Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Georgia Dale

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams

provide you with an insight into our productions and take you on a journey through the creative process. They are compiled by emerging direct and the creative team, giving you unique access to the production. ing directors by offering a range of opportunities to help them develop their craft. These packs are produced by the Taking Part Department at the Young Vic. Taking Part is committed to offering our community in Lambeth and Southwark a wealth of opportunities to be involved in the big world inside the Young Vic. We produce work with local schools, young people and adults, which run alongside our professional productions. From the plays we produce, to the way that we produce them and all of the other work t interest everyone. If you live or study in Lambeth or Southwark and would like to find out more about our work or get involved please visit www.youngvic.org/takingpart http://youngviclondon.wordpress.com/category/taking-part/ If you have any questions about these packs or our work please contact schools@youngvic.org We hope you enjoy learning about our production from the inside. The Taking Part Team

Written by: Susanna Gould Edited by: Georgia Dale With thanks to Natasha Nixon Photos by Johan Persson, unless otherwise stated First performed at the Young Vic on 23 July 2014 2

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Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams Contents

Introduction Part 1: The Director, Benedict Andrews (page 5) Part 2: The Play and the Playwright (page 9) Synopsis of A Streetcar Named Desire The Different Levels of Streetcar Literal Symbolic/ Mythological Allegorical The Playwright: Tennessee Williams The Language and Poetry of Tennessee Williams Part3: From Page to Stage (page 20) Collecting Images Concept/Design Berlin production Part 4: In the Rehearsal Room (page 33) Realising the Vision Work on Scenes: Scene 2 Transition and Scene 3 Scene 11 Part 5: Meet the Creative Team (page 41) Benedict Andrews talks to Natasha Nixon Interview with Magda Willi, Designer Interview with Ben Foster, Stanley Interview with Frankie Finney, Deputy Stage Manager In the press

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Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams

Hello, Welcome to Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire chance to write about one of my favourite plays and to observe the process of turning it into an extraordinary production. I love Tennessee Williams for his incredible ability to write so beautifully about human experience, create atmosphere and capture emotions. Streetcar is such a clever, complex play - it somehow encompasses a massive historical and social shift, ost fundamental issues, and yet, through its finely nuanced characterisation, is completely and utterly human. Watching this production evolve has been particularly special because, like the text, it is incredibly beautiful. Through taking really bold, unconventional decisions, Benedict Andrews, the cast and creative team, have created something that totally captures the essence been in rehearsals throughout and I have loved experiencing how it changes and enhances perspective, creates images and makes the audience eavesdroppers and voyeurs. I am excited by the kind of work Benedict creates because it seems to take what is felt rather than stated in the text, and make it visible, audible and palpable onstage. What I have tried to do in this pack is give some sense of the creative process that lies behind this, the journey from page to stage. I have tried to give a sense of the text itself, and how this has been used as what Tennessee Williams himself described Everyone working on the production has been so generous with access to the rehearsal room, their time, and the insights they have provide process of researching and writing this pack enormously, and I hope you enjoy reading it. Susanna

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams

Part 1: The Director, Benedict Andrews

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams Part 1: The Director, Benedict Andrews The Young Vic prides itself on its stages: it is not only about programming great plays, but matching these plays with great directors who will make them live, make them speak to us about ourselves and our own time, and possibly make us see them in a new way. For David Lan, the Artistic Director of now, and if a play is worth doing cts him to the work of directors like Benedict Andrews. Benedict is the multi-award-winning Australian-born director, of both theatre and opera, the fact that he has worked extensively both internationally, and in his homeland, creating a body of work that encompasses both classic and new texts. He has regularly collaborated with Cate Blanchett at The Sydney Theatre Company, where productions include the highlyacclaimed The War of the Roses Gross und Klein The Maids. It is telling that Benedict has worked extensively with Schaub端hne am Lehniner Platz in Berlin: like Ivo van Hove, who directed t A View From the Bridge The text is central, but is also metamorphosed into a theatrical language of image and sound in time and space.

The War of the Roses, Sydney Theatre Company / Sydney Festival, January 2009 (Top row, left and centre) Part One Richard III; (Top row, right; Bottom row, left and centre) Part Two Henry IV and V; (Bottom row, right) Part Three Henry IV and V Photography Tania Kelley & Benedict Andrews (www.benedictandrews.com)

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Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams Aesthetic voke the 1

Images from The War of the Roses [see page 6] show a stage filled with gold confetti, playing against the empty space of later scenes, all the glitter swept away; a ring of men with bags on their heads; a stage strewn with flowers; The Seagull shows Masha standing in black sequins behind an ink-black veil. In another image, from Measure For Measure, Isabella Three Sisters, was similarly visually constructed: a classic text borne of the Naturalist movement2, and often staging was instead, in the words of the theatre critic Michael Billington3 Beckett4 other words there was an emptiness and bleakness to the set and staging. Whilst the bare stage and mound of earth is obviously not the literal setting of the play, or the emptiness and bleakness that resonates throughout the text of Three Sisters.

(Top row, left) The Seagull, Belvoir Street Theatre, Sydney, June 2011, Photography Heidrun Lรถhr (Top row, right) Measure for Measure, Belvoir Street Theatre, Sydney, June 2010, Photography Heidrun Lรถhr (Bottom row) Three Sisters, Young Vic, London, September 2012, Photography Simon Annand

http://www.realtimearts.net/article/issue42/5722 2 th th A movement in European drama and theatre of the late 19 and early 20 century which attempted to create the illusion of reality 3 See http://www.theguardian.com/stage/2012/sep/14/three-sisters-review 4 The Modernist playwright Samuel Beckett, 1906-1989, known for his bleak, existential explorations of the human condition, such as Waiting For Godot

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Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams Staying True to the Text atre and directing. Some would argue that this treatment is too radical and not what Chekhov intended; that if and a table being set for lunch, this is what should be on the stage. However, it could be said that such a literal rendering of the text does less to illuminate its feelings and ideas, the heart of the text, than something more abstract might. It could be argued that the stage directions are actually clues to the atmosphere and emotional undercurrents of the play rather than simply the backdrop to the story. In Streetcar, as we will see, Tennessee Williams uses setting in both a literal and symbolic way both in terms of the area of New Orleans where Stella and Stanley live, and the space of the apartment negotiated by Stanley and Blanche and he creates atmosphere through the use of characters such as the Mexican Woman who appears only to call out her wares, 5 V various moments throughout the play. This, in turn, potentially forms the basis of a more poetic type of theatrical production. In an article for RealTime Arts magazine, Benedict n language forms a skeleton of ideas and emotions which are brought 6

in some senses a play text does not exist

until it is given life in the theatre. play in a book is hardly more than an archite destroyed. The color, the grace and levitation, the structural pattern in motion, the quick interplay of live beings, suspended like fitful lightning in a cloud, these things are the play, not word articulate the magic and poetry of theatre, the intangible, visceral atmosphere that a great play evokes and which, arguably, cannot be communicated literally. It is not about ignoring the written text but about finding a new way to make it speak through performance; looking embedded in the writing, and finding expression for them in a tangible, physical form such the text. A useful analogy is the difference between poetry and prose as in poetry ideas sed realistically, but suggested, often metaphorically -

