A VIEW FROM THE BRIDGE - REVIEW OF 2024 PRODUCTION IN LONDON

Reviewed by James Karas 

Arthur Miller’s A View from the Bridge is a riveting play about love, jealousy, honour and betrayal. In the final scene the protagonist Eddie Carbone (Dominic West in a bravura performance), screams “I want my name back” because he has been shamed to core. He has been accused of betraying two relatives to the immigration authorities for their illegal status in the United States.

A view was written in 1956 at the height of the Hose Unamerican Activities Committee (HUAC hearings. The Senator Eugene McCarthy witch hunts, where people like Arthur Miller were subpoenaed by HUAC and asked to name friends or acquaintances who had Communist or leftist associations were one of the lowest points in American history.

Marco (Pierro Niel-Mee) and Rodolpho (Callum Scott Howells), two brothers related to the Carbones, jump ship and go to live with them where they are welcomed. But Catherine is attracted to the handsome Rodolpho and Eddie’s jealousy becomes explosive. When he realizes that the two are in love and want to marry, he goes berserk and finally reports the two brothers to the immigration police. The brothers are arrested and Marco delivers the ultimate insult to the traitor Eddie by spitting on him in public.

Miller structured the play like a Greek tragedy with a Chorus and traits that will inevitably lead to a terrible end. Alfieri (Martin Marquez) is the Chorus, a lawyer who introduces the play and comments on the events as well as being the voice of reason in a situation that is not susceptible to rational solutions. 

Dominc West in ‘A View from the Bridge’ (Johan Persson)

Lindsay Posner has directed the play before but there are certain areas where he is not completely successful. The relationship between Catherine and Eddie lacks the sexual electricity or tension that we must see to make Eddie’s motivation and treachery credible. Catherine does not exude the sexual attraction and tension needed to drive Eddie to commit the ultimate treachery.

The play achieves its potential in the last half hour or so when Eddie’s illicit attraction and jealousy take over and he desperately tries to prove that Rodolpho is a homosexual by forcibly kissing him on the lips. The inevitable forces of tragedy take over as Eddie’s demons overwhelm him and he destroys the lives of the illegal immigrants and destroys himself when he loses his honor, his self, his humanity and screams “I want me name back.”

Katie Fleetwood gives a fine performance as the decent wife of Eddie who sees and understands what is happening but can do very little about it. Marquez is good as the wise lawyer who sees all that is happening and knows that there is almost nothing that can be done to change the course of events. It is like Oedipus running away from his place of birth in order to avoid the prophecy that he will kill his father. He does the very thing on his way to Thebes when he accidentally meets his father and kills him. Marco as played by Niel-Mee is a decent man working hard to provide for his wife and children in Italy. He is driven beyond any endurance and spits on Eddie when he realizes what has happened. 

The play takes place in New York where they speak with an accent all their own and the Italian newcomers would have their own accent. I simply note that the London trained cast was not very successful in doing any kind of New York accent.

Miller gives directions for a single set that includes a desk for the lawyer Alfieri, a telephone booth, furniture, a ramp leading to the street and a stairway leading to the upstairs apartments. Posner and Set and Costume Designer Peter McKintosh us a single all-black set with a table and a few chairs and a dresser with a record player on the right. I could not see it very well from my seat. The back of the set shows three floors and when the light on the third-floor window is lit, I presume it means it is an outside seen. You can tell that from the context of the script. 

Paul Pyant, the lighting designer, could have been more helpful with the variety and focus of the lights and McKintosh could have provided another entrance for the non-family characters closes to the audience. All entrances and exits were done at the back and you had to rely on the context of the script as to who was coming from where.

