The Dinner Party story
Blake is a brilliant accountant, but does he deserve a promotion to the board of directors? It all depends on the suitability of his wife. His bosses attend a small dinner party given by the Blakes to check her out, and Mrs Blake seems to be a lower class, loud, obnoxious woman. Or is everything as it seems? Directed by: John Robins. Story by: Julian Bond, based on a story by James Michael Ullman.
14 total · 1 choice · 9 major · 4 minor
| Theme | Level | Motivation |
|---|---|---|
| sociocultural issue | choice | In his commentary, Orson Welles spoke of how big corporations may consider all sorts of details about an employee and their family when considering them for executive position. In the story, the board members were keen to evaluate Blake's wife according to these considerations before offering him a big promotion. |
| coping with humiliation | major | Blake feigned to be mortified by his supposed wife's rude behavior at the dinner party. In reality, the two had staged the scene to ensure that he would be passed over for a promotion. |
| embezzlement | major | In a surprise twist, it was revealed that Blake desperately wanted to avoid the promotion because it would derail his lucrative embezzling scheme. |
| greed for riches | major | The story's grand revelation is that Edmund and Jane Blake were well on their way to embezzling a substantial sum from the corporation where Edmund worked as an accountant. |
| human character stereotype | major | Jane played the role of a brash, ditsy, lower class young lady. |
| husband and wife | major | The story concerns Edmund Blake and his supposed wife socializing with Blake's colleagues and their respective wives at a dinner party, where Blake's suitability for a promotion was to be determined. |
| manners | major | Jane comported herself in a pantomimically ill-mannered way at the dinner party. For example, she obliquely insulted one person after the other and derided the hosts for owning an overly large house. |
| snobbery | major | Jane explicitly called the dinner party attendees out for their snobbery, and derided the entire game of golf for the same flaw. |
| the flip side of a promotion | major | In a surprise twist, it was revealed that Blake desperately wanted to avoid the promotion because it would ruin his lucrative embezzling scheme. |
| the importance of reputation | major | The corporate higher-ups at the dinner party were of the opinion that the wives of board members needed to live up to certain expectations in order to maintain a good corporate image. |