His work is marked by the intense and fragile beauty of its imagery and the sense of deep metaphor lying beneath the narrative surface. In an artform that needs to be both popular -Neil Armfield, 2005 Sidney Myer Performing Arts Award Citation.7

A Tamale is a dish, made of dough and containing a filling such as meat, cheese or vegetables, originating from Central America 6

http://www.realtimearts.net/article/issue42/5722 7 See www.benedictandrews.com

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Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams

Part 2: The Play and the Playwright

Tenessee Williams

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Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams Part 2: The Play and the Playwright Synopsis of A Streetcar Named Desire A Streetcar Named Desire depicts the mental deterioration of Blanche DuBois, who comes to visit her sister, Stella, and brother-in-law, Stanley Kowalski, in New Orleans. Blanche and Stella have had a privileged upbringing on a plantation in the Southern States, but the and other members of the family. Though Blanche had been married, she had discovered her husband was homosexual, and, subsequent to this discovery, he had shot himself. Unmarried, and having lost her inheritance, Blanche is now essentially destitute. She has left her job as an English teacher, and is in a state of heightened nerves. It is in this state Stella and Stanley live in a working-class, run-down and boisterous, but vibrant, portrayed from the outset as moth-like and fragile. She has not seen Stella for ten years, and is shocked to find her sister living in such poor conditions. This adds to her already incredibly anxious state, and she drinks surreptitiously to steady her nerves. Her tension, which grows as Stanley arrives home from bowling, and he and Blanche meet for the first time: their characters are shown in drastic contrast to each other from the start, both in terms of social background and class, and their sensibilities and outlook on life. Tension builds as Stella tells Stanley about the loss of Belle Reve and asks him not to mention yet that she is pregnant. Stanley does not believe the estate was lost, and suggests that Blanche is swindling Stella and, in turn, him. Whilst Blanche is in the bath the first of many she takes in the course of the play to calm her nerves Stanley rifles through her trunk, looking for papers which might prove his suspicions. Although he does not find any, the amount of clothing and jewellery Blanche possesses heightens his suspicions. Emerging from her bath, Blanche sends Stella out and, after a tense exchange, presents Stanley with the legal documents for Belle Reve. During the course of the conversation, Stanley reveals that Stella is going to have a baby. Stella and Blanche go out for the evening, as Stanley and his male friends are having a poker-night. They return home late, but the game is still going on and the men have been her on the thigh in front of his friends. She and Blanche retire to the bedroom, where Blanche encounters Harold Mitchell (Mitch) emerging from the bathroom. Blanche immediately returns later to use the bathroom again, he stays to talk to her rather than returning to the poker game. When Blanche switches on the radio that Stanley has already turned off once, Stanley loses his temper, throws the radio out the window and Stella retaliates furiously. Things spiral completely out of control as Stanley goes for Stella and has to be restrained by his friends; and Blanche and Stella flee upstairs. However, after Stanley recovers and pleads for his wife, Stella comes back down to the apartment leaving Blanche to spend the night with the upstairs neighbour, Eunice. throwing around ideas as to how they might do this together, one of which is to contact an old admirer of hers, Shep Huntleigh. Stella makes it clear she has no intention of leaving Stanley and there is a heated discussion between the two sisters in which Blanche makes her

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Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams Stanley starts making enquiries about Blanche, trying to get information on her and her past. Meanwhile, Blanche has started dating Mitch in the hope that he will marry her and she will no longer need to depend on Stella and Stanley. One evening, whilst waiting for Mitch to pick her up, Stanley tells Blanche that he has met someone who says he met Blanche at a place called The Hotel Flamingo, back in Laurel where Blanche had been living. Blanche denies this, but the suggestion has clearly disturbed her. She is verging on hysterical, asks Stella for a drink, and subsequently questions Stella about what she has that she has been forced into this through her lack of finances. After Stella leaves to join Stanley on a night out, a young man calls by to collect money for the Evening Star newspaper. Blanche invites him in, flirts with him and eventually kisses him. The young man leaves just as Mitch arrives for their date. Blanche and Mitch arrive home late after their date, and Stella and Stanley are still out. It has not been a successful evening. Blanche tells Mitch that she had been married very young, and that she had then discovered her husband with another man. Although they had all pretended nothing had happened, her husband shot himself shortly afterwards. Blanche breaks down telling the story to Mitch and he responds by suggesting that they should be together. home and tells Stella what he has unearthed about her sister. According to Stanley, Blanche has a bad reputation back in her home town of Laurel and, rather than leaving her teaching job, has been sacked for an affair with a seventeen-year-old boy. Stanley tells Stella that he has brought Blanche a bus ticket and that she has to leave. However, he does not immediately confront Blanche when she emerges from the bathroom. Stella has invited has discovered, and Mitch does not turn up. Blanche becomes increasingly distressed, and when Stanley presents her with the bus ticket to Laurel, she runs to the bathroom to be sick. Stanley reproaches Stella for how things have changed between them since Blanche arrived, e taken to hospital. Whilst Stanley and Stella are at the hospital, Mitch arrives and confronts Blanche with her take home to his mother. Blanche screams for him to leave and, once he has left, she starts drinking and dressing up in her various dresses and jewels. Stanley arrives home from the hospital, where Stella is remaining for the night. He and as become bizarre and delusional, and the animosity between her and Stanley descends into aggression. Stanley becomes increasingly threatening and eventually he attacks Blanche and rapes her. The last scene of the play takes place some weeks after Blanch now completely delusional. Although she has told Stella what happened, Stella has chosen not to believe her. Although she is unsure it is the right thing, Stella has arranged to have Blanche taken to hospital. Blanche does not realise this and thinks she is going to stay in the countryside with Shep Huntleigh, the admirer she has tried to contact earlier on in the play. The doctor and nurse arrive and, although Blanche initially resists, she is persuaded to go with them. Stella is distraught, but the play ends with her embracing Stanley, and the

