Jarry had definite ideas, not only about the staging for Ubu Roi, but for the theater in general. In an essay, translated by Barbara Wright as "Of the Futility of the Theatrical," Jarry discusses "a few things which are particularly horrifying and incomprehensible ... and which clutter up the stage to no purpose."

It would be dangerous, says Jarry, for the writer to impose the decor [stage setting] that he himself would imagine and conceive. For "a public of artists" (as opposed to the general public), each audience member should be able to see a play in a decor that does not "clash with his own view of it." The general public, on the other hand, can be shown any "artistic" decor because "the masses do not understand anything by themselves, but wait to be told how to see things." A colorless background, an unpainted backdrop or the reverse...