Web viewthe live jazz and blues ... purples and rich passionate reds created the type of world...
Transcript of Web viewthe live jazz and blues ... purples and rich passionate reds created the type of world...
Stagecraft Discussed: A Streetcar Named Desire
part one (of two)Tennessee Williams’ 1947
tragedy of the destruction of
Southern belle, Blanche
Dubois, is one of the most
performed plays of the 20th
Century [and probably 21st
too]. Famous for its heroine slumming it in a steamy, claustrophobic New Orleans ghetto and her subsequent conflict with alpha male brother-in-law, Stanley Kowalski, it is a cocktail of heat, desire,
deception and madness. It is the play that made the actor Marlon Brando
famous, whose legacy is an almost impossible role to surpass for all budding
wanna-be Stanleys.
Most productions follow the excellent 2013 production directed by Ethan
McSweeny, with its faithful reproduction of a typical 1947 rundown
neighbourhood and characteristic cramped two bedroom apartment. This
version, starring Lia Williams as Blanche, retained the period costumes and
the realism for which most productions strive. Its most impressive aspect,
apart from Williams’ stunning performance as Blanche, was to use the original
play’s prioritising of music as a way of joining separate scenes. Between scenes a vocalist, accompanied by a clarinettist, performed live songs that musically bridged scenes – both extending their mood and anticipating new ones.
This stagecraft decision in not indicated in Williams’ [Tennessee this time]
stage directions despite the use of music being a significant indicator of
emotional tone in the play. In the play we encounter stage directions of this
nature:
“The music of the ‘blue piano’ grows louder.”
“The rapid, feverish polka tune, the ‘Varsouviana,’ is heard.”
“The sound of it turns into an approaching locomotive.”
“The hot trumpet and drums from the Four Deuces sound loudly.”
As Blanche’s mental state unravels the
music becomes more and more
intrusive, disrupting the realism of the
action with the surrealism of her
madness. In McSweeny’s production,
the live jazz and blues performances further emphasised and articulated both the sultry, sensuality of the New Orleans location and the tragic sadness of Blanche’s breakdown.
This musical colour was also matched
by vibrant colourful lighting where deep
sensuous purples and rich passionate
reds created the type of world corresponding to Blanche’s projected self-
delusions.
However, a radically
different approach to the
play’s setting was taken
by director Benedict
Andrews in 2014.
Breaking with tradition, he
created an ultra-modern
New Orleans setting. His approach to the stagecraft of the play was to ditch the realism and emphasise the
artifice of the spectacle. To this end by staging the play in the round (i.e.
the audience surrounds the spectacle of the drama itself) his production
destroyed the so-called ‘fourth wall’ that the audience usually occupies.
Additionally, his entire stage set rotated at slow speed so that the audience
was confronted with a constantly moving performance that never allowed the
audience to get fully comfortable. To accommodate this, the two-room
apartment became a space with no walls but with furniture and doors. Seen
from far away it resembled a type of sterile cage. While allowing maximum
visibility for the almost intrusive audience, it also emphasised the complete
lack of privacy that Blanche suffers in her new cramped abode.
Overall, the audience became much more engaged as it strained to see the
expressions of the actors, to hear their lines and to put all these pieces
together. The overall effect was to increase the voyeuristic nature of the audience and cleverly draw them closer to the action. This blending
together or unrealistic setting with realistic action also emphasised the
unstable boundaries between reality and fantasy, safety and threat that
characterise the play. The transgression of these supposedly separate
boundaries as indicated by William’s use of music and flashback [the fatal
gunshots that echo through the play and Blanche’s fraying mind] thus found
reinforcement through the staging of this production.