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Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams Part 2: The Play and the Playwright The Different Levels of Streetcar and communication. She or he will have a sense of what the play is about, meaning, and set about finding a way of communicating this to an audience via the various theatrical means. When working with text a director will usually have done months of preparation and research before he or she even gets into the rehearsal room. Much of this is likely to be work on the text, understanding it in depth. As with any piece of literature, A Streetcar Named Desire is much more than its storyline. It works on several different levels and there are themes, ideas and motifs embedded in the characters, their language and actions in about Streetcar having levels. So, what might this mean? The distinctions below are inevitably somewhat simplified, but aim at being a starting point for considering the text. Literal It is, perhaps, useful to start by considering what the difference is between literal and allegorical, mythological or symbolic. On one level, there is the literal, realistic, concrete human story of the characters in the play, their actions and emotional responses to events. virtue of being in a play, these are universal emotions that everyone recognises and most, if not all, experience at some point or other. He is interested in, and sympathetic to, human beings and what makes them tick. In Streetcar Williams has created completely truthful characters who are beautifully and humanly complex, and it is possible to see the play as (amongst other things) an exploration of jealousy and insecurity, loneliness, and the need to survive. As we have seen, Blanche is described from 8

appearance is suggestive of a delicate creature, a moth. Set against this is the tough brutality of Stanley Kowalski, who has his own needs and sense of self to protect and, as the play unfolds, a complex psychological struggle between these characters ensues, culminating partly in this complexity with which he draws his characters. For example, Blanche is not portrayed completely sympathetically and is shown to be, at times, manipulative, snobby and, ironically, insensitive. Likewise, there are moments when even Stanley appears, if not play goes beyond the palpable contrast between them, and creates a web of different emotions and psychological actions, subtle and nuanced. For example, after Blanche and in Scene Two about what has happened to Belle Reve, Stanley, apparently casually, throws into conversation that Stella is pregnant, despite the fact that Stella has explicitly told him not to do so until Blanche is less anxious. Benedict talked about the big human questions of the play, including memories and tory and survival; and desire. Tennessee Williams often writes about memory, and the author Bernard De by 8

characters, suggesting that there are certain things that

See section on The Playwright: Tennessee Williams, page ?

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Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams have to be blocked out or denied in order to survive. Stella, for example, says towards the with him. Her words suggest that it is not a case of simply disbelieving that Stanley could do such a thing, but an active choice, which at least presupposes an element of doubt and

Williams also often writes about sex, though in his plays it is often necessary to read between the lines a bit to discover this. For Benedict, Streetcar 9

that the opposite of desire is death (Scene Nine, page 206)10. Much of what has happened gr

-and-love-

Symbolic/Mythological Although Streetcar works on this human, psychological level, the characters and their story are also symbolic, standing for something more abstract and poetic. As we have seen, Blanche is portrayed from the outset as delicate and fragile. Apart from her moth-like appearance, she cannot seem to cope with loud noises, and has an express dislike of bright light. In Scene Three of the play she famously asks Mitch to put a paper lantern she has Blanche has a concrete reason for not wanting to be seen in the light she is scared of looking old and believes her looks have faded the naked light bulb also stands for a brashness and reality that she cannot cope with. Throughout the play she takes hot baths to calm her nerves. Again, although this has a factual, concrete basis in the idea of being calmed by hot water, it is also suggestive of a possible to view Blanche as symbolic of tender, Tied in with this is the way Blanche embodies fantasy and illusion as an escape from reality. The issue of the light bulb also brings this into play, making reality, for Blanche, synonymous with rudeness and vulgarity. In Scene Nine she explicitly states her need for fantasy , and the denial of what is real, reverberates through the play in, for example, the letter Blanche writes to Shep at the beginning of Scene Five, and the constant references to this old admirer of hers which culminate in her delusional phone call to him in Scene Ten, and expectation of his arrival in little details like her insistence on referring to Eunice and Steve as Mr and Mrs Hubbel, in Scene Six, and in asking Mitch to bow to her when he arrives at the end of Scene Five. In direct contrast to Blanche we have Stanley, who can be seen as symbolic of what animalistic terms, and his abrupt idiom is drastically different 9

See interview with Benedict Andrews, page 42 All page references are to the Penguin Twentieth Century Classics edition, ed. E. Martin Brown 11 A Streetcar Named Desire : Benedict Andrews Gives Blanche and Stanley a th y 20 July 2014 10

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Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams poeticism. On meeting Blanche he immediately removes his sweat-soaked shirt something which she would have considered impolite - jokes about Stella falling down the toilet and asks Blanche about her marriage which, we discover, ended tragically (it is unclear whether Stanley knows this at this point). If Blanche can be said to represent fantasy and illusion, Stanley Kowalski represents a drive for truth and reality. Again, the complexity of the play means that neither fantasy nor reality are presented purely as good or bad, though the tension between the two is clear. This is, perhaps, most explicit in Scene Ten, , in which each character tries to impose their own version of events on the other. The tension in the play between Stanley and Blanche becomes a clash between two different ways of looking at the world. In this particular situation, each threatens the other because, way of life slipping away and of which Stella is the only other potential survivor. In this context, in one of the most violent ways possible. The symbolism of the play extends to a number of details within the text. For example, the -ending cycle, or inability to escape. A number of mythological references in the play contribute to its symbolic aspect. For example, Elysian Fields, the name of the area where Stanley and Stella live in New Orleans, is a term from Greek mythology which refers to the final resting place of heroic and victorious souls, those who had died in battle. Allegorical America post- World War II understanding it is to see it as a specific type of symbolism - using characters or events to symbolise ideas. Although, as we have seen, Streetcar works on a human, psychological level, arguably the story and characters of Streetcar are also representative of wider issues, with Stanley and Blanche being particularly symbolic. Crudely put, Stanley can be seen as representative of the machismo evident in American society after WWII, with Blanche being representative of an older set of values that were being swept aside at that time.

Streetcar was first published in 1947, not long after the end of World War II, and in many ways Stanley and Blanche can be seen as representative of tensions which arose in the aftermath of this conflict. America had helped crush Nazi Germany. Many Americans had lost their lives, but those that returned home were hailed as war heroes and, as a result, many saw the middle and lower classes as symbolic of the true American spirit of heroism. Equally, this became synonymous with the values of family and home, as many of those who returned were ready to settle down with wives, children and steady jobs. Although women did serve in the military during the war, this was a predominantly male area and, therefore, representative of a strong masculinity. Following the defeat of Germany, a strong sense of this masculinity, bravado and victory, pervaded America.

It is no coincidence that Williams has made Stanley working class and, not only a decorated war hero, but a soldier of the 125). In the picture Stella shows to Blanche before Stanley arrives home, he is wearing his medals and, although Stella assures Blanche the kind of pride and patriotism felt at the

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Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams contrast, are of a privileged, moneyed upper class. They have grown up on a plantation12 in the South, which puts them into the bracket of wealthy, landed aristocracy. The upper class from which both Stella and Blanche come was particularly unpopular following the war: the Great Depression of the 1930s had affected millions, bringing unemployment, high interest rates and debt, and many saw this upper class as blind to the struggles of ordinary working and middle class people. This opinion of the upper class served to further underline the heroism of the A whole mythology surrounded the way of life common to the wealthy Southern states where Blanche and Stella grew up, alongside or perhaps because of complicated codes of social conduct in society and culture. Men and women prided themselves on good breeding and good manners. Men were expected to be chivalrous and women were expected to cultivate an air of mystique and charm which was reverenced by the men. Amanda Wingfie The Glass Menagerie, continually references this way of life, constantly regretting its demise. This demise is, again, relevant to Streetcar. After the war, and following the Depression, a new era of economic prosperity was ushered in, fuelled by an increased consumption of goods and an increased productivity to meet this. This, in turn, resulted in a wide-spread industrialisation which had no time for the dreamy Southern ideals of chivalry and inheritance. Having been largely rural, and dependent on agriculture, the South became more industrialised and urbanised after 1945, and attracted national and international migrants. The difference in social class between Stanley and Blanche is an explicit source o Blanche is disturbed by what she sees as a lack of as an allegory of the destruction of an older way of life by modern forces; and of a privileged elite by the emergent hard-working masses. Early on in the process Benedict tender, the sensitive, the delicate by the savage and brutal force of

