Taking its title from New Orleans’ famous French Quarter, Tennessee Williams’ overtly autobiographical play Vieux Carré tells the story of a nameless young writer (his namelessness perhaps reflecting the playwright’s decision, made around the time the play was written, to abandon his own birth name of Tom and adopt the sobriquet by which he is best known) and his time spent in a decaying New Orleans boarding house. His fellow residents – including the landlady – are variously dying or insane, the play’s mood is languorous, the story minimal.
Though Williams began writing Vieux Carré shortly after moving to New Orleans in 1938, he did not finish it for almost 40 years; the play’s original Broadway production, which opened on 11 May 1977, closed after just five performances. It’s easy to see why.
As a drama, Vieux Carré does not satisfy. Its characters, including the Writer (Thomas Blackburne); Nightingale, a consumptive homosexual artist (Stephen Whittaker); the slumming and sickly society girl Jane Sparks (Samantha Murray) and her brutish lover, Tye McCool (Des Fleming) an alcoholic strip-club barker, lack depth and substance – though it’s tempting to see Tye as an early version of a more rounded Williams character, Stanley Kowalski.
The plot, such as it is, recalls the structure of a road movie – the Writer encounters various characters and situations over the play’s 150 minutes rather than there being a clear story arc featuring drama, conflict and resolution – but save for increased self-confidence he seems little changed by his time at 722 Toulouse Street; an impression that is not aided by Blackburne’s somewhat bland performance in the lead role.
More impressive are Samantha Murray as Jane, and Kelly Nash as the increasingly erratic landlady, Mrs Wire: though prone to overacting in some scenes where director Alice Bishop fails to rein her in, Nash successfully captures her character’s anguish, and Murray gives a solid, measured performance throughout. As Mrs Wire’s long-suffering servant, Nursie (a role seemingly written as an African-American character) Francesca Waters does well with a limited role. Conversely, Maureen Hartley and Brenda Palmer as the senile and starving old ladies Mary Maude and Miss Carrie seem to be acting in a completely different play; their exaggerated performances do not suit this production – again, a directorial fault. Bishop has blocked the play well, but does not successfully present its scenes of heightened emotions, such as Mrs Wire’s occasional moments of hysteria; perhaps too close to the material, she has also resisted cutting some minor characters and moments, which could have increased the production’s pace and shortened its interminable running time.
The most effective element of this production is the superb set, created by Alexandra Hiller; a detailed and evocative representation of the many rooms and floors of the boarding house in which the play takes place. John Dutton’s lighting design and the haunting live score are also impressive.
Overall, Vieux Carré is an uneven production of a flawed work – one for Tennessee Williams devotees only.
Rating: 3 stars out of 5
Itch Productions present
Vieux Carré
By Tennessee Williams
Directed by Alice Bishop
Sound design: Nat Grant
Musicians: Bob McGowan (guitar) and piano (Josh Blau)
Lighting design: John Dutton
Set design: Alexandra Hiller
Cast: Thomas Blackburne, Josh Blau, Des Fleming, Maureen Hartley, Samantha Murray, Kelly Nash, Brenda Palmer, Dallas Palmer, Francesca Waters and Stephen Whittaker
fortyfivedownstairs, Melbourne
17 January – 3 February
Midsumma Festival
www.midsumma.org.au
13 January – 3 February
