by BRIAN TROMPETER

Staff Writer

 

     Tennessee Williams’ New Orleans is soaked in corruption, lassitude, booze and moral ambiguity.

Keegan Theatre’s production of Williams’ “A Streetcar Named Desire” evokes that atmosphere and provides characters who are both admirable and pitiable.

 

     Stepping off from the streetcar of the play’s title, well-dressed Blanche DuBois (Kerry Waters) is horrified that her sister, Stella Kowalski (Susan Marie Rhea) is living in a French Quarter tenement. Heading straight for the liquor cabinet, Blanche divulges that she left her teaching job because of nerves. One rightly suspects this will be the first of many lies from her.

 

     Blanche meets Stella’s loutish husband, Stanley (Mark Rhea), who cannot hide his attraction for her. This soon fades, however, when the diva takes up residence and hogs the bathroom. Mark Rhea is perfect for the role of Stanley, an animalistic brute who has little use for pretense, chicanery, propriety or politeness. He rumbles with pure, bottled-up aggression and woe to those who venture near the volcano. When people mess with Stanley, he gets in their faces and snarls. When his wife treats him like an employee, he quotes Huey Long and smashes a dirty dinner plate in the kitchen sink. When he sees what he wants, he takes it. That goes for people, too.

 

     As Stella, Susan Marie Rhea shows a woman who sees her husband’s faults but knows the good that’s buried somewhere beneath the muscles, beer gut and wife-beater T-shirt. She forgives his shortcomings, which include drunken punches at her, and stays with him, despite a seemingly marriage-ending episode with Blanche.

 

     Waters’ Blanche is reserved, dignified and not off her rocker, at least at first glance. She’s a liar, drunkard and pedophile, but has enough sense to urge her sister to find less squalid living conditions. Her scene with an underage newspaper collector, played by Joe Baker, is downright creepy. Waters’ accent wavers a bit during the performance, never quite capturing that of an overly pampered Southern belle. Her French, however, is flawless.

 

      Eric Lucas, who directed the play along with Mark Rhea, plays Stanley’s friend Mitch, with whom Blanche flirts and toys. Lucas is charmingly awkward as he tries to court his more devious and experienced quarry. When he learns the truth about Blanche, his reactions are vehement.

 

     The set by George Lucas reflects the Kowalskis’ cheap and ramshackle circumstances. Stanley and Stella eat and entertain at a card table surrounded by unmatching chairs. Not even Blanche’s decorative touches, such as a red Chinese lantern shade over a formerly bare light bulb, can do much to redeem this place.

 

     Keegan’s production captures the spirit of this Tennessee Williams classic. --Brian Trompeter