A plantation is a farm or estate where crops are grown on a large scale, to be sold commercially. The plantation owner would normally live on the plantation in a large mansion. Cotton, tobacco and sugar cane were common crops in the southern states of America

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Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams Part 2: The Play and the Playwright The Playwright: Tennessee Williams d poeticism. His plays and short stories are peopled with characters with fragile souls and minds that are often lost in memory and story/fantasy rather than fully aware of the present or reality. Tennessee Williams is often drawn to the misfit, and has a particular sensibility for what makes people vulnerable. Referring to his whole body of work (not just Streetcar), A Streetcar Named Desire characters can be traced throughout his work. For example, there is Laura in The Glass Menagerie, a girl who spends all her time with a collection of glass animals, afraid to go out in the world; and her mother Amanda, who, stuck in a dreary St Louis apartment, like Blanche, dreams of her past in the South and insists on using Southern terminology in her day-to-day life; there is the delusional heroine of The Lady of Larkspur Lotion, one of many Sweet Bird of Youth. Desire is a theme often explored, often with a sense that it is a potentially dangerous force for example, in Suddenly Last Summer Catherine recounts how her cousin was killed and eaten by a group of men for expressing his homosexuality; and in Orpheus Descending, the character Val causes commotion in a conservative Southern town when he starts a passionate affair with one of the women who lives there. Williams explored this theme further in his short stories, many of which are surprisingly explicit bearing in mind how subtly these ideas are expressed in his play texts. Tennessee Williams was born Thomas Lanier Williams in 1911, in Columbus, Mississippi, in ster, Rose. Rose was mentally fragile. Later in life she was hospitalised and, in 1943, was lobotomised. Her delicate state of mind had a profound effect on Williams, who was extremely close to her growing up. The family moved to St Louis (where The Glass Menagerie is set), and Williams and Rose found it very difficult to adjust to city life. Life for this family was complex

Tennessee Williams in front of Broadway theatre where A Streetcar Named Desire opened.

childhood was troubled. He was unwell with diptheria as a child and spent a lot of time at home, overprotected by his mother, whilst his father travelled with his job. When his father was at home he often chastised Williams for what he saw as girlish behaviour. The relationship between Cornelius and his wife was also difficult and gradually deteriorated. In an attempt to escape these difficult relationships, Williams spent a large part of his life on the road, attending three universities and travelling all over America and Mexico. He never stayed anywhere long. Eventually, aged 28, Williams left home for New Orleans, which is where he changed his name from

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Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams Tom to Tennessee. He kept an apartment there, in the French Quarter (where A Streetcar Named Desire is set), right up until his death in 1983, suggesting his close personal identification with the city. It is, perhaps, telling that Williams cites this move to New xuality was classed at this time as a crime and, in fact, was not decriminalised in the Southern States of America until 2003 which, perhaps, gives us some sense of the repression Williams might have experienced. family was central to his life and work, and clearly had a profound impact on his concept of sex and desire, a theme which, as we have seen, runs through much of his work. He was greatly affected by how his sister changed as she got older, recalling his sense of betrayal when she began to be interested in boys other than him. However, he also believed that his mother had Rose hospitalised in order to prevent her being raped or seduced and bringing shame on the family. The Glass Menagerie, which opened o with his mother and sister in particular. It was this play which brought Williams recognition and acclaim, and it was closely followed by A Streetcar Named Desire in 1947. Tennessee suggesting that, though not strictly and precisely autobiographical, he certainly created art requently with outsiders, misfits on the edge of society who are little understood by those around them. The language he uses is lyrical, and his plays are often prefaced with epigraphs taken from poems, such as A Streetcar Named Desire. His vision is of a tough world where the fragile individual is pitted against society.

Thomas Lanier Williams III (right), who would later adopt the name Tennessee Williams, with his mother Edwina and his sister Rose.

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Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams Part 2: The Play and the Playwright The Language and Poetry of Tennessee Williams In all his plays, Tennessee Williams uses rich, dreamily poetic language to evoke his characters and the worlds they inhabit. The lengthy, opening stage directions of A Streetcar Named Desire, whilst depicting the ramshackle environment of Elysian Fields in New Orleans with concrete facts -storey corner building on a street in soon merges into peculiarly tender blue, almost turquoise, which There is a sensuality to the way Williams writes and, in these opening moments, he refers not only to what can b directions are very typical of Williams and set the scene in a very particular way. Their detail and sense of metaphor suggests an atmosphere as well as a physical environment. ht, we emotional undercurrents of the scene alongside the actual dialogue. An atmosphere is, of course, intangible -storey corner translated onstage. It is not only stage directions, however, that play a role in this sense of atmosphere, but also lyrically, des poetry. This sense of atmosphere is palpable throughout A Streetcar Named Desire other plays). Sound plays a particularly important role in the text to evoke both the life of the Quarter, where Stanley and Stella live, but also the emotion experience the sound has a symbolic or metaphoric role in the text. Characters that, at first glance, might seem very incidental, are, in fact, central to this aspect of the play.

for example, a cat screeches, startl re is also constant reference to the sound of music heard from elsewhere in the neighourhood, and the fact that Stella and Stanley live near a train track.

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Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams Part 2: The Play and the Playwright Discussion Points and Exercises

Points for Discussion How does this production of Streetcar set the scene in its opening moments?

What decisions have been made about sound in the production? How does this compare to what is suggested in the text? Are all the suggested sound effects used? If not, why

Exercise Look at the openings of a selection of plays by different playwrights and compare how they set the scene. Where stage directions are used, compare how these are written. Choose two of the plays you have looked at and decide how you as a director would set these opening scenes (before any of the characters speak) in your own production of each. You may want to consider set, lighting, and sound. Where possible, try to set up a space using these ideas. Make a collection of images that evoke for you the atmosphere of the opening of Streetcar. In groups, each person should choose a sound from the play this could be a line spoken by a character like the Vendor (see above), or a non-verbal sound such as music. Create a soundscape using these sounds. Perform these to the rest of the class (try keeping your eyes shut, both as performers and audience as this will help you to focus purely on the sound). What effect do the sounds have? What kind of atmosphere is evoked?