These may be small points of disagreement about a play that has a huge impact almost seventy years after it premiered in a very different world.
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A View from the Bridge by Arthur Miller continues until August 3, 2024 at the Theatre Royal Haymarket, Haymarket, London. SW1Y 4HT  https://trh.co.uk/

James Karas is the Senior Editor, Culture of The Greek Press

 

IPHIGENIA IN AULIS AND IPHIGENIA IN TAURIS – REVIEW OF 2024 AIX-EN-PROVENCE DOUBLE BILL PRODUCTION

Reviewed by James Karas

The House of Atreus has been a most generous contributor to writers and composers by providing them with fascinating subjects for works of art. Agamemnon, Clytemnestra and their children Electra, Iphigenia and Orestes are all ripe subjects for an endless number theatrical and operatic works. Christoph Willibald Gluck wrote two operas about the travails of one daughter, Iphigenia, in her youth in Aulis and twenty years later in Tauris.

The two operas were not intended to be performed as a double-bill, but the Aix-en-Provence Festival has decided to pair the two works as a sort of operatic marathon lasting five and a half hours. Yes, there is s upper break in the middle.

The drawing card for the double-bill is Dmitri Tcherniakov, the brilliant Russian director. He has given the two operas a similar production with an ant-war stance that one may want to relate to the Trojan War but in the modern-dress production, he is no doubt thinking of modern conflicts like the Israeli-Hamas conflict in Gaza and the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

The two operas are different but have much in common as well. They deal with the same main character in a life-and-death situation. At Aulis, Iphigenia has been chosen as a sacrifice to the goddess Diana for the latter to give favourable winds for Agamemnon to sail to Troy to rescue his brother’s wife Helen. Tcherniakov leaves Iphigenia’s fate somewhat ambiguous but if we find her in Tauris twenty years later, we know that she has been spared. 

Aix-en-Provence Festival. Photo: © Monika Rittershaus

In the barbaric kingdom of Tauris, Iphigenia has become a priestess in a temple dedicated to Diana, the goddess for whom she was slated to be sacrifices at Aulis. When two strangers arrive at Tauris, they are ordered to be killed, or one of them at least. The candidate for sacrifice at Aulis becomes a potential executioner in Tauris. At Aulis she is given as a sacrificial victim by her father. At Tauris she is ordered to murder unknowingly her brother Orestes or his best friend Pylades. She is in danger of being killed herself. It is thus possible to view the two operas as the different sides of a coin.

For the opening scene of Iphigenia in Aulis, Tcherniakov has devised a dream sequence played during the overture. We see a frantic Agamenon (done superbly by Canadian baritone Russell Braun) in a nightmare dreaming of his daughter’s execution. He dithers between killing his innocent daughter which will follow, of course, with the killing pf countless innocent Trojans. He decides to do both, but his daughter is probably saved by the goddess Diana for whose sake she was to be sacrificed.

Both operas are dominated by American soprano Corinne Winters as Iphigenia. She has a lovely voice and sings in a measured and mellifluous way in Aulis and much more forcefully in Tauris. It is a marathon performance by any definition, and she deserves a standing ovation. French soprano Veronique Gens sings the powerful Clytemnestra with marvellous tones. Australian tenor Alasdair Kent plays and sings a clownish Achilles. 

Soprano Soula Parassidis from Vancouver, a rising star, sang the role of the goddess Diana in both operas with vocal beauty.

In addition to directing, Tcherniakov designed the sets for both operas. For Aulis, the set consists of several playing areas constructed from steel posts with highly imaginative and changing lighting by Gleb Filshitinsky. The same style is used for Tauris, but it is in post-war ruins compared to its previous condition.

Baritone Florian Sempey as Orestes and tenor Stanislas de Barbeyrac as Pylades competed in their display of manly friendship and willingness to die for one other. They displayed the same prowess vocally in their outstanding performances.

Finally let me praise, perhaps more than anyone, Emmanuelle Haïm conducting Le Concert d'Astrée. She was on her feet for the full five and a half hours but that is the least for which she deserves praise. She conducted exemplary performances of both operas in an unforgettable evening.

