Andronicos Market San Francisco

Posted on November 30, 2011 by Admin
Andronicos Market San Francisco

Andronicos Market San Francisco

Boxcar Theatre has mounted an innovative, very successful new interpretation of Tennessee Williams' play The Glass Menagerie in their black box theater South of Market. In their small, intimate space they have even added six more characters to the original four, serving to flesh out and humanize the stereotyped symbols that Williams wrote about. On a stage configured as a runway with audience on two sides, Boxcar's Artistic Directors Peter Matthews and Nick A. Olivero have opened up Williams' play with sympathy, providing greater insights to the lives of the desperate Wingfield family and their "Gentleman caller."

Thomas Lanier Williams wrote autobiographically about Tom Wingfield, son of a proud, genteel Southern woman and a distant father. Williams' father did desert the family and they did live in St. Louis, Missouri, where the play is set. Thomas did work in the shoe business, as does Tom. Thomas' sister Rose did have a disability, as does Laura Wingfield in the play. Williams' stage directions describe it as a "memory play." Boxcar has taken this to heart and run with it.

The Shadows of memory

The shadowy lighting and additional characters filter the surreal show through Tom’s memory, subject to guesswork and subconscious distortions. Mother Amanda Wingfield, a vivacious woman clinging feverishly to memories of a vanished past, is also portrayed by a "Shadow Amanda" (Maggie McCally acting smug and flirty) who is mute, as are the other two shadow characters, Shadow Laura (Lauren Doucette) and Shadow Tom (Peter Matthews). These three barefoot characters seem to be earlier, perhaps more stable representations of the Wingfields.

On a bare set with moveable stools for furniture and only four props, the delicate animals of Laura's glass menagerie are mimed, as are other bits. The ingenuity of this production lies in the wordless interactions between the shadows and the distraught Wingfields. For instance, while Laura protests her innocence to her mother for dropping out of business school, using shyness as an excuse, her shadow sits on the stage deck and pretends to fixate on playing with something small and fascinating.

Later, when gentleman caller Jim (Nick A. Olivero) joins Laura in her fantasy world, he participates in her belief in the imaginary animals. Olivero's aggressively unctuous character clumsily breaks her favorite one. His regret does not read as being genuine, whether by production design or because of monotonal acting, but she mimes giving the figurine to him as a parting gesture.

The marvelously complex staging of this show holds interest intensely, despite some audience views of characters' backs and shoulders, inherent in a strip-style set. Having the shadows react to their real selves heightens the emotions of anger and disillusionment, while extending Williams' metaphors of uncertainty and melancholy.