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Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams

Part 3: From Page to Stage

(Left to right) Gillian Anderson, Vanessa Kirby and Benedict Andrews in rehearsal

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Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams Part 3: From Page to Stage Collecting Images

Rehearsal room photograph by Johan Persson

For each of his productions Benedict compiles images that evoke for him the atmosphere and ideas of the play, and relate to his vision of the production, its look and feel. This is really interesting given that he has such a strong visual aesthetic to his work, but also because the images evoke something beyond words and therefore seem to be a suitable starting point for finding expression for those things in the text which are palpable but unspoken, such as the different levels in Streetcar. It is not a question of trying to replicate the images on stage, but using them to inspire the world of the play as imagined by the 13 director. These images go into a . They also form the basis of the exchange central to the creative process - with the production designer, who also collects images. Magda Willi, the designer for Streetcar, who has worked with Benedict on a number of a big collection which is our Streetcar

our Streetcar world, and by working through

. This suggests that the look and feel of the production are at the forefront throughout, as well as its more literal, psychological aspects. What is striking about the images for this production is that they seem to be immediately evocative of A Streetcar Named Desire, yet it is hard to put into words exactly what it is that makes it so. Although there are some images with more literal links to the play, such as one of a streetcar, and one of a vast white plantation mansion, most of the images link to the play in a more atmospheric or symbolic way. There are lots of images of interiors, and of women and men. One page shows an image of a small house in the dark, its shape barely distinguishable, but with an orange light glowing through the closed curtains of one large window. On another page, there is an image of an empty interior of a house, the curtains closed, with daylight just sneaking in. Elsewhere, a woman sits at a window, by a bare 13 14

Further examples of these can be found on www.benedictandrews.com See Interview with Magda Willi, page 52

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams mattress in a darkened room, her head turned away from the camera. There is a delicate, sheer curtain which is almost completely closed but sunlight filters through the gap she is looking through. Beneath her, in a different image, a woman sits at a kitchen table, eating or preparing food, looking boldly at the camera. The kitchen is simple and modest, with splashes of colour provided by basic objects in it rather than any kind of dĂŠcor. There are images of gyms with weights and heavy training equipment; a whole page of images from poker games which look to be a riot of colour and noise; a car suspended starkly in a factory; children playing amongst apartment blocks and houses amidst wonky telegraph poles and concrete. These are set against more delicate images a woman in a tiny, flimsy emerald colour dress, elegantly poised on high heels and carrying a red handbag, with nothing around her but darkness; a child pulling back a heavy theatre curtain. colour and stuck up in the rehearsal room. This suggests that as well as forming a basis for the design, the actors, director and creative team can also refer to them throughout the rehearsal process even if they are not explicitly discussed. Perhaps this non-verbal element is just as important in the creative process as discussion.

Exercises Choose a play and gather and compile images that, for you, relate to what you have read in some way. There is no right or wrong. Try to be instinctive about this rather than over-analysing your choices at this stage. Collect images for your own production of A Streetcar Named Desire and create a workbook. Look at the image of the woman with the red bag on page 24? Create a character using this image as a starting point. Who is she? Where is she? Where is she going? What does she want?

Points for Discussion Look at the images on the following pages. How do they relate to the different levels of A Streetcar Named Desire ) in your opinion? sort of world is suggested by these images?

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams Part 3: From Page to Stage Concept/Design The exchange of images between Benedict and Magda gradually evolves over time into decisions about design and staging. Obviously, it is essential that this process is completely collaborative as the set will determine the space used by the actors, and the physical and spatial relationships possible therein, as well as informing the overall look of the piece. In terms of design, there will be a number of drawings and models before the final set is constructed and put in place.

White card model. Photo

Magda Willi

In this production of A Streetcar Named Desire Benedict and Magda have taken the radical decision to stage the play on a revolve which turns throughout the production, offering different viewpoints on the action as it unfolds. The set encompasses the whole of Stella and walls have dissolved, allowing us to peep in, as well as see right through the apartment all at a fridge, kitchen sink, table and chairs, separated by a thin gauzy curtain from the bedroom with bed and dresser which, in turn, leads into the bathroom, complete with bath and wash basin though this is not fully realised in the sense of being photographically real. This allows everything to be present at once so that, for example, when Blanche is shut in the bathroom, rather than being offstage, her presence is still felt and actually seen, even if she is behind a shower curtain. Equally, when a character approaches the apartment from the street, we are able to see their approach at the same time as watching the scene within the apartment. When you are sitting with the narrower edge of the revolve in front of you, the stage takes on an extraordinary depth, unusual in theatre, and when there are actors in different places on the set all at once, the image is really layered. There is something ghostly and unfinished about the place. Benedict refers to this 15 . This interplay in the set between the tangible and intangible, the visible and invisible, seems to link back to the different levels in the play and hints at its more metaphorical aspect. For duping of the audience that this is a c more suggestive again brings to mind a sense of the poetic and this, in turn, helps bring into 15

See interview with Benedict Andrews, page 42

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams play traditionally a masculine material and is something very hard, 16

not human,

The audience are seated in-the-round17, which is something that was very important for Magda and Benedict. This was an active choice as the space does not have to be configured like this the stage space is not in a set position, as it is in many other large theatres, and the seating can be moved around, allowing directors and designers to factor this into their concept. The revolve allows for space on the perimeters of its circle for characters to come and go as if from the street, or other parts of the Quarter. This appears to make the layering of images possible and bring to life the atmosphere of the Quarter, with even the more minor -turning spiral. There is something very voyeuristic about the relationship between the audience and seen from the outside and people by windows. Sometimes it feels, for example, like you are see, or overhearing an argument you are not supposed to hear. The revolve is also very cinematic as it controls and changes your perspective in much the way a camera does in a film. Again, this is a bold decision as, with most conventional staging in the theatre, the being fixed. Conversely, the revolve, perhaps, allows for an even more naturalistic style of acting as the actors do not have to think so much about positioning and sight-lines but can use the space more fluidly.

White card model. Photo

16 17

Magda Willi

See interview with Magda Willi, page 52 On all sides of the stage, with the stage in the centre (though not necessarily in a circular shape)

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams

White card model. Photos

Magda Willi

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams Part 3: From Page to Stage Berlin Production In some ways this production of Streetcar has had an even longer evolution than most productions because, in fact, Benedict and Magda collaborated on a production of the play in 2009 at Schaub端hne am Lehniner Platz in Berlin. The production in Berlin was very different to the one at The Young Vic, and looking at these differences further highlights the thinking behind this most recent production.

Endstation Sehnsucht (A Streetcar Named Desire), Schaub端hne am Lehniner Platz, Berlin, April 2009 Photography Tania Kelley & Magda Willi

The production of Streetcar in Berlin had, in itself, a complex creative journey behind it. a pool of water in front of it. And Blanche would go off into that pool of water at various 18 . However, it was back then, in Berlin, that the idea of a less completely realistic set was born though at this stage, the production went to the other lieve in the complete realism of the initial concept, and they started taking the set apart. The set that they eventually used was a collection of dressing table mirrors and some other items that happened to be stored at the side of the space they were using. This complete stripping down of the set meant that the actress playing Blanche actually entered by the actual door to the theatre at so that when

See interview with Benedict Andrews, page 42

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams 19

. The production was minimalist, with little set and

f 20

. Although this idea was exciting and bold, Benedict felt that something was lost by getting rid of all of the disappears. This human element is so finely nuanced in the writing, expressed through the everyday detail of people living together for example, Stanley not being able to get into the bathroom when he needs to because Blanche is taking a bath and is, arguably, difficult to communicate on a completely bare stage. Benedict describes the impact of what he felt

and it was this sense of the everyday that he wanted to bring to this production of Streetcar at The Young Vic. However, the abstract element of the Berlin production was still resonant. So the creative process for this production started with Magda and Benedict looking at two possible approaches on the one hand the abstract approach, and on the other, a more Naturalistic approach. This continued for a while, with the idea of choosing one approach or the Tellingly, one of the key characteristics that has translated from the Berlin production to this production is the idea of a revolve. Although the stage in the Berlin production was almost completely bare, there was a revolve. This was different from that used in the current production as, instead of being three dimensional and sculptural, there was simply an inset in the floor which turned. Something about the change of perspective made possible by this was important and exciting to both director and designer. Another aspect of the production in Berlin was that the play was cut and ran at just under 21

Woman chatting, and Stanley arriving home and shouting to Stella. In the Young Vic production, these aspects have been restored and the text remains uncut.