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Iphigenia in Aulis (Iphigenie en Aulide) and Iphigenia in Tauris (Iphigenie en Tauride) by Christoph Willibald Gluck opened on July 3 and will be performed in repertory until July 23, 2024, at the Grand Theatre de Provence, Aix-en-Provence, France. www.festival-aix.com

JAMES KARAS IS THE SENIOR EDITOR, CULTURE OF THE GREEK PRESS

 

 

SAMSON – REVIEW OF 2024 AIX-EN-PROVENCE FESTIVAL PRODUCTION

Revised by James Karas 

Go to Aix-en-Provence and see the premiere of an opera by Jean-Philippe Rameau and Voltaire called Samson. If you were in Paris in 1733 you could have almost seen it, but the church gave a resounding NO to the production and that was the end of it. Until 2024, that is. The history of the opera is almost as interesting as its first production this year at the Aix-en-Provence Festival.

A few details will have to suffice. In 1734 Voltaire approached Rameau, the greatest composer of the time, to put together an opera. He completed the libretto and Rameau composed the score by midyear. The Catholic Church ruled that an opera on a religious subject was out of the question. Voltaire kept the libretto and it’s easily available, but Rameau did not keep the score. But he did use parts of the music in other operas.

In 2024 director Claus Gutz and conductor Raphael Pichon decided to adapt the libretto and hunt down Rameau’s music and in the end create a new work, a retelling of the Samson story that finds its roots in the Bible, in Voltaire and Rameau, in today’s world of war and inhumanity. It is a unique take that is difficult to pin down but full of fascination.   

Both Voltaire and Guth-Pichon set Samson in “the present” but Voltaire starts with Bacchus. Hercules. Virtue, the Followers of Virtue and Voluptuousness surrounded by Pleasures and Loves. Guth-Pichon gets rid of all of them. 

Samson, Aix-en-Provence Festival 2024 (c) Ruth Walz

The opera opens in the present with Samson’s mother, a non-singing role played by Andrea Ferreol. She is at Samson’s grave in the ruins of the temple that he brought down in the final outburst of his strength killing a countless number of people. She wants to understand what happened. She will go back in the life of her son to try and understand what has happened.

We learn that she could not bear a child, but she became pregnant and God informed her  that her son will have superhuman power. The Hebrews are the slaves of the Philistines and looking for a liberator. Samson (Jarett Ott) appears wearing white attire and not in the biblical description of covered by the skin of a lion that he killed with his bare hands.

The Philistines wear black, and the Hebrews are in white clothes but there is no pronounced dichotomy between good and evil. In fact, Samson sees the beautiful Timnah (Lea Desandre), a Philistine, falls in love with her and marries her. There is an inexplicable row during the wedding celebration and Samson reacts with horrendous violence. Timnah leaves Samson and his mother is at a loss to understand her son’s behaviour.

These are times of trouble in general and between the Hebrews and the Philistines in particular. We do not know the particulars, but we do see Samson the recluse coming back. The Philistines know his superhuman strength and send the beautiful Delilah (Jacquelyn Stucker) to seduce him and find the source of his power. As the Bible tells us and the whole world knows, Samson betrays his greatest secret and tells Delilah that his strength lies in his long hair. Delilah is paid for her treachery to her lover Judas-like with gold pieces thrown at her. Like Christ’s betrayer, she kills herself.

Samson, Aix-en-Provence Festival 2024 (c) Ruth Walz

Samson is shorn and blinded and kept like a weak slave in the temple of the Philistines. They of course celebrate their great victory, but Samson regains his strength and brings down the temple killing all the Philistine and himself.

We see his mother again on the spot where he is buried under the rubble of the temple, reemerging from the past and trying to understand her son’s behaviour in the past and in his final act.

Much of the singing of Samson falls on American baritone Jarett Ott. He goes through the emotional and vocal demands of the opera with apparent ease. Guth and Pichon do not make it easy to understand the person, despite repeated references to chapter and verse of the Book of Judges of the Old Testament. Ott sings with resonance in an admirable performance. Soprano Jacquelyn Stucker and mezzo soprano Lea Desandre sing gorgeously as the two women that attracted the Hebrew Samson to marry them. Special kudos to the Pygmalion Chorus and Orchestra under the direction of Pichon.

