The setting of the play is explained in the production notes. The play opens in 1950, with a mansion as the background, built around 1900. The walls are lined with photographs and paintings of the family, and there is a rosewood chair and mother-of-pearl table, on which is a telephone. As the play progresses, the setting varies from time to time and place to place - flashing back to the 1930s or continuing in the '70s, and with different places as the background.

There is ample evidence of dramatic irony throughout the play. Emily is both a victim and a victimiser, in a sense. She had been the subject of many hardships suffered in her younger days, by her husband's estrangement, by her son's suicide, and by the moving out of all her children. However, being a victim has led to her drive for absolute control over her family...