Word: backdrop
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King Priam (1961) borrowed from the Iliad to examine moral choices in a time of war. The Knot Garden (1970) sorted out a maze of sexual and psychological bonds against a backdrop of freedom fighting, racism and analysis...
Written late in Shaw's career, Heartbreak House unfolds against the backdrop of World War 1. It opens almost like an Agatha Christie murder mystery: a young girl, accompanied her finance and father, comes to a strange country house, invited by a woman she doesn't know all that well. The house is bulging with a variety of guests, to who terms like "wacky" and "zany" cannot be too strongly applied. A burglar enters the premises, as does the long-lost daughter of one of the guests. Relationships among the characters are tangled--nobody is quite what he appears...
Written late in Shaw's career, Heartbreak House unfolds against the backdrop of World War I. It opens almost like an Agatha Christie murder mystery: a young girl, accompanied her fiance and father, comes to a strange country house, invited by a woman she doesn't know all that well. The house is bulging with a variety of guests, to who terms like "wacky" and "zany" cannot be too strongly applied. A burglar enters the premises, as does the long-lost daughter of one of the guests. Relationships among the characters are tangled--nobody is quite what he appears...
This battle-of-the-sexes takes place against the backdrop of a Chicago nightclub and jazzy be-bop syncopation. The era? When guys packed heaters and goils snapped chewing gum and were referred to as having "gams," instead of legs. People mispronounced words longer than three syllables. Gun molls abounded, and their boyfriends had special revolver pockets fitted into their suits...
Although Simon rarely deals with young people or with bright show-biz professionals, his tart and wacky one-liners are in perfect accord with the temperaments of his hero and heroine. The show is very New Yorky in mood, with an opening backdrop of the Manhattan skyline that is like a bas-relief of tinseled Christmas trees. A top-name pop composer. Vernon Gersch (Robert Klein), surveys the scene from his luxury apartment where he first meets Sonia Walsk (Lucie Arnaz), an aspiring lyricist much in awe of his success. When she picks up his solid-gold Oscar...