The production required some extraordinary sets, lighting and special effects. The brilliant Guth and Pichon are responsible for the concept of the opera and the attendant musical and dramatic details. Without them nothing would have been possible. Extraordinary light and video effects by Bertrand Couderc, sets by Etienne Pluss, Costumes by Ursula Kudma, sound by Mathis Nitschke, all added to the outstanding production values.

Voltaire and Rameau may be rolling in their graves but also applauding the fertile imaginations and talents of the 21^st century creators of the premiere of their opera.
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Samson by Claus Guth and Raphael Pichon based on the lost opera by Jean-Philippe Rameau and the libretto of Voltaire continues in repertory until July 18 2024 at the Théâtre de l'Archevêché, Aix-en-Provence, France.  http://festival-aix.com/

JAMES KARAS IS THE SENIOR EDITOR, CULTURE OF THE GREEK PRESS

MADAMA BUTTERFLY – REVIEW OF 2024 AIX-EN-PROVINCE FESTIVAL PRODUCTION

Reviewed by James Karas                                                            

The Aix-en-Provence Festival is in full swing (July 3 to 23, 2024) offering an eclectic selection of operas and other musical entertainments in the gorgeous weather and in the beautiful medieval city in southern France after which it is named.

Puccini’s Madama Butterfly is one the selections from the standard repertoire that gets an idiosyncratic production by German director Andrea Breth. Some of her choices appear inspired, others arbitrary and some simply confusing.

First the singers. The big drawing card is Ermonela Jaho, the Albanian soprano with the luscious and big soprano voice. She gave her all as Cio-Cio San (Madama Butterfly), the 15-year-old Japanese girl who falls in love with and marries B. F. Pinkerton, a swaggering and irresponsible American naval officer. Jaho manages a lovely tremolo to express tenderness and love. And oh, the longing in “Un bel di vedremo” when she imagines the return of Pinkerton’s ship in the harbour, his climb up the hill and her delirious happiness. We know that he spent one night with her and disappeared for three years, and she had his baby.

Jaho is about 50 years old, and she has been singing for more than 30 years. But she did not disappoint. From the happy child bride to the determined and faithful American wife and finally the crushed human being she played our emotional strings like a virtuoso. In the final moment of the opera when the orchestra played the last beat, Madama Butterfly’s head dropped, and she collapsed dead. The audience gasped, the lights went out and we jumped to our feet in a standing ovation.

Pinkerton is one of the most odious characters in opera and British tenor Adam Smith does a good job with his stentorian voice. But he tries too hard to reach his high notes and his voice becomes harsh and in fact cracks a couple of times. He is otherwise fine. He wears a suit in the opening scene but does put on a navy jacket in the end. The fact that he is a naval officer emphasizes his disgusting conduct and there is no reason for the singer not to appear in all his glory in that outfit.

Decency is represented by Sharpless, the American consul, sung by Belgian baritone Lionel Lhote. He must maneuver between his compatriot’s evil and the innocent Butterfly with vocal steadfastness and moral equanimity. We like what the character does and how Lhote achieves it.

Madame Butterfly, Aix-en-Provence Festival 2024 (c) Ruth Walz

Japanese mezzo soprano Mihoko Fujimura’s performance as Suzuki is praiseworthy. She is Butterfly’s maid who is not divorced from reality as Butterfly is. Admirable work by Fujimura.  Italian tenor Carlo Bosi’s looked and acted like an American real estate agent but he sang well and his characterization enhanced the role. In short, the production had a fine cast. 

