The point of the story is to keep the lovers apart. That’s where the drama is. That’s what we paid to see. We want to anticipate them being together, we want to hope for them to stay together, but once they do stay together they become a bit dull. They share a bathroom and go to work and come home and share a bathroom. They’re no longer lovers. They’re a couple. Who wants to watch that? Nobody. Not even the couple. Especially not the couple.

So the goal of the dramatist is to keep the lovers apart for as long as possible. How? However. Family hatreds, class issues, war. She’s married, he’s shallow, they’re gay. He doesn’t recognize true love, neither does she. Fiddle-dee-dee and lah-dee-dah and Play it again, Sam. Stella! Elaine! Adrian! Or the old standby: Please, we’re British.

Which is to say if you’re alone on this awful day of forced national celebration of what Gore Vidal once referred to as “love love love”? You’re the point of the story.