The Festival of Two Worlds was established in Spoleto in 1958, created and directed by the Italian-American composer Gian Carlo Menotti. For its second edition, Menotti invited European and American authors to present short and very short works to be staged as a compilation in two separate shows.
Zeffirelli was entrusted with the task of orchestrating the European segment of the program, which was titled "Fogli d’album".
In the general program of the 1959 Festival, Zeffirelli wrote:
“It would be difficult and, in any case, risky to try to decide what kind of a show "Fogli d’album" is. According to the intentions of Gian Carlo Menotti, who thought it up, "Fogli d’album" and its unidentical twin "Album Leaves" should be a kind of quick and nonchalant résumé of the wit and the theatre of the Europeans and the Americans, respectively. Naturally, neither of the shows proposes, in a single evening in the theatre, to carry out exhaustively such a bold program. Nor can we say that the selection presented in this second Festival of Two Worlds will be absolutely complete. Still, within the limits of the possible, and according to the availability of the authors involved, Menotti’s plan has been courageously followed.
"Fogli d’album", with its brief plays, its light-hearted little operas, its strongly characterized pantomimes, with the help of set and costume designers almost all of the new generation, through the efforts of the technicians and all the others who have collaborated to create a small and modern piece of theatre, is offered to the public as an evening for amusement and reflection.”