While that really did happen to "Your Show of Shows, " it feels like a contrivance, an excuse for comedy.

WSJ: Putting the Punch in Punch-Line | Neil Simon | Laughter on the 23rd Floor | Mad Cow Theatre | Review by Terry Teachout

The story's climax turns out to be anticlimactic, a predictable contrivance that pits the countess, for the last time, against Chertkov, who wants to manage Tolstoy's death as he managed his life.

WSJ: The Last Station and The Book of Eli | Review by Joe Morgenstern

The whole plot is a pretty dumb contrivance, but, if you want to be picky, that's exactly what a plot always is.

CNN: Not nearly a 'Perfect' picture, but agreeable

Like their very names, Ms Wiggins's characters never quite dispel a whiff of contrivance.

ECONOMIST: New American fiction

Obama's post-partisan pragmatism, he has confirmed with his inaugural address, was only a useful political contrivance.

CNN: Obama leads Democrats out on a limb

But, without a hint of contrivance, Mr Gursky makes it strange.

ECONOMIST: New German photography

It was a cog in the machinery of a three-country contrivance for cleansing illicit profits.

FORBES: Magazine Article

And the movie itself shades from coldness and contrivance into a story as touching and mysterious as anything Kieslowski has ever made.

NEWYORKER: Red

Intangibles are an accounting contrivance that resembles a cosmic black hole--we know it exists but understand little of its inner workings.

FORBES: Asset Assessment

For one thing, against the contrivance of the lead opinion there is the clarity of a united dissent that we now understand started out as a majority view with Justice Roberts's support.

WSJ: McGurn: Chief Justice Roberts Taxes Credibility