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Unlock'd, a musical based on Alexander Popes The Rape of the Lock, debuted at the Duke Theatre in Manhattan on June 27, 2013 and closed on July 20, 2013. This clever and imaginative retelling of Pope's classic mock epic stays true to the intent of the poem as it expands the story to suit the new genre. Pope's satire offers a critique of upper class society's penchant for turning petty squabbles into serious conflict. In the later version of the poem, he adds a speech delivered by Clarissa in which she condemns women's obsession with beauty over actual development of character. This speech (which scholars have read as tongue-in-cheek, hypocritical, misogynistic, or moralizing) seems to form the basis for Sam earner's adaptation of Pope's narrative. The musical opens with Clarissa decrying all the attention given to her flirt of a "stepsister," Belinda. Because audiences may not be familiar with Pope's poem or context, Carner develops the musical as a romantic comedy in which Belinda, the hopeless flirt who cannot settle on one man, keeps all of her suitors from choosing other women. Her power over men rests in her perfectly coiffed hair-particularly one powerful ringlet that is named "Beatrice." Her stepsister Clarissa, whose motivation in Pope's work is unclear and seems spiteful, expresses frustration and jealousy in her inability to compete with Belinda,...