He was a volunteer orderly at a local hospital when the War broke out, and he began to entertain the convalescing soldiers with revue sketches, engaging nurses and other civilians as fellow performers.  He also began to act in college productions.  Performing enabled the introvert to become someone else, anyone else, and Charles reveled in his success.

Toward the end of the War, a film company came to a nearby village to do some location shooting, and the budding actor was offered a bit part in a group scene.  As a film debut, it was singularly inauspicious, but with the help of the leading actor in the production, Charles was able to persuade his mother that he needed to go to Paris and seriously pursue an acting career.  She in turn convinced him not to abandon his formal education entirely, and Charles left Figeac in 1918 to enroll at the Sorbonne.  He would not return to his birthplace for more than 30 years.