REVIEW: The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams – Running With Scissors


Tennessee Williams’ The Glass Menagerie was first performed in 1944, the year after his sister, Rose, was subjected to a lobotomy, after which she was institutionalised for the rest of her life. In some ways, this play – the one that launched Williams’ career as a playwright – is much more forgiving of him and the complicated relationship he had with Rose and his mother, Edwina. He’ll be much more critical of how his family treated his sister when he writes Suddenly Last Summer and delves into how the medical establishment has often disbelieved women when consulting doctors.

It seems right that his early memory play (a term Williams coined in the opening narration) is “dimly lighted, sentimental and not realistic” as protagonist Tom Wingfield explains. As a writer, he is starting to unpack his past – his lower class background, his suppressed homosexuality, his overbearing mother, while he forgives himself for leaving.

I’ve seen this play twice over the past twenty years and my memories of it are both clear and hazy. There are clear moments of Tom and his mother arguing, Tom and Jim on the landing outside the front door, Laura fixated on her glass sculptures and the women dressing up for dinner. I didn’t remember how ever-present the absent father is – his disappearance at the surface of the family’s fracturing, his picture hanging in the living room, staring at them all. I didn’t remember how tender Jim is with Laura in their scene together, even though he is lying to her the whole time.

Watching Running with Scissor’s new production, currently playing at the Meat Market’s Stables space in North Melbourne, was like being reminded of a story I’d heard long ago. Directors Nadia Sirninger Rankin and Nicholas Reynolds have embraced the dimly-lit aesthetic, enveloped the stage in theatrical haze and have designed the show to be watched in traverse.

The box-without-sides design by Ashely Reid suggests voyeurism but it also obscures some moments, for both good and bad. Occasionally, missing bits felt perfectly suited to an imperfect memory. Sometimes the actors were behind the coat rack by the front door and all I could do was listen, momentarily robbed of connection.

A lot of important stuff happens outside the front door and Rankin and Reynolds haven’t found a good way to keep the characters in full view. But when the action is central in Reid’s gorgeously-designed living and dining room, the hot-box feeling of being trapped with these characters takes over.

Oliver Gorringe’s Tom is delicate and softly-spoken. You can see the older, wiser writer trapped inside the timid son and brother though; Gorringe's performance suggests a Tom trying to break out of his shell. Tom's opening monologue should usher us into the world, though playing to both sides of the house robs us of the full impact of this captivating introduction by Williams, which brings us up-to-speed on the politics of the time and the dynamics of the family and the structure of the play itself.

The cast took some time to warm up and settle into their characters on opening night. Early on in the show, they weren't quite connecting, occasionally playing past each other. But as the show progresses, and the drama ramped up, things started to come together. Linda Cookson makes a meal out of Amanda, the problematic matriarch. She shines as mother flies off the handle later in the show. Caitlin McCallig plays Laura as suitably lost in a world that has no place for her, without othering the character too much. Columbus Lane’s gentleman caller is compelling, as he inserts himself into the family home, his motivations unclear, even to himself.

Viv Hargreaves’ lighting is suitably cosy, finding warmth in the candle-lit scenes. Rohan Dimsey's sound design is a a mixed bag; the songs from the Victrola are evocative, but the score underneath stories from these characters' pasts feels too on-the-nose. A rabid heartbeat at one moment feels apropos, but other sound effects try to up the tension too much. 

Williams’ play is his earliest success and remains thoughtful and insightful eighty years later. Running with Scissors’ production is solid and delivers the text with passion and a wistful nostalgia.

- Keith Gow, Theatre First

The Glass Menagerie is running until August 2

Photos: Matthew Chen


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