19 20 21

See interview with Benedict Andrews, page 42 See interview with Magda Willi, page 52 r to music specifically, but the word originates from the Greek

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams Part 3: From Page to Stage Discussion Points and Exercises

Points for discussion A Streetcar Named Desire? What evidence can you see of that in the text and/or in the production? Why do you think Benedict Andrews wanted to add these back into this production? Why do you think the revolve was so important to the director and designer in their productions of Streetcar? What do you think it adds to the production and why is this important?

Exercises Look at the images of the production at Schaub端hne am Lehniner Platz in Berlin and compare them to the images of the production at The Young Vic. What are the similarities and differences? What do you think seem to be the advantages and disadvantages of each approach? Take a scene from the play and try staging it, first with minimal props and set, then with more fully realized props and set. How do the two versions differ in terms of effect for the audience?

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams

Part 4: In the Rehearsal Room

Gillian Anderson and Benedict Andrews in rehearsal

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams Part 4: In the Rehearsal Room Realising the Vision vision for a play obviously happens in the rehearsal room with the actors. Every director has a different approach to this part of the process and the way the rehearsal process works is obviously determined to a l particular vision for the play. In a play with characters, at least part of the focus is likely to be on the psychological, the actions and motivations of the characters what they do and why they do it and what they are doing with the words they speak and how this is expressed through use of voice, physicality and the use of space.

Vanessa Kirby and Benedict Andrews in rehearsal

one which works almost poetically to express the play so it is interesting to see how he works in rehearsal, how this aesthetic is realised, how it is integrated with the human, psychological aspect of the text, and how this text is felt and spoken/expressed by the actors. The rehearsal process for Streetcar demonstrates how its aesthetic is rooted in the text, and how it arises from the seems integral to this, particularly because in this play there is so much about space and the idea of territory Stella and Stanley live in a small apartment and, though Stanley is the least because of her belongings spilling all over the place and the encroachment of her world-view through the introduction of things like the paper lampshade and the smell of her perfume, and her constant confinement to the bathroom.

Gillian Anderson in rehearsal

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams The set itself is in Streetcar rehearsals from Day One. Although rehearsals do not take place in the theatre itself or even at the Young Vic to begin with the set has been constructed in the rehearsal room (often when rehearsing a play, there will simply be a mark-up of the set on the floor rather than a replica of the set, or the set itself). From the very beginning this allows for the emotional/psychological subtext of the play to be expressed vividly and beautifully not only through the words, but also through the movement of the actors in time and space. Benedic seemingly natural gesture opening a door, opening a cupboard, pouring a drink, lighting a kitchen, all the things about how people live and how they live close to each other become the notes in which the drama is played out, but they want to feel like a very instinctive lived-in subliminal ever-forward moving choreography in which all these massive drives are then us, in rehearsal, the actors and Clare Burt in rehearsal director are constantly on their feet, testing out the possible journeys through the apartment space and its immediate surrounds, and much of the process is about painstakingly picking apart the text moment by moment and, having interrogated its emotional undercurrent, working out how it occurs in space. Benedict often talks about the choreography of the moment and, though it is arrived at more naturally than dance steps that are taught, there is definitely a choreographic quality to the work, particularly around exits and entrances and transitions. Often, seemingly tiny moments will be repeated again and again to refine a moment or a particular image. Coupled with the effect of the revolve itself, images start to occur naturally, which change dependent on where you are sitting and the position of the revolve: for example, Stanley, viewed from afar stalking in his pyjamas behind a white curtain just before he rapes Blanche, whilst her hysteria plays out almost in front of y from the bedroom, through the curtain to the front door, seen in its entirety with the revolve sideday tea after her exposure by Stanley to and furniture which in themselves speak volumes heel shoes on the floor by S the bright green toy frog sitting on the floor as Blanche is taken away by the doctors, or things and somehow jump out at you more than they might in a more conventional stage space. Another distinctive element of the rehearsal room is the emphasis on sound. Benedict often o into the

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams

Vanessa Kirby in rehearsal

Benedict and the actors discovered a doorframe as he comes from the bathroom into the bedroom and through to the living area, s they set up for the card game. In Scene Five, Blanche is writing a letter (which she reads aloud) to Shep Huntleigh, the contents of much wealthier than they are). In rehearsals, Benedict worked with the actors on finding and Eunice that is happening upstairs (in the text this argument is indicated after Blanche reads out her let this way, the argument, and the seemingly small actions of Stanley and Stella getting ready to go out, become almost poetic because they are symbolic as well as incidental to their characters. At times it feels as if a musical score is being played out in which both the text and movement are notes alongside the sound. As we have seen, the text works on different levels and how this comes into play in the rehearsal room is interesting in itself. For example, for an actor, whilst an abstract idea interesting and helpful to explore, it is difficult a pragmatic sense the play asks this you kind of have to forget the mythic sense. You

these complex layers to the play, they are rooted in the concrete world of human beings therefore, in working on the play you are still working on untangling the myriad of words and actions that human beings say and do to each other. Again, this is part of the genius of Streetcar the abstract ideas are so well embodied within realistic characters that it is entirely possible to approach the play in this way. Gillian Anderson in rehearsal

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams In approaching realistic characters, again, different directors have different methodologies. This can range from a highly systematic approach which verges almost on the scientific working round a table to break down the text into smaller and smaller units of sense and to a much more organic approach. In rehearsals for Streetcar every scene is broken down in detail, and this is always active, taking place in the space created by the set. There is lots of discussion of lines and moves. The process is incredibly organic, with questions about character and character history, for example, arising as part of the interrogation of the scene rather than being explored through character exercises. This makes it all feel incredibly natural, and the actors are very instinctive knowing its corners and negotiating its parameters at every turn. Benedict talks about the ch other and then actually find almost the most simple or the most logical patterns. Organic 22 .