Now for some unfriendly comments about Breth’s handling of the plot. Whenever Breth could choose between static and kinetic she opted for the motionless. There are opportunities for the singers to move around but Breth tries to restrict such luxuries. What she does do is have characters walk on and off the stage for no explicable reason. They slowly shuffle or are brought on by a rotating conveyor belt. I could not figure out what they were doing,

When Pinkerton’s ship arrives in the harbour, we see a man holding the small replica of a ship in his hand while the revolving conveyor belt brings him around. Other characters less obviously do the same. Are they figments of Butterfly’s imagination? Are we watching a psychodrama about her imagination? In other words what is going on?

Breth and Set Designer Raimund Orfeo Voigt want the action to take place in an enclosed area. That is an acceptable approach, but the area is separated from the audience by upright girders. These frequently block the face of the singer and that is annoying. Did no one notice this unnecessary nuisance which increases in intensity every time a performer’s face is blocked? The production gains nothing by telling us that all action takes place in an  enclosed space. All else about the set design is fine.

A final bow and standing ovation are due to the Choir and Orchestra of the Opéra national de Lyon led by the master conductor Daniele Rustioni.
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Madama Butterfly by Giacomo Puccini continues in repertory until July 22, 2024, at the Théâtre de l'Archevêché, Aix-en-Provence, France  https://festival-aix.com/fr

James Karas is the Senior Editor, Culture of The Greek Press 

THE HOUSE THAT WILL NOT STAND – REVIEW OF 2024 SHAW FESTIVAL PRODUCTION

Reviewed by James Karas

The House That Will Not Stand is a play by Marcus Gardley about the fate of women of colour in Louisiana in 1813. The date is important because that is when France transferred the territory to the United States. Women of colour were relatively well off under French jurisdiction. Some were part of the plaçage where a woman of colour could become the concubine of a white man and even marry one and live much better than slaves. The system was complicated, and I am in no position to explain it fully. 

Gardley’s 2014 play deals with Beartrice Albans (Monica Parks) a plaçage whose wealthy white husband has just died leaving her, and her three daughters as well as their Negro servant with an uncertain future under the American system.

When the play opens in the Jackie Maxwell Studio, we see a man lying dead and a well-dressed woman entering the stage laughing her head off. The dead man in Beartrice’ s lover Lazare and the laughing woman is La Veuve (Nehassaiu deGannes). Beartrice is concerned about her position, the future of her three daughters and perhaps the slave Mikeda (Sophia Walker). The latter is a hyperkinetic and comic person who claims that she is a diviner and is able to have the soul of Lazare transferred to her.

The real concern, as I said, is the future of her daughters and the question is can they find decent plaçage positions for them. There is great ball where young girls go accompanied by their mother and seek a good placement. The daughters Agnès (Deborah Castrilli), Maude-Lynn (Rais Clarke-Mendes) and Odette (Ryann Myers), plot to find a way of going to the great ball against their mother’s wishes in search of their fortune.

 (l to r): Rais Clarke-Mendes, Ryann Myers and Deborah Castrilli 

in The House That Will Not Stand. Photo by David Cooper.

In the meantime, Makeda practices her voodoo and claims (not seriously) that Lazare’s spirit has entered her. No everybody believes that.

The central issue and pursuit is freedom. For Beartrice it is the search for a paper signed by her “owner” grating her freedom. Her daughters need to find a wealthy man to give them plaçage in all its variations. After all that is the purpose of the ball, a kind of shopping mall for young women that is not entirely clear. Makeda is perhaps more eager for freedom because she is a slave. The daughters argue and scheme for a placement and one of them finds one only to lose him when one of her sisters takes him away from her.

In the end Makeda gives up her savings for Beartrice to buy the house and subsequently grant Makeda her freedom.

The play has seven characters, all women except for Lazare who is a dead man.

Louisiana in 1803 presents a fascinating historical moment. Some of the details ae abstruse and difficult to explain in a play and the position of women of colour (and there are gradations) and their treatment by the French and uncertainty and fear of what awaits them under the Americans cannot be made clear because of its complexity.

