Beryl Bainbridge on Samuel Johnson and her novel According To Queenie - Johnson through the eyes of Queenie Thrale, the eldest daughter of Henry and Hester Thrale.
Liverpool. 1947. Right after World War II, a star struck naive teenage girl joins a shabby theatre troupe in Liverpool. During a winter production of Peter Pan, the play quickly turns into a dark metaphor for youth as she becomes drawn into a web of sexual politics and intrigue and learns about the grown-up world of the theater.
In England during World War II, a repressed dressmaker and her sister struggle looking after their 17-year-old niece, who is having a delusional affair with an American soldier.
William McClusky (Sam Waterston) is a dashing and eccentric Scotsman whose charms rapidly overwhelm the sweet and naive Ann Walton (Jenny Agutter), but she nearly as quickly begins to comprehend that her new beau is anything but a one-woman man. In addition to his two ex-wives, with whom he remains remarkably close, William exhibits a disturbing attraction for nearly any female who crosses his path -- Ann's friends among them.