Word: germanized
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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Shortly before the beaten German armies surrendered in 1945, Charles de Gaulle, leader of the Free French forces, received a secret appeal from Nazi Gestapo Boss Heinrich Himmler...
Since his first meeting with Adenauer 15 months ago, De Gaulle has treated West Germany as a junior partner, has shown a lofty lack of concern for German sensibilities. So far, his government has made no public apology for the French navy's high-seas seizure six weeks ago of the West German freighter Bilbao, suspected of carrying arms to the Algerian rebels. De Gaulle has put it more bluntly than anyone else: he regards the present frontiers between Poland and Germany as permanent and dismisses the German dream of recovering the "lost provinces." De Gaulle is obviously...
Making her way back to their Pigalle apartment, Lydia was soon joined by her father, who had also survived German internment (her mother had been shot by the retreating Nazis on their last day in Warsaw). In Paris, father and daughter picked up the pieces of their old life. Lydia enrolled in a dancing school in 1948, two years later was among the few chosen from hundreds of applicants for the Folies chorus, has been there ever since. Says Lydia: "It's not the Warsaw Opera Ballet, but I love it." Asked where she would pin her Legion ribbon...
Into their divided, miscomprehending midst, as tutor to a still cheery teen-age daughter, comes a quiet young German, hating the land of which his brutal Nazi father seems a symbol, and eager for a friendly English home. Discerning about the neurotic Harringtons, he-who has known real horror-tries to prevent the needless horror the family is inflicting on itself. But in sounding the alarm bell, he feeds the fire, and soon accusations and recriminations flare up everywhere...
Playwright Shaffer can write sharp dialogue that is also characterizing, can cunningly create atmosphere and tension. This, linked to a vivid production, makes for a generally good evening that at its best is engrossing. The play has its contrived moments and false notes, and the German-however well played by Michael Bryant-serves too many purposes to emerge entirely right. But in view of England's gulf between classes and generations and often evasive family tactics, there is more than a measure of truth in Shaffer's picture. And with John Gielgud eloquently directing a good cast...