THE STORY: Set in Brooklyn during the 1950s, A BAD FRIEND brings us into the household of Shelly and Naomi Wallach, a middle-aged couple who are as fervently opposed to McCarthyism, anti-Semitism and exploitation of the working class as they are passionately committed to the Rosenbergs, civil rights and Stalin. Their independent-minded teenage daughter, Rose, squirms under the weight of her parents’ oppressive Marxist principles. “Maybe I’m only a liberal,” Rose says, which provokes a stern lecture from her mother; and as the antagonism between the rigidly ideological Shelly and her questioning, rebellious daughter grows, it becomes increasingly clear that politics is personal and that developing your own beliefs comes at a price.
“[The characters] become rounded, deep people, women whose choices have consequences that are not only persuasive but moving…Resonates with painful nostalgia and honestly appraised personal history.” —The New York Times.