Ben Foster in rehearsal

See interview with Benedict Andrews, page 42

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams Part 4: In the Rehearsal Room Work on Scenes Scene Two (Week 2 of rehearsals) In this scene Stella tells Stanley that they have lost Belle Reve and Stanley, furious, and suspicious of Blanche, starts to go through her things whilst she is soaking in the bath. When she gets out of the bath, Blanche sends Stella out to get her a drink, and she and Stanley have a heated discussion about the legal papers about Belle Reve, which Blanche something Stella has expressly asked him not to divulge yet. Using the revolve demands a combination of pragmatism and creativity, and Benedict worked with Vanessa Kirby (playing Stella) and Gillian Anderson (playing Blanche) to create the moment Blanche meets Stella coming back from the store with her drink. This is experimented with a number of times, and, as the moment evolves it seems to become both more truthful and fluid for the two actresses, and a more refined visual image of them embracing in the street. Despite the choreographic element to the work happening at this text. Benedict talks about the fact that when gives up something, very subtly betraying Stanley because he has betrayed her by mentioning her pregnancy to Blanche; and the idea of the sisterly bonding which happens here for the first time, which they take back into the end of the poker night in the next What is unsaid is as important as what is actually said. For to dash expresses what is too painful for Blanche to articulate husband, Alan husband was and I

what happened to her

Ben Foster and Gillian Anderson

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams Scene Three and Transition From Scene Two to Scene Three (Week 2 of rehearsals) Scene Three takes place later the same night as Scene Two. Blanche and Stella arrive home to find the poker night still in full-swing. Benedict worked with the actors on a transition that suggests the time-lapse between the two scenes, as well as showing the emotional and atmospheric shift that occurs. This is layered gradually, bit by bit. There was some discussion of the fact that, though the characters are in a real psychological realm in this moment - on a basic level, Stella and objective is for the transition to somehow find and show a relationship between Stella and Blanche leaving to go out for the evening, the men arriving to play cards, the time-lapse that takes them deeper into the game and the night, and Stella and Blanche arriving home. t being available to achieve seems to be something more theatrical and stylised than the simple act of arriving and leaving, and results in the As we have seen (above) the score that evolves includes Ben Foster (Stanley) thumping the doorframe as he comes out of the bathroom and Branwell Donaghey (Steve) and Troy Glasgow (Pablo) entering to set up the game, cracking cans open. This sense of musicality extends into the scene, where the actors are asked to create a general hum of conversation suited to the poker game, and the actual lines of text have to fight through. The scene is sketched out first, then fleshed out with more detail, evolving with each repetition. When Blanche and Stella enter, Benedict asks Vanessa and Gillian to try this with Blanche There was discussion of the relationship between the sisters at this stage. It is now Stella

Branwell Donaghey, Ben Foster, Vanessa Kirby and Troy Glasgow

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams Scene 11 (Week 5 of rehearsals) This scene takes place several weeks after state has completely deteriorated. Stella has arranged for her to be hospitalised, but this has been disguised as plans for Blanche to go on holiday. She, in turn, has confused this in her mind with meeting up with Shep Huntleigh, an old admirer23. Stella and Eunice help Blanche prepare to leave whilst Stanley plays poker with his friends including Mitch in the next room. The scene ends with Blanche leaving with the doctor and nurse. Benedict refers t

Stella and Stanley have amassed

away with Shep

on is

arrives, and the moments leading up to this being like the cast backstage before a as if you are

they have to be aware of what is going on with Blanche on the other side of the curtain, in the next room, rather than enclose themselves within their poker game as if they are not s story about dying at sea. Again, there is an emphasis on for example, responding to Eunice when she calls them pigs. Particular attention is paid to the moment the doorbell rings, Eunice answers it, and tells Blanche who is expecting Shep Huntleigh Blanche immediately picks up on the fact that

tha weight and tension of the scene, with the idea that this might shatter the fantasy they have so carefully constructed. Extending the

detailed conduction of what becomes a sort of musical score of actions, sound and words, curtain and eventual departure out the front door an air of a releasing of breath that has been held in, in anticipation, in the moments leading up to this. 23

See Synopsis

Ben Foster

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams

Part 5: Meet the Creative Team

Vanessa Kirby

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams Part 5: Meet the Creative Team Benedict Andrews talks to Natasha Nixon How is it being in week three of A Streetcar Named Desire? I'm very pleased to be getting towards this final stretch of the play. Here the tone shifts as it drops deeper and to have the end in sight of the rehearsal process therefore kind of mirrors the structure of the play a little bit. The first bit is about an arrival and a group of people working out how to deal with a stranger... sort of getting to know it in the beginning and the tensions of that. And the beginning of the rehearsal period is also working out What is this place? Who are these people in it? What's going on between . is instead of finding a hundred different ways to do for the actors to have a very clear understanding of what's going on between each other and then actually find almost the most simple or the most logical patterns. Organic patterns for each of the scenes within the house. This special situation with the revolve provides such an incredible abstraction and a double movement. On the one hand it pulls you in and puts you in the position of a voyeur - it problematizes your watching, it makes you aware of your watching. It gives you an outsider perspective but simultaneously pulls you in and makes you want to know more about the people in there so you have a kind of double movement. So then within it, when you're assuming the very natural moves - if that's what this sort of naturalism is, the illusion of the organic -there's a reason for everybody's behaviour and a seemingly natural gesture opening a door, opening a cupboard, pouring a drink, lighting a cigarette, sitting down, lying on a bed, going in to a bathroom, going in to a kitchen - how people live and how they live close to each other, become the notes in which the drama is played out. They want to feel like a very instinctive lived-in, subliminal, ever forward-moving choreography, in which all these massive drives are then contained. There's something about the big movement of the revolve that is this massive drive going on while you watch this moth and this ape and these various things move around in it - a bit likes rats in a maze. It's been very interesting for me to work from absolute naturalism and no abstraction, and seemingly not an awareness of being on the stage. Often my work is predicated in the first instance from an awareness of being on the stage - standing there in front of people. We know that Blanche DuBois has been played before, we know that Blanche DuBois has been played independently of us - but she also can't exist without us. She can't exist unless she comes back inside the body of the actress. great role of King Lear or the Lady M or the Hamlet. When Lear dies with his daughter in his arms he was just passing through and we travelled with him to some extreme and extraordinary place. We feel his passage through our lives, and through the lives of the people in the play, and then

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams his leaving, Streetcar. One interested in is this sense that theatre making is a ritual process, the passage of someone from one stage to another. The passing through the Elysian Fields, drinking the waters of forgetting there, but the passing through of purgatory state to a state of transcendence and the eviction of a scapegoat from the community as well. So there's a ritual sacrificing of Blanche within the community. She has to be sacrificed and evicted but she's a kind of extraordinary creature who passes through their lives.

