.Santa Cruz Shakespeare Meets an American Masterpiece

The bittersweet poetry of Tennessee Williams casts a spell in The Glass Menagerie, the fourth production in the Santa Cruz Shakespeare 2024 season.

What a pleasure it is to finally have one of my longstanding wishes come true and see a play by one of America’s most distinguished and controversial playwrights produced by this company. An early work strongly based upon the playwright’s own troubled youth, Menagerie is a perfect place to start. But hopefully this company’s affair with Williams will continue.

The work earns its reputation by leaving an emotional echo that continues long after the lights have gone down. Much of the enchantment must be credited to Charles Pasternak, as skilled a director as he is actor. His light touch with this script is matched by his ability to supercharge the powerful tensions that electrify his actors. Bravo to all.

Repertory casts its spell once again. Tom, played by the agile Will Block, introduces the characters, including himself, his mother Amanda (Marion Adler), sister Laura (Allie Pratt) and “a gentleman caller” (Charles Pasternak). That symbolic gentleman caller is “the long-delayed but always expected something that we live for.” Thanks to the nimble performance by Block, we are able to occupy his narrative overview as well as his entrapment in a life shared with two lonely, abandoned women. Underscoring everything is Tennessee Williams’ love letter to those who are, as he says, different. Despite the misty chill of opening night, the audience hung on every moment of the SCS cast’s plunge into familiar dreams in a heartbreaking scenario.

Deception, illusion and longing perfume the poignant moments of the play. Living in the past, and worn down by disappointment, mother Amanda eternally replays her giddy girlhood as a belle in the deep south.

In seclusion forced by her awkward limp, Laura lives in a timeless present of music played on the old phonograph and a collection of tiny glass animals that she endlessly polishes, rearranges and cares for.

As the playwright’s surrogate, Tom alone lives for the future, the future he can’t wait to escape into, the future that will take him away from this cramped tenement, and a meaningless job in a shoemakers warehouse. Tired of escaping into Hollywood movie adventures, he wants to live a real adventure.

When Tom invites a work friend, Jim, home for dinner, his mother’s obsessive fantasies for Laura’s future spin into high gear. Fussing and reminiscing, preening and nagging, Marion Adler’s Amanda practically levitates with excitement over the prospect of her daughter finally enjoying some attention that she herself craves. This explosion of pent-up longing, her character’s desperate anticipation—a gorgeous eruption of emotions—left the audience breathless.

Williams lets his own character explode in stunning tour de force. Unable to endure his mother’s hovering, relentless criticism, Tom unleashes a cascade of truth-telling sarcasm about what he really does with his evenings. Block is a powerhouse in this pivotal revelation, channeling Tennessee Williams’ own sense of helpless rage over his literary aspirations.

As the gentleman caller, director Pasternak orchestrates a delicate exchange of dreams, coaxing the painfully shy Laura into smiles, even laughter. Here Allie Pratt’s Laura drifts in and out of internal reverie and lucidity. So many colors appear in her characterization of the sweet, troubled Laura. It is an appealing performance and a tribute to both actor and director. Their scene dancing together by candlelight conjures real magic, a moment as timeless as Laura’s fragile glass animals. The final moments embody great theater.

Watching this taut production in the Grove, at night, heightened the intimacy this play requires. And the illusion was polished by the seamless production team. Scenic design by Michael Schweikardt was punctuated by the impeccable costumes of B. Modern, the magical lighting of Marcella Barbeau and Luke Shepherd’s sweet nostalgic sound work. Together they have given the quartet of players a setting that takes us back 80 years into the world Tennessee Williams recalled with poet’s eye and the heartache of a misfit artist. This great artwork is about the people for whom we sacrifice, and the point at which we can sacrifice no longer. Tom can leave his stultifying life but he can’t escape the past, and those he loved and abandoned.

The Glass Menagerie is a haunting play, performed with insight. Such a bold move on the part of Santa Cruz Shakespeare, expanding itself into a longer, richer season. We are incredibly lucky. Here is professional work, enchanting and provocative, performed in a eucalyptus grove in a small community on a northern California Riviera. Don’t even think about taking for granted the presence of this evolving theater company.

The Glass Menagerie, directed by Charles Pasternak, Santa Cruz Shakespeare Grove, DeLaveaga Park, through Sept. 28. Full-moon performance 7pm on Tuesday, Sept. 17.