Use these questions or activities to help gauge students’ familiarity with and spark their interest in the context of the work, giving them an entry point into the text itself.

Short Answer

1. How does the importance of movies to Tom compare with the role of movies in people’s lives today?

Teaching Suggestion: It may be useful to poll the group to find out how many have gone to a movie in a theater in the last month (or another period of time). Why did they go—or why don’t they go? What about the cost? How many think watching a movie at home is just as good as or better than going out to the movies?

• “Now Is the Perfect Time to Revisit the Movies That Brought America Comfort in the Past”—This article summarizes eight Depression-era movies that helped lift people’s spirits.
• “1930s Movie Trailers”—A 10-minute collection of previews of some classic 1930s movies (Content Warning: Some of these films, such as Gone with the Wind, include content that is racist or considered offensive in other ways today.)

2.  How were mental health issues treated in the 1930s? Tennessee Williams’s sister Rose had a mental health condition and underwent a prefrontal lobotomy; she lived most of her life afterwards in an institution.