Word: upper-class
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...aware that a problem exists. So, significantly, are the English. The Times of London responded to the Figaro statistics with the headline IT'S TRUE: THE FRENCH REALLY ARE THE SMELLIEST IN EUROPE. But are they? I know people, some of them holders of British passports, who insist that upper-class English are the filthiest people on earth. In England, there's an old story about the astounded response of the president of an Oxford college whose students, in a past less distant than you may think, asked for the installation of bathtubs: "Bathtubs! Bathtubs! These people are up here...
...then-taboo issues of racism, xenophobia, unwed mothers and exploitation of the lower classes, to name just a few of the topics sung about onstage, are brought up with a bit of cliche, but are tackled with honest zeal nonetheless. The plot revolves around three families--one upper-class WASP, one black and one immigrant Jewish--who are striving for success and happiness in turn-of-the-century America, which is offering them as much adversity as it is opportunity...
...production opens by introducing the smiling Mother (Raebecca Eichenberger) and Father (Cris Groenendaal) who, along with Little Boy (Nathan Keen), Mother's Younger Brother (Aloysius Gigl) and Grandfather (Austin Colyer) round out the white upper-class upstate New Yorkers. The audience is also introduced to Coalhouse Walker Jr. (Lawrence Hamilton), a talented Harlem pianist, and his captivating lover Sarah (Darlesia Cearcy); as well as to the fanatically patriotic immigrant Tateh (Michael Rupert) and his Little Girl (Jenell Slack). The three groups of people--the WASPs in frilly white, of course; the Harlem natives in deep burgundies and blues...
...ages. A delicious, brilliantly crafted example of how a movie can entertain, move and impress without sacrificing wit and intelligence. In a play within a play, Joe Fiennes plays Shakespeare as an ill-fated Romeo trying to woo his upper-class Juliet (Gwyneth Paltrow). What prevents this familiar tale from degenerating into cliche is its self-awareness--it's a fulfilling romance and a sharp comedy. And a luminous Paltrow glowingly convinces why she is worthy of the greatest mind of all time...
...some rich parents will visit clinics in more permissive nations, then come home to bear their tip-top children. (Already, British parents have traveled to Saudi Arabia to choose their baby's sex in vitro, a procedure that is illegal at home.) Even without a ban, it will be upper-class parents who can afford pricey genetic technologies. Children who would in any event go to the finest doctors and schools will get an even bigger head start on health and achievement...