The play takes place during a 24-hour period on a Sunday in Faubourg Treme, New Orleans, Louisiana. Gardley tackled a great and complicated subject that needs more details and substance. As presented it did not engage me and what is worse by the time it reached the final curtain, I started wondering who and why the play was chosen in the first place.

In Philip Akin it has one of the best directors around and one cannot complain about the quality of the acting despite the muddled script. The Huse That Will Not Stand has been produced by university theatres and professional groups including off Broadway, but it does not seem to have received a major staging anywhere. Even the Shaw Festival is producing it in the small Studio Theatre. A disappointment.
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The House That Will Not Stand by Marcus Gardley will run in repertory until October 12, 2024, at the Jackie Maxwell Studio Theatre as part of the Shaw Festival in Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario.  www.shawfest.com.

James Karas is the Senior Editor, Culture of The Greek Press.

ONE MAN, TWO GUVNORS – REVIEW OF 2024 SHAW FESTIVAL PRODUCTION

Reviewed by James Karas 

One Man, To Guvnors as staged by the Shaw Festival should be considered an unstoppable, laugh-producing machine. Yes, it is Richard Bean’s adaptation of Carlo Goldoni’s The Servant of Two Masters and if you look hard enough you will find connections. But who cares and who has the time to look for them.

The production has a master director in Chris Abraham who can turn a simple look, and innocuous movement and a simple sentence into a guffaw, the actors know when to pause, look askance at another performer or the audience, do a pratfall or many pratfalls and produce farcical moves and manners that produce nothing but laughter.

You do need a master farceur like Peter Fernandes as the servant Francis Henshall who is fast of speech, quick of foot and able to get roars of laughter by involving members of the audience. Fernandes is not a small man, but he contorts his body, speaks asides and has a love relationship with the audience that gives him the power to make us laugh.

Get a pratfall star like Matt Alfano as Alfie who makes the audience scream with fear and laughter at his actions. Alfie is supposed to be a doddering waiter who can barely walk. He walks or falls into walls, falls down the stairs, is punched and engages in physical comedy of extraordinary proportions. Alfano is a young athlete and can do almost miraculous moves.

A bit of background.  Goldoni wrote The Servant of Two Masters in 1746 within the tradition of commedia dell’arte. In that that tradition he used stock characters, convoluted plots and physical comedy. He opposed the traditional fashion where actors who specialized in certain roles improvised much of their acting. He insisted that they follow the plot. 

Peter Fernandes as Francis Henshall and Martin 

Happer as Stanley Stubbers. Photo by David Cooper.

Richard Bean’s adaptation takes place in Brighton, England in 1963 instead of Venice and he is reasonably faithful to some of the commedia dell’arte traditions but with a script that must be followed. You will not give a hoot about any of this as you roar with laughter.

Here are a few points about the plot and if you don’t remember any of them, don’t worry about it. More important are the names of the performers whom I want to praise Henshall was the servant of Roscoe Crabbe who is dead. Roscoe’s sister Rachel (Fiona Byrne in a suit) shows up in Brighton disguised as her twin, Roscoe, to claim a pile of dowry money from mobster Charlie Clench (the inimitable Tom Rooney). Roscoe and Clench’s daughter Pauline (Jade Repeta) were to be engaged but he was killed by Stanley (an impressive Martin Happer) who happened to be Rachel’s boyfriend. Are you still with me? 

In the meantime, Pauline wants to marry dufus actor Alan Dangle (Andre Morin) the son of the crooked lawyer Harry Dangle (Patrick Galligan). Furthermore, Francis has his eye and much more on busty Dolly (hilarious Kiera Sangster) who is Clench’s bookkeeper. But He is also hungry and broke and gets the chance to work for Stanley and complications ensue. Don’t forget Allan Louis as Lloyd, a man who knows people from Brixton prison. He and Clench are former prison inmates. All of this and much more will keep you laughing for about two and a half hours. 

I had to mention all the actors to compliment and praise them for their outstanding work.

