Le Vicomte de Valmont begins the play as an unworthy, cynical pleasure-seeker, proud of his reputation as a seducer. He is encouraged in his enterprises by his former mistress, La Marquise de Merteuil, who would seem to share his cynicism, but who has an ulterior motive. Set in France among aristocrats before the Revolution, this is nevertheless a play for all time about sexual manners and manipulation, ending in tragedy.