Gerry Colgan reviews The Glass Menagerie at the Civic Theatre, Tallaght.
The Glass Menagerie was the first play to bring real success for Tennessee Williams and, as is often the case with breakthrough works, it was largely autobiographical. It is a sensitive study of his mentally impaired sister, whose disability, for dramatic purposes, he alters here to a club-foot. The sadness and the pain remain real.
It is written as a memory play, with the author-narrator recollecting the past. In it, Tom lives with his mother Amanda and sister Laura in near-poverty, his father having long since deserted them. Amanda, once a southern belle, is fiercely ambitious for her children, and wants Tom to find Laura a husband. He brings fellow-worker Jim home for dinner, not knowing that Laura once had a school crush on him, or that he is engaged to be married.
The evening, with the humiliations it brings, is the final straw that drives Tom to leave home, but he cannot forget his sister; he is more faithful to her than he intended to be. His story has a bitter-sweet flavour, a depth of emotion conveyed beautifully in the author's eloquent words. It requires acting of the highest standard to extract their full essence, and to capture the complexity of the relationships.
This production, by the Keegan Theatre from the US, is certainly a competent one. If it is no more than that, it is largely a matter of nuances in the acting and direction. Amanda is a highly complex character, a monster-mother whose very dedication to her children is driven by her own sense of having been undervalued. Linda High gets much, but not all, of this.
Similarly the character of Laura, played by Susan Grevengoed, seems overcooked, a virtually unrelieved depiction of a woman wearing her nerves on the outside. There is room for more light and shade here, for sadness instead of heavy tragedy.
Best are Mark Rhea (who also directs) as the ineffectual Tom, and Jon Townson as the good-hearted Jim. Together, they are all worth seeing.
Runs until Saturday. Booking: 01-4627477
