Honest Bird, a future queen All innocent and green Sparring all the livelong day Make ready for our play So gentles all, who will hold sway To a garden in Vienna, let us make our way...