Trouble in Tahiti is Leonard Bernstein's brilliant examination of suburban life. The opera draws upon popular song styles to deliver an uncompromising critique of post-war American materialism. Beneath the couple's marital discord is a profound longing for love and intimacy. Their spiritual emptiness, in contrast to a veneer of happy consumerism, creates the heart of the drama and is emphasized by sudden stylistic shifts in the music.

Gallantry: A Soap Opera is a farce centering on a television soap opera set in a hospital. A surgeon has fallen in love with the anesthetist, who in turn loves the patient on the operating table. Critical moments are, to be sure, interrupted by commercials.