It is a January evening in 1870s New York City and the fashionable are attending the opera. As young Newland Archer, lawyer and man about town, gazes up at his soon-to-be fiancé, May Welland, in the Mingott-family opera box, he is disconcerted by the arrival of May’s cousin, the Countess Ellen Olenska, who has left her profligate but wealthy Polish husband. To discourage gossip, Newland decides to announce his and May’s engagement at the Beaufort’s ball that night.... More
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