This is a glitzy world of cigar smoke, whiskey ice, nylon stockings and haute couture. In the Georgetown Salon in Washington, DC, politicians and diplomats' wives exchange tacit secrets; on the Sunset Strip in Los Angeles, Hollywood stars sell carefully packaged dreams under the spotlight, but in private they may be forbidden to any powerful person. This was an era before social media, and the public image was entirely shaped by the cover of Life magazine and the newscasts of the three major television networks. However, beneath this glamorous appearance, there are deep social divisions: the scars of apartheid have not yet healed, the shadow of the white terror of McCarthyism still exists, and the nuclear cloud between the United States and the Soviet Union hangs in everyone's mind. People release the passion and anxiety of the times through jazz, rock music and infinite reverie about space.