Chris Abraham choreographs the whole show with meticulous attention and an unfailing feel for the laugh he can evoke from the most unlikely line, look, move, action or reaction. It is a show made for laughs and it succeeds superbly.

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One Man, Two Guvnors by Richard Bean based on The Servant of Two Masters by Carlo Goldoni continues until October 13, 2024, as part of the Shaw Festival in the Festival Theatre, Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario.  www.shawfest.com.

 James Karas is the Senior Editor, Culture of The Greek Press

A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE – REVIEW OF 2024 SOULPEPPER PRODUCTION

Reviewed by James Karas

Soulpepper has very wisely decided to revive its 2019 production of Tennessee Williams’ great play with almost the same cast.

The production is an undeniably superb staging owing to the bravura’s performance of Amy Rutherford as Blanche Dubois. Rutherford faces a character that is fragile, mendacious, egotistical, and trying desperately to conceal the fact that she is at the end of her rope. She has the fading beauty of Blanche, downs alcoholic drinks while pretending not to drink much if at all and wants to be admired for her clothes and her beauty regardless of reality.

Rutherford’s Blanche goes to extremes to appear sophisticated, cultured and a woman of refined tastes who looks down on everyone especially her sister Stella’s lifestyle and the manners of her husband, the “Pollack” Stanly Kowalski. The truth about her life, her lies and the depravity to which she has sunk, come creeping on her until they destroy her.

Rutherford brings out the deteriorating physical appearance, the mannerisms and the body language that define Blanche perfectly in a brilliant and unforgettable  performance. 

Stanley Kowalski played by Mac Fyfe, Blanche DuBois played by 

Amy Rutherford, and Stella Kowalski played by Shakura Dickson. 
Photo: Dahlia Katz

Blanche is the perfect opposite of her sister Stella who has married a crude, ill-mannered man but with whom she is in love, in lust and happy about it. The couple lives on the wrong side of the track but in an integrated community that gets along. Shakura Dickson delineates a sympathetic, tough and humane Stella who understands her sister and tries to cover up the awful reality that she sees. She has made her truce with life and is content but is forced to face the reality of her sister’s delusions and deterioration. Dickson shows Stella’s strengths and humanity and when Blanche is taken away to an asylum, she lets out a heart-wrenching scream that is like an emotional punch in the gut.

Mac Fyfe has no difficulty portraying Stanley. One of the most famous moments occurs when he bellows “Stella” following his drunken abuse of her. He yells her name but he adds two syllables to his bellow and the word Stella is elongated to Stella-ah-ah and modulates his voice to express anguish, regret, fear, terror, it is a masterly touch.

Blanche DuBois played by Amy Rutherford 

and Mitch played by Gregory PrestCredit: Dahlia Katz

What I did not get from Fyfe is the magnetism that should modify his character for the audience and Stella. His lust, his crudeness and love for Stella are there, but there is no other saving characteristic. We should not forget that in the end he becomes a rapist.

Gregory Prest deserves special praise for his portrayal of the decent, lonely, pathetic Mitch who tries to establish a relationship with Blanche. He is quickly disabused when he finds out a few facts about her past.

The set designed by Lorenzo Savoini showed a card table on the left separated by a curtain for  the kitchen and bedroom to the right, A staircase leads to the apartments of the neighbors. In short, it does the job well. The same may be said of the costumes designed by Rachel Forbes.

Director Weyni Mengesha has added some music and a large screen is projected on the stage and we hear a band play. I have no idea why she added the music but I found it distracting and annoying. aside from that I found this a landmark production and Mengesha deserves full credit for attending to the details required for an outstanding production. Except for the music, everything was done meticulously for a great  night at the theatre. 
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A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams continues until July 7, 2024  at the Young Centre for the Performing Arts, 55 Tank House Lane, Toronto, Ontario, M5A 3C4. www.soulpepper.ca

James Karas is the Senior Editor, Culture of The Greek Press