This is “The Glass Menagerie” the way the playwright intended it.
“My goal is to really get as close to what Tennessee Williams wanted in this play,” Director Mark Steensland said. “There are certain scenes that over the years have sort of become distorted from his original intentions. So we’re getting back to that.”
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Independent Players continues its 40th anniversary season with the classic play, which runs May 4-19 at Elgin Art Showcase in downtown Elgin. Performances are at 7:30 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays.
“What makes this such a classic is that it is psychologically true to life,” Steensland said. “And it’s just a wonderful, wonderful vehicle for good actors, and those I have.”
Set in 1930s St. Louis, the play tells the story through the recollections of Tom, who shares an apartment with his former Southern belle mother, Amanda, and his older sister, Laura. Amanda is obsessed with finding a husband for the very shy Laura, who walks with a limp as a result of polio and spends much of her time with her collection of glass animals.
To escape the boredom of real life, Tom often goes to the movies. When he invites co-worker Jim over for dinner one night, Amanda seizes the opportunity to make a match for Laura. While Jim encourages Laura to overcome her shyness, he also reveals he is engaged, shattering Amanda and Laura’s illusion of what might have been.
Premiering in 1944, “The Glass Menagerie” is Williams’ first successful play. Steensland said one of the reasons the play has endured through the years is the because of the characters Williams created.
“It’s a character piece. These are flawed people, but Tennessee Williams has such compassion for them, you can’t help rooting for them,” he said. “And even when they have qualities that might be crippling for their success in life, he finds a beauty in those things.”
Steensland, who lives in Elgin, said the play has always been one of his favorites.
“My parents actually saw the original production on their honeymoon in 1945,” he said. “The play started out in Chicago, that’s where they saw it, before it moved to Broadway,” he said. “… I’ve always wanted to direct it, and now I have the chance.”
As director Steensland wanted to present the play as Williams envisioned it. That includes a pivotal scene with Laura and Jim.
“Over the years, this has been played, more often that not, as a pseudo love scene, and it isn’t really,” he said. “Laura has been smitten with this boy ever since she knew him in high school. She didn’t know him well. It’s a coincidence that he’s coming to dinner.
“He doesn’t really fall for her, he tells her what he thinks she needs to know to help herself get over her shyness,” he said. “But he’s more of a motivational speaker, if anything else. He speaks in generalities. So the emphasis is a little different from what you otherwise see.”
The play also originally had a lot of background music, which Steensland is also using.
“We’re using the original music for it, which you don’t hear too often. It adds real atmosphere to the play,” he said. “We’re using a lot of lighting effects too, because this play is not meant to be realistic. It’s poetic and based on memory, and you know memory isn’t always accurate. We exaggerate some things in our memory, we forget other things. Memory is fragmented. So all of this comes into play.”
‘The Glass Menagerie’
When: May 4-19
Where: Elgin Art Showcase, Professional Building 8th Floor, 164 Division St., Elgin
Tickets: $15 adult; $12 seniors (age 65+); $10 students (age 14-21)
Information: 847-697-7374; www.independentplayers.org
Kathy Cichon is a freelance reporter for The Courier-News.
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