A Streetcar Named Desire
Even if you were born in the 40s, also called the War Years, you may not remember the name of Thomas Lanier Williams III. But if I were to mention his pen name, Tennessee Williams, an American playwright and screenwriter, one of the greatest playwrights of 20th-century, many would know his pen name, which he changed to Tennessee because of an age requirement to submit plays in a competition in New York. Still, few would know the enormous plays written by Williams, including yours truly. Some of Williams's top plays were, 'Night of the Iguana, "The Glass Menagerie, And 'Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.' Still, few plays have reached the critically acclaimed platform, such as his number one play, A Streetcar Named Desire. Performed on Broadway on December 3, 1947, and released as a film in 1951, starting Jessica Tandy as Blanche DuBois, Karl Malden as Harold "Mitch" Mitchell, and relatively unknown but soon-to-become superstar Marlon Brando as Stanley Kowalski, A Streetcar Named Desire with its famous line, "Stella," and "Whoever you are—I have always depended on the kindness of strangers," has been most performed plays worldwide. Paramount Theatre presents Tennessee Willams's A Streetcar Named Desire at the Copley Theatre, and the cast performance of this well-known play was exceptional.
Williams's agitated sister, Rose, is considered the true inspiration behind his protagonist character, Blanche DuBois, who comes to live with her sister Stella and her sister's husband, the antagonist Stanley Kowalski. Williams's characters all seem to have some form of schism personality via post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
“ Intimacies with strangers was all I seemed able to fill my empty heart with.”
Blanche DuBois suffers from several traumatic experiences, including the suicide of her gay husband and the personal loss of the Belle Reve, their ancestral home, and her prestigious lifestyle. Her vanity keeps her in the dark, away from lights that may reveal her age. To cleanse herself from the filthy past, which included intimacies with strangers, she bathed frequently to soothe her nerves, hoping it would provide an escape from reality. She eventually succumbs to the pressures of that reality, displaying traits of schizophrenia and depression, which lead to her sister committing her to an insane asylum.
“ It looks to me like you have been swindled, baby, and when you’re swindled under the Napoleonic code I’m swindled too. And I don’t like to be swindled. ”
Stanley Kowalski, whom Blanche sees as a lower-class individual unworthy of her sister, is determined to destroy Blanche's storybook lifestyle of lies and expose her sexually promiscuous past. Stanley is hypersensitive and prone to violent outbursts.
“You take it for granted that I am in something that I want to get out of. He didn’t know what he was doing . . . He was as good as a lamb when I came back, and he’s really very, very ashamed of himself.”
Stella has psychologically broken down to accept her abusive husband's violent and drunken rants as love is torn between supporting her mentally ill sister and her mentally depraved husband. She is passionately in love with Stanley and the subservient wife he needs to counteract his low self-esteem and volatile behavior.
“No, you’re not clean enough to bring into the house with my mother. ”
Mitch is a lonely man, uncomfortable in his skin, looking for the right woman to love. He desperately loves Blanche but refuses to marry her because he fears her being unclean —and the upstairs owners of the flat Stanley and Stella rent, Eunice and Steve, continue the play's misogynistic overtones, which can be viewed as inappropriate in today's society. However, the mental illness within the play overshadows its prehistoric past.
The eleven-member cast featured main characters Amanda Drinkall (Blanche), Casey Hoekstra (Stanley), Alina Taber (Stella), Ben Page (Mitch), Andra Uppling (Eunice), and Joshua L. Green as Steve. Roberto Antonio Mantica (Pablo/Doctor), Adriel Irizarry (Collector), Desiree Gonzalez (Flower Vendor/Nurse). Tatiana Bustamante and Gabriel Fries are understudies. Hoekstra, Taber, Page, and Uppling were outstanding and provided powerful performances; however, Drinkall's portrayal of Blanche DuBois was phenomenal. She captured the very essence of Blanche, and her visual and emotional interpretation of a woman battling between reality and sanity will take your breath away.
The Film, A Streetcar Named Desire was banned due to its sexual content, scenes of domestic violence, rape, and drunkeness, and its mention of homosexuality and prostitution; however, it wasn't the only film banned when impure content and immorally ambiguous characters were seen as indecent and unacceptable to the public. In the 50s, "African Queen" was censored for perpetuating immoral relationships between characters. Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye (1950) (Brutality and Crime), Cease Fire (1953) (Improper usage of Words), The Moon Is Blue (1953) (indecent and obscene)— even a Disney film, The Vanishing Prairie (1954) was banned because censored committees felt buffalo giving birth was unacceptable for public viewers. Williams had to remove scenes of Blanche getting raped in the film and her lustful relationships with men so that the film could receive an admissible rating. Even the book, viewed as being too pornographic and obscene, was banned until 1977 from U.S. schools. With all of its censorships and bans, A Streetcar Named Desire was released and nominated for a several Oscars, winning four. However, in the end, did censorship win over immortality? The film industry demands punishment against Stanley for his lack of remorse for raping Blanche, which is why in the end, Stella decides to leave Stanley. But the original version of her staying with him has also been shown. But if you remove the rape, which symbolizes Stanley as the streetcar looking for forbidden desire towards his sister-in-law, does it lessen our intrigue towards the play? Even Tennessee Williams believed that the rape of Blanche by Stanley in A Streetcar Named Desire was pivotal to the climactic ending of the play. Blanche's perspective is the driving force behind the play, and her past experiences are crucial to understanding her character and the guilt and obstacles she faces. Omitting those elements would undoubtedly weaken the story and lessen its overall impact. It's important to acknowledge and honor the complexity of Blanche's character and the effects women endure after being raped to appreciate the depth and richness of the Tennessee Williams play.
⭐⭐⭐⭐
Copley Theatre
A Streetcar Named Desire
By Tennessee Williams
Directed by Jim Corti
March 13 - April 21, 2024
