The classic American screwball comedies of the late 30s and 40s are revered for their sparkling dialogue, their intricate plotting and their mixing-and-matching of glamorous, witty Golden Age icons like Cary Grant, Katharine Hepburn, Jimmy Stewart, Barbara Stanwyck and Claudette Colbert. But one of the important, under-appreciated qualities of those movies – what made Adam’s Rib, Bringing Up Baby, The Lady Eve, His Girl Friday, and others really pop – is there was something serious at stake. These romcoms were not all meet-cutes and gimmicks, but cultural arenas for a battle of the sexes that was being waged off screen, too. Happy endings were achieved through intense negotiations.