Good farces have lots of slamming doors, so I thought I’d regale you with some door trivia.
Doors have traditionally been used to protect people from the elements and from strangers entering homes, barns and other private buildings. Doors define who is in and who is out. Doors lock people out. Doors lock people in.
Doors have been used as a metaphor, as in “death’s door,” to signify a border or passageway between one place and another. People often change when they go through doors, and what goes on “behind closed doors” is kept secret.
The stage door is a powerful demarcation between celebrities and their adoring fans who wait outside the stage door for a photo or autograph. Stage Door is the name of a 1937 movie starring Katherine Hepburn and Ginger Rodgers about a troupe of aspiring actresses. Another well-known movie is Stage Door Canteen (1943).
A door-to-door salesman makes cold calls by knocking on people’s doors to sell them home products, such as magazines and cleaning supplies.
William Blake used doors as a metaphor for man’s blindness to God. “If the doors of perception were cleansed, every thing would appear to man as it is, infinite. For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things through narrow chinks of his cavern. -- The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1790s)
Aldous Huxley wrote about his experiences taking mescaline a 1954 book called The Doors of Perception, which derived its title from Blake’s poem.
Jim Morrison named his band, The Doors, after the doors of perception.
Internet Movie Database lists 149 feature films with the word “door” in the title. One of these is the 1972 porn classic Behind the Green Door starring Marilyn Chambers.
Elizabeth Arden line of spas and salons are called “Red Door Spas” for their signature red doors.
There are many styles of doors. French doors have small window panes and are often used to highlight a home’s garden. Saloon doors swing in and out for easy access in both directions. Trapdoors are mounted horizontally in cellars and attics and are often accessed by a ladder. Dutch doors are divided horizontally, allowing the top to open while the bottom stays shut.
