The gunfire from the revolution outside echoes with corrosive consequences, through Madame Irma's House of Illusions. Within its marble corridors fantasies are being re-enacted day after day. But where does fantasy end and reality begin? What will happen when the revolutionaries claim their right to belong to Irma's mirrors?

The Balcony is Genet's most metaphysical play, in which reality is illusive and conflicts are acted out within the context of questioning the validity of the political establishment; a humourous and terrifying dramatisation of the individual's rage against social norms.

Much has been said about the biographical content of Genet's work, particularly in the light of Jean Paul Satre's massive study, St Genet. Genet's life of destitution, petty theft and male prostitution did, indeed, equip him with a rich array of characters whom he weaves into his writing, but they are placed in a created world where Genet's political and moral attitudes are given an environment where the very foundations of existence may be explored. The questioning of reality and existence echoes the work of Pirandello, who Genet admired, and cynical attitudes towards social and political institutions are reminiscent of Brecht, for whom Genet showed less enthusiasm.

The most startling feature of The Balcony is the attempt to create a mixed theatrical language that embraces not only the word, but a totality of sound, movement and visual image that sets it firmly as a supreme example of "total theatre" where the audience are invited to respond to the emotional, intellectual, metaphysical and spiritual influences. The characters are not only motivated by psychological desire, but by deeper philosophical questions that are rooted in the nature of being itself. For Genet, the discovery of "being" is to find what he called "solitude". That is not to say loneliness, but the real "being" of the individual that lies behind perceived existence. The apparent functions of existent life are merely masks that hide the truth. The prime function of life is death, and even that is interpreted as nihilistic.

The characters in the play can only find their truth in fantasy in which they acquire satisfaction through sex and power. In the end only truth is the realisation that there is no truth.