We've talked a lot about how the play works on two levels: the reality and illusions and the literal and the mythological. How have you taken care of that in rehearsals? You kind of have to work in a pragmatic sense - the play asks this - you kind of have to forget the mythic sense. You can talk about the mythic intellectually while you're working and you can be aware of the drives but you have to then study the minutiae. You have to work through it and make sense of all the minutiae to the point where all the minutiae - the drinking or the seemingly incidental fabric of life - seem incredibly organic and not thought through. Part of the pleasure of watching it is that without being television it seems real how people behave, and this is the kind of study of the minutiae. I guess the minutiae are the weaving of the fabric of the whole piece, and then when you're assembling that whole tapestry you say ok now what are the big, big movements through it ? Maybe our revolve also helps with this., having a sense that there are cogs and gears moving. All of this realism, all of the minutiae gets to a point that is fundamentally like each scene is a runaway train - the people who begin the scene are not the same ones who end it. It moves inexorably forward, and has this stance of drives and compulsions on the edge. It The desire is a kind of wildfire that is a flame that's lit at the beginning and you're kind of watching move through the grass lands and burning the forest and everything down. I think what we've discovered through the realism/not realism of the set is 'skeletal an get to both these levels at once in a chocolate box realism set - on a set that has wallpaper on the walls and doilies. That's trying to pretend to the audience... there's a sort of an agreement with the audience, duping the audience that this is a complete reality. approaches that type of realism, I always

Vanessa Kirby and Gillian Anderson

a mythic dimension. To me the play takes place on a borderline, on a seam between reality and fantasy. On one hand you say Stanley represents concrete realism, puritism, what can be touched is real, and Blanche represents illusion, magic, fantasy. And both are true - they're not set against each other. The mask is just as true as what

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams is behind it -a go all the way

f theatre. One part of theatre where you want the real to on what the American school of theatre-making becomes, is that things are real That goes as far as performance artist Chris Burden24 shooting himself in the arm, or while speaking the text somebody runs for three hours of the performance - you get it a lot in contemporary dance theatre practices. If you put a woman with a mastectomy on stage25 that's real, she's not someone who's had make-up done, she's real. Simultaneously the theatre is also a circle where children pick up a stick and it becomes a sword, or put a paper crown on their head and they're a king. Theatre is also a kind of act of make believe and substitution. Both these things are sort of fighting in theatre - we want the fake to be real and the real to be fake. These two things are in conflict because theatre is the place that is actually the tear in reality. where we go to mimic reality; w e got cinema and television which does that much better. a place where we test reality. We turn reality inside out and we enter all great plays enter - this seam, this tear of reality. I think Streetcar literally takes place on because of these two protagonists, but also because [Tennessee Williams] wrote in the stage ow the walls of the house become transparent", which was a really radical new idea at the time, to find a moment where these borders become confused - inside, outside. Not anymore, but at the time the only way to make theatre was to dissolve a part of the interior fourth wall of the house to show interior and outside. The confusion between the inside and outside activates this seem of realities and I think what we found where we have this sk and I think this is the thing that's important to me in all of my theatre making always - you're watching the thing being produced in front of you, you're aware that being in front of you, that's it's not already there. There's something about this that's very liberating in terms of situating our production on the border between these two places. There's a big invitation to the audience to not see this as a realistic documentary in New Orleans - either kind of a museological26 recreation of a supposed version of what the piece was in post-war New Orleans America, which to my mind always ends up in a fantasy, it's just first train to kitschville, the play becomes twee, the play loses its bite and the play becomes genteel. Tennessee Williams is built on nostalgia - nostalgia about loss. It's entirely what The Glass Menagerie is about and there's a very powerful drug of nostalgia and loss in this piece. When in a production that nostalgia becomes the first thing and the only thing of the 1940s - the piece stops being about what it is actually about, which is sex and a kind of cataclysmic or cyclonic force of desire that rips lives apart. Every single heartbeat of the play is predicated upon sexual hunger and it's the bruises and damage and drive caused by that; the way people hide from it, the way people go after it, the way people destroy each other because of it. It's not nice, it's not genteel, and wrapped up in a museological production they only become quaint people from the past who have problems. Simultaneously though, it's also just completely reductionist to only update it to a sort of post-Katrina New Orleans, everything 100% realistic or real - it's not that either because you miss many dimensions of the play that are the particular stampings of Tennessee Williams the poet. I think that the play is set in is the New Orleans of the mind or the New Orleans of Tennessee Williams.

24 25 26

performance in dance-theatre piece Mata Hari, 10 days after she had a double mastectomy The science of collecting and arranging objects for museums.

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams Cities are chosen for particular reasons as New Orleans is. The heat of the city, the idea of this as a hypersexualised city and a city that people are passing through, and a city with these great names like Desire cemetery, Elysian Fields and the special emotional temperature of the city. That then becomes transplanted into something else that is then a metaphor and a place that only exists here. You could go copy from Google Earth Elysian Fields now or Elysian Fields then and it's banal - it's an act of fantasy. To me every play is it's its own reality and it has its own nervous system and its own ways in and out. And if you give that nervous system to someone else another director, another actress or another group of people - they will try and get into what these nervous systems means to them in another way. Their job is to make it raw and present in their time, and they invent a series of things for themselves but the play is its own nervous system. It's a big misunderstanding I think of what we can call -with-theTo a certain group of people who think there is only one way to do a play of the potential of theatre. I think they're scared of what's inside it so they want to sort of hold it down to something that you can compare to like a museum painting.

Ben Foster and Gillian Anderson

You did a production before of A Streetcar Named Desire27. How will this production differ? It was a very, very different production and it was now five years ago. I do believe that in coming back to some productions that I have made that there would be a very exact blueprint hat to another where there's a lot of unfinished business. Also, even in the short time of five years my perspective on things has changed and there's still an inquiry to be made into the piece. 27

A Streetcar Named Desire was first directed by Benedict Andrews at the Schaub端hne am Lehniner Platz in Berlin

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams Funnily enough the only two plays this has happened to me on have been Three Sisters28 at the Young Vic - which done in 2001 in a very different production in Sydney - and this. When I did Three Sisters I felt I was meeting people who were very dear to me again. Very very dear, aybe that they'd died forgotten: Oh wow I remember you and I know you very very well but there's still more to know about you . I had the sense with this, but I also have the analogy from a painting that Magda29 and I and the actors who we worked with five years ago made - a very brutalist rough sketch. We had a big piece of tarpaulin we were drawing over on a big white wall that was very liberating. This has always been one of my favourite plays - when I did it in Berlin I was very liberated because I hated the idea in Australia of doing it with people pretending to be American. I did Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? with Australian actors - of course it sounds good with American accents, but we decided to get rid of them and do it with thick Australian accents just so that there wasn't a layer of mask. So it was very liberating in Germany with the great actors at the Schaubuhne30 to say ok the only thing that matters is what's going on between people - we're not pretending to be authentically American New Orleans, none of that even mattered And it was a bare stage? It was a completely bare stage with a curtain in the background and a massive revolve. It wasn't at first at the bauprobe31 production as well, first made a model of a realistic modern apartment set with a pool of water in front of it and Blanche would go off into that pool of water at various times and flap around it. I just remember at the bauprobe we gradually started dismantling it - I did not believe in the complete realism of it, the technicians working on it, as the last thing you want to think at a bauprobe is that these people don't know what they want. We threw away everything we had and there were a series of dressing table mirrors at the side of the stage and some stuff stored at the back and - we'd just like to use this. When at the beginning of the play the door opened at the back of the empty stage and Blanche DuBois came in with her