Ionesco's first play opened in 1950 to baffled audiences who expected the avant-garde and got something even stranger: an English couple making statements that mean nothing, a fire chief who tells stories with no point, and clocks that strike at random. The Theatre of the Absurd began here, in a comedy that should not be funny but is. Ionesco said he learned English from a phrase book; the play consists of phrase-book sentences exposed in their meaninglessness. It is still performed constantly. The jokes never stop landing.