By: Tennessee Williams
Directed by: Joe Dowling
Cast: Randy Harrison, Harriet Harris, Tracey Maloney, Bill McCallum, Jonas Goslow.
Where: Guthrie Theater -Minneapolis
When: Jan. 20 2007 - March, 25. 2007
Opening: January, 12 2007
Source: Courttheatre

Set in St. Louis in 1937, The Glass Menagerie is a memory play, recalled by the character of Tom Wingfield. Tom lives in an apartment with his sister Laura and his mother Amanda. Mr. Wingfield, Tom and Laura’s father, does not appear in the play except for a picture hung prominently in the living room. Mr. Wingfield, as we find out in the play, has abandoned his family and is never heard from except for one postcard with no return address. The action of the play is driven by the three family members, headed by Amanda. In wishing for her children to be happy she pushes Tom to get a better job, and hopes for Laura to find a suitable husband, or at least entertain men who she refers to as “gentlemen callers”. She also has enrolled Laura in a business college to acquire a family fortune. Tom works at a shoe distributor warehouse, a job which he loathes; he frequently looses himself in movies, drinking, and literature – a fact which has earned him the nickname “Shakespeare” at his job.

As the play begins Tom and Amanda discuss Laura’s prospects for a suitor, and Tom selects his coworker Jim, a man as it turns out that Laura remembers fondly from her shy days in high school. Preparations are made for his arrival as Amanda interrogates Tom about the young man, who she is pleased to find out is driven with his sights set on career advancement.

The day arrives, and Amanda is a flutter with preparation as Laura cowers in fear and shyness. The men arrive and dinner is served. After dinner Amanda and Tom excuse themselves so Laura and Jim can have a moment to chat and catch up on old times. Laura tells Jim she remembers how kind he was to her in high school, and recalls an incident in which Jim asked her why she was wearing a leg brace, when she tells him it was because of “pleurosis” he mishears and thinks she said “Blue Roses” which soon becomes his nickname for her. After a moment of dancing and music, Jim lets slip that he is engaged to be married, a fact which does not go over well on Laura. Amanda and Tom enter the room in good spirits and Jim excuses himself, telling Amanda that he must go home to visit his fiancé. Amanda, full of charm but seething underneath, bids Jim farewell. Turning to face the room she confronts Tom for his incompetence, and Tom storms out of the house. In his closing monologue we see Amanda comforting Laura. The play ends.




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Edited by Marcy