"Haunting and lyrical" or "trite and predictable", The Glass Menagerie, Tennessee
Williams’ first major success, provokes a lot of anticipatory judgment before
the audience ever walks into the theater.
The power of this cast, particularly but not limited to Cherry Jones,
upends conventional wisdom. This Glass
Menagerie balances the tried and true with updates that draw the audience into
the show.
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| Zachary Quinto and Cherry Jones |
Journeyman artist Celia Keenan-Bolger takes on the difficult
role of Laura. Laura is a whiny wisp of
a thing, overpowered by her mother and her mother’s memories of her own
youth. Ms. Keemam-Bolger handles the
role well, making the moments of hope entrancing, while keeping the moments of
anguish from overpowering the story.
Laura is crippled both emotional and physically; one leg refuses to move
as she wants. Her condition piles on
insecurity to her already shy demeanor.
In a house where her mother has a huge personality and her brother
disappears nearly every night, Laura is weighed down by expectation and pity barely
disguised as oversolicitous behavior.
Cherry Jones plays mother Amanda as self-involved but
unaware woman who’s interest in others is defined primarily by how much they
are interested in her. Her performance is stellar, refracting every conversation
and interest into a reflection on her.
Amanda weighs oppressively on both Laura and Tom, her son played by
Zachery Quinto. Mr. Quinto plays Tom
subtly, with a controlled emotion that only slowly reveals itself to be fury
and claustrophobic dread.
The Glass Menagerie takes place in a small depression era
apartment some years after Amanda’s husband and the father to Laura and Tom,
has left. Both Amanda and Tom worry that
the frail Laura will be a spinster, lost in her world of glass knick knacks –
they will have to take care of her always.
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| Celia Keenan-Bolger and Brian J. Smith |
Through Amanda’s pushing, Tom finally brings home a young
man from the job in order to set up Laura.
Brian Smith plays the Gentlemen Caller – Jim. Mr. Smith does a hell of a job with the role,
managing to transform himself and Laura in front of our eyes.
The staging and pace of the show is beautiful, if slower
than modern audiences are familiar with.
Director John Tiffany has brought the play forward as a period piece without
making it feel dated. This Glass
Menagerie will stay with you long after you leave the theater.
The Glass Menagerie
Playwright: Tennessee Williams
Director: John Tiffany
Cast: Cherry Jones, Zachary Quinto,
Celia Keenan-Bloger, Brian J. Smith
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