By Michael J. Toscano
Special to The Washington Post
Thursday, February 8, 2007; PW03
"A Streetcar Named Desire," Tennessee Williams's 1948 Pulitzer Prize-winning drama, is one of those plays in which actors scramble to get parts.
There are few meatier roles than that of Blanche DuBois, the fading Southern belle whose fragile grip on reality slowly disintegrates as the story unfolds, or the character of crude and uncouth Stanley Kowalski, who is all animal energy and desire. It is also a director's dream challenge, filled with steamy atmosphere, pulsing sensuality and Williams's symbolic imagery.
Castaways Repertory Theatre has taken on the challenge with mixed results, producing an effort that tells Blanche's story but fails at creating any atmosphere, mood or tone.
The sexual charge Williams created is significantly dissipated in what seems to be a deliberate decision by director Zina Bleck. Stanley exudes no sensual threat, and a scene of sexual brutality is missing. All that's left is a partial portrait of Blanche, and although that is interesting, it's not the masterpiece Williams created.
Delicate Blanche (Kristine Cornils) shows up at the run-down New Orleans apartment that her sister Stella (Erin M. Gallalee) shares with her brutish husband, Stanley (Pete Sampogna). An aging and lonely beauty, Blanche has somehow lost the family plantation and, for reasons that are not clear, is no longer a teacher.
Blanche and Stanley are opposites and clash immediately. She clings to genteel appearances, while he revels in being crude. She is controlled, while he is all impulse. Blanche's facade dissolves under Stanley's continual assaults until her mysteries are brutally revealed.
Cornils is appropriately wispy and ethereal as Blanche, moving as if in a dream. Blanche constantly flirts with Stanley, but Cornils shows there's no joy or sexual attraction present; it's the only way Blanche knows how to relate to men. Cornils starts with a clear voice and an animated expression, but there is weariness in her eyes and voice that tells us this is a mask the character is working hard to maintain. We see her struggling to uphold the imperious appearance of pride, especially as she furtively drinks too much and begins to lose herself in fantasy. Cornils carefully calibrates Blanche's gradual dissolution, holding our interest as clues about the woman's mysterious past pile up.
Sampogna is an unusual choice for Stanley, described by Williams as full of feral energy, a lithe and sweaty animal. Sampogna is mild, compact and tightly coiled. He's buff, but not big and muscular in the sloppy way Stanley is. Sampogna doesn't lope -- he moves with tidy precision. He is also significantly hampered by the director-imposed limits, and perhaps a result of that is a lack of sensual zing between him and the women.
Gallalee is a worthy Stella, softly rounded and earthy, while Doug Nelson is credible as Mitch, Stanley's short-tempered pal who begins to court Blanche. Other members of the 10-person cast make little impression.
Bleck strands the actors onstage with little theatrical support. Scenic design is furniture heaped in a jumble against a plain curtain background, a staircase providing the spot for Stanley to bellow for his Stella. Evocative lighting is nonexistent; flat white lighting brightly illuminates actors regardless of the time of day or intended ambiance of the scene. The oppressive heat, the sweaty bodies, the open windows letting in the sounds of the French Quarter, the claustrophobia of the two-room apartment that Williams wrote into the play don't exist here.
Everyone is dry and crisp, and Blanche, who hates the light, is constantly bathed in it. A ghostly vision from Blanche's past is confusing and seemingly out of place in bright lights.
Cornils may take us on an interesting trip, but otherwise, this "Streetcar" stalls short of its destination.
"A Streetcar Named Desire" continues through Feb. 17, performed by Castaways Repertory Theatre at Ferlazzo Auditorium in the Dr. A.J. Ferlazzo Building, 15941 Donald Curtis Dr., Woodbridge. Showtime Friday and Saturday is 8 p.m. with a Saturday matinee tomorrow at 1 p.m. For information or tickets, call 703-508-5418 or go tohttp://www.castawaystheatre.org.
