The Muted, Melancholy Synesthetics of “The History of Sound”

In “The History of Sound,” a new romantic drama set during and after the First World War, passion is an intensely private thing, and in more ways than you might expect. Love and desire are not simply expressed in the sweaty vigor of bodies in bed; the two central characters are turned on, and brought together, by moments of quietly harmonious convergence, rooted in shared qualities of heightened perception, cultivated taste, and specialized knowledge. A crucial early scene takes place in 1917, where Lionel Worthing (Paul Mescal), a voice student at the New England Conservatory of Music, is out drinking with friends. Suddenly, amid waves of cigarette smoke and chatter, he hears a song that he recognizes: “Across the Rocky Mountain,” an old folk ballad that he learned while growing up on a f