THEATRE REVIEW:

“A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE” at San Diego Repertory Theatre

Published in Orange County Register February 1996

"I don't want realism," asserts Blanche DuBois. "I want magic." And, in his 1947 Pulitzer Prize-winning play, as well as in his life, Tennessee Williams felt the same.

In a multicultural production of “A Streetcar Named Desire,” San Diego Repertory Theatre director Sam Woodhouse has set the piece in a magically musical environment, but the story unfolds in gritty realism, parenthesizing Williams' poetry.

This is a drama of dualities, both in theme and character. It's the genteel Southerner versus the working class Northerner, the aesthete vs. the brute, spirituality versus carnality, repression versus release. For the play to work, the dichotomous nature of the characters has to be heightened, so we can be astonished, enthralled, appalled -- and sympathetic.

That is the genius of the 1951 film; it engenders discomfort, even distress, but also compassion. Vivien Leigh and Marlon Brando faced off as the fluttering former-belle, Blanche DuBois and the sweatily virile Stanley Kowalski. Standing helpless in the middle of this psychosocial battleground was Stella, unable to prevent her husband's inevitable destruction of her sister.

Woodhouse, in an effort to replicate the intercultural ambiance of New Orleans, cast a white Stanley (Matte Osian) and African American sisters. Obie Award winner Pamala Tyson is Blanche and Sabrina ("The Cosby Show") LeBeauf is Stella. So far, so good. There is a long precedent of black and interracial productions of “Streetcar.” Woodhouse mixes it up just fine, with a range of colors, cultures and dialects.

Michelle Riel's design concept is a cluttered cutaway which is detailed but not starkly realistic. It is, however, unflatteringly lit by John Philip Martin. Michael Roth wraps the production in an evocative cacophony of international sounds, a jaunty, wailing mixture of live and taped blues, jazz, honky tonk, industrial rock and primal drumbeats. Mary Larson's costumes are perfect.

But center stage, in the midst of that maelstrom, we want to feel something for Stanley and for Blanche. Osian starts out with every line reading an echo of Brando. Gradually, he comes into his own, as a brawny, bestial, angry, boorish, sexual being. But he doesn't show us Stanley's sensitive side, his boyishness, his deep devotion to Stella. This Stanley is all physical, and that makes him monochromatic and unsympathetic.

Tyson's Blanche is his monstrous match. Unlike Osian, she plays against prior portrayals, and highlights Blanche's fierce, feline, survival instinct, downplaying her fragility and artistic sensibility. Though it's is a powerful performance, it's ultimately an unsatisfying one. This Blanche is so rapacious, so brazenly flirtatious and manipulative, you don't gasp or cringe at her ultimate ruination.

The delightful surprise of this production is how LeBeauf makes Stella sparkle. Typically a rather colorless, ineffectual character, this Stella is multi-faceted: giddy but sensible, plain but extremely sensual. It's a wonderful performance. And Bill Dunnam does well by Mitch, poker buddy to Stanley and suitor to Blanche. He capably balances a very tough exterior with a very credible soft side.

That kind of nuance is in short supply here. Toward the end, melodrama replaces dramatic tension, and there's an excess of screaming, anger, overacting and ancillary commotion.

In many ways, this is a daring and muscular production. What's missing is subtlety and poetry.

©1996 Patté Productions Inc.