Word: leer
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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Pasty-faced and crater-eyed, behind his boldly rouged cheeks, the lone figure onstage when the footlights go up on Broadway's hit musical, Cabaret, is a garish apparition indeed. He twists his scarlet mouth into an obsequious leer as he whines the lyrics of Willkommen, Bienvenue, Welcome. The character has no name, no dialogue. But in Joel Grey's insinuating performance, the sleazy, empty-souled, fanny-grabbing emcee of Berlin's Kit Kat Klub is not only the glue that holds the musical together but also the embodiment of a nation's depravity during...
STEPHANIE: Hey, let's go downstairs and LEER at the check-out girls...
ELLEN: You leer at the check-out girls. I'll leer at their wedding rings...
Esoteric as that may sound to the adult ear, what it means to the young is that they have exorcised sexual inhibitions. They are monogamous only if they choose to be; they claim to find the body neither shameful nor titillating, and sneer self-righteously at the adults who leer at "topless" waitresses. "Hung up on sex," is the putdown. Ironically, the revolt of the teeny hoppers on the Sunset Strip last November resulted in the demise of discotheques and the rise of "topless" clubs...
...code was designed in 1930 to keep actors and actresses out of bed-on the screen. It seemed like a good idea at the time, for movies were as sex-conscious as the films coming out of Sweden today. But the production code launched an era of hypocritical leer; moviemakers often did their vulgar and ingenious best to be as provocative as possible, without violating the code's letter...