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PHOTO COURTESY OFJON GARDINER But with increasingly cor
Kathleen Nolan, theater and television star and former president of the Screen Actors Guild, leads the cast of Tennessee William's
"The Glass Menagerie" as Tom Wingfield's controlling and constricted mother, Amanda.
Play Depicts Familial, Female Struggle
Play Makers Repertory Company
presents Tennessee Williams' play
"The Glass Menagerie," its first
production of the new millennium.
By Carl Jacobs
Staff Writer
Lost dreams. Madness. Isolation. Failure.
Humor despite it all. These are common traits
associated with some of the richest stories in
Southern literature, and all are to be found in
Tennessee Williams’ play “The Glass
Menagerie,” opening this week at Play Makers
Repertory Company’s Paul Green I heatre.
In this play, which launched Williams’ career
as arguably the South’s greatest dramatist,
Williams creates an autobiographical portrait of
a Southern family that proves both humorous
and heart-wrenching.
In “The Glass Menagerie,” Tom tells the story
of his family life years earlier. Through the flash
backs, a complex play comes to life that echoes
Williams’ own life experiences. Tom’s mother
Amanda and sister Laura both represent the
women who played pivotal roles in the author’s
life.
Though the play is told from a male perspec
tive, women are perceptively portrayed. Sarah
Rose, who plays I .aura, said Williams had talent
in depicting women.
“Williams writes women so sensitively with
such a heavy, deep understanding," she said. “In
some ways I think he understands women bet
ter than he understands men."
Much like another of Williams’ heroines,
Blanche from “A Streetcar Named Desire,”
Amanda’s attempts to hold onto her past wreck
havoc on the lives of those around her.
Amanda tries to give her daughter the oppor
tunities that she herself missed out on. But the
painfully shy Laura wants only to be left alone
She latltt Sar Heel
with her collection of glass figurines.
The story exists on many levels. First, it is
Tom’s story as he tries to reconcile the events
that have befallen his family. Then it is Amanda
and Laura’s story as they try to cope as women
in a society that offers them few choices. Finally,
it is Williams’ own story in which he incorpo
rates personal elements, possibly to exorcise the
demons of his past.
“The play is about Tom’s coming to terms
with his family,” director Kent Paul said.
Paul said the play fascinated him, partly
because of the elements that are connected to
Williams’ life. He cited Williams’ reluctance to
leave the overbearing influence of his mother
and the way Williams’ sister “haunted” his life as
telling pieces of historical information to keep in
mind while watching the play.
Stage and television star Kathleen Nolan
(“The Real McCoys”) plays Amanda, a fading
Southern belle whose prospects in life are all but
finished. She said William’s depiction of her
character’s family sang with lyrical inflection.
“It’s poetry,” she said. “He is a poet, and that
lyricism of language always remains.”
Paul said Williams’ lyric style, much like the
storylines of his theatrical works, began in his
home.
“(Williams’) mother had a great lyric gift,”
Paul said. “Whenever (Williams) was around his
mother, he stopped talking just to listen.”
Later Williams would make this gift his own,
incorporating a talent for lyric storytelling into
his work.
Like much Southern literature, the play blurs
past and present, reality and imagination.
Donald Fastman designed the set to allow space
for the play's selective and active memory
aspects.
“I would think of the set as an assemblage. It’s
like a piece of sculpture rather than a realistic
rendering of the space,” Paul said.
Switching from the 1940s present to his mem
ories a decade earlier, Tom demonstrates how
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memory lives on. Citing Williams’ own demons
as an impetus behind the play, Paul added that
“... an artist makes a play from material that is
haunting him.”
These haunting memories prove powerful
enough to keep the play on stage more than half
a century after it was written. Dealing with such
universal topics as the relationships among fam
ily members, the work maintains an enduring
quality that makes it viable still today.
Tickets, priced from $9 to $25, are on sale
now. For more information call Playmakers Box
Office at 962-7529.
The Arts & Entertainment Editor can be
reached at artsdesk@unc.edu.
Female Performing Art Festivals
United States:
California:
Los Angeles LA Women's Theatre Festival
San Francisco—Working Women Festival
Colorado:
Boulder Moondance International Film Festival
Illinois:
Chicago Women at the Door Playwriting Festival
Chicago—Women in the Director's Chair
New York:
New York New York Women's Film Festival
Rhode Island:
Providence —Annual Women's Playwriting Festival
Washington:
Seattle Mae West Fest
Seattle—Women in Cinema Festival
Australia:
Sidney—WOW Festival, Women on Women International Film Festival
Germany:
Koln FEMINALE, Biannual International Women's Film Festival
Slovenia:
City of Women International Festival of Contemporary Arts
Taiwan:
Tapei—The Women Make Waves Film and Video Festival
f Women Aim Toward
More Dramatic Voice
W By Robin Clemow
f Arts & Entertainment Editor
f In 1660, women took the
stage for the first time. The pub-
W lie loved the dramatic addition,
f especially the men who chose their
mistresses from the stage.
I More than 300 years later,
f despite progress, which has led to
numerous theaters and festivals that
* support female dramatists and new
female leaders in the arts, women still
face challenges in theater and cinema.
Sarah Rose, who will play Laura in
* Play Maker’s Repertory Company’s pro
duction of “The Glass Menagerie” opening
“ this weekend, said maintaining support for
women was one struggle.
Rose said organizations like Women’s
■ Project and Productions in New York City,
f which only produces plays written by women
and centered around women’s issues, have given
women an opportunity to contribute to theater
■ like never before.
“I don’t think (women) have had the support to
shape the history of theater as they had the abili
ty to, but now the support is there,” she said.
But with increasingly conservative politics,
Rose said she feared that arts funding would get
cut across the board. “I think women will be the
first to get hurt from it,” she said.
However, women’s theater groups and film fes
tivals continue to spring up internationally with
out political support.
North Carolina recently gained one of these
organizations. Three women in Charlotte
launched an all-female Shakespeare company
called Chickspeare to give women the opportu
nity to play more roles in classical plays whose
casts consist mainly of men.
“When you have an audition for Shakespeare
in a typical theater, there is not cross-gender cast
ing,” said Anne Lambert, co-producer of
Chickspeare.
That means minimal roles for women in
Shakespearean theater, a fact that Chickspeare
attempts to combat with their shows.
But even with groups like Chickspeare suc
ceeding, UNC dramatic art Professor Bonnie
Raphael said women face other struggles in the
field.
Although she said roles for women have dras
tically improved from theater’s beginning when
they played victims, crazies,
witches and whores, there is
still a shortage of worthy
characters.
Star parts for women
over 40 are only beginning
to emerge in theater, and
television and film are still
chock full of roles set aside
for the young and beautiful.
“It’s about writers writing
better roles for women,”
Raphael said. “It’s also
about women having the
courage to turn roles down
if they don’t meet certain
standards. You’ve got to see
what you can do from with
in the system.”
Kathleen Nolan, who will
play Amanda in “The Glass
Menagerie,” has been fight
ing for women behind the
camera since she hit star
dom playing Kate McCoy
in the TV series “The Real
McCoys” in the late 19505.
Nolan said theater roles
had multiplied greatly in the
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reat," the story of 'Valley of the Dolls" author Jacqueline
Susann's rise to feme.
20th century, praising this weekend’s Tennessee
Williams show for its exploration of women.
“Probably the playwright who has contributed
more (women’s roles) in American theater is
Tennessee Williams,” she said.
A strong voice in the Screen Actors Guild
throughout the women’s rights movement, Nolan
became a role model for women in the arts when
she was elected the first female president of The
Screen Actor’s Guild in 1975.
But despite her success, she said screen parts
for women were limited, especially strong roles
for older women like the character she will play
this weekend.
“In TV, women over 40 disappear,” she said.
“It’s about catering to the commerce of a young
audience.”
The focus on appearance in the dramatic arts
weighs on the minds of aspiring actresses like
UNC senior drama major Michelle Ries.
“I’ve thought about it before - the pressures,
physically, to be so thin and look a certain away,”
Ries said. “It’s not something I’ve encountered
yet, but I’m afraid I might when I get into the real .
world.”
Ries said she agreed with Raphael and Nolan
that the pressure was even greater in film and tel
evision than in the theater.
“If you watch the Oscars, as opposed to the
Tony’s, the women who win the Tony’s are much
more diverse,” she said, pointing to the greater
ethnic and physical variety of theatrical roles. •
Ries also blamed commercial drive, explaining
that advertisers want their products set next to a i
socially attractive image. Beautiful women and
athletes top their lists.
Amid these limitations, film and television, like
theater, have organizations that help women. The
largest of these is Women in Film, a national
organization bom in Los Angeles in the 19705.
Nolan, who won one of the organization’s -
acclaimed Crystal Awards for her dedication to
women in dramatic arts in 1981, said Women in
Film created a network of women and awarded
them for making changes on both sides of the
camera.
“It was started not only because of the lack of
roles for women but also the lack of places for
women behind the camera and in production,”
Nolan said.
Along with the continual need for support and
the effort demanded from women to combat the
system from within, women in the performing arts
also have to face the problem of balancing fami
ly duties with a career.
UNC dramatic art Professorjulie Fishell said
the demands on performers and directors include
the need to be able to follow jobs and companies
across the country.
After college, Fishell toured with a number of
professional companies, but now with a 6-year
old daughter, she said she's glad to be somewhat
settled.
While some male actors also have family
responsibilities, many more female actors must
sacrifice career for obligations at home.
“The simple fact is, we’ve had many male guest
artists who’ve come (to UNC) who’ve had chil
dren, and we’ve had very few women come
who’ve had children,” Fishell said.
But despite a threatened support system, a
need for better roles, and social limitations on
women, both Fishell and Raphael hold high
hopes for young female artists like Ries.
“Women have to be able to visualize them
selves in leadership positions,” Raphael said. And
Fishell said many women leave the department of
dramatic art with that drive.
“The students need to be ready to go out and
make their own opportunities, and many of them
are.”
The Arts & Entertainment Editor can be
reached at artsdesk@unc.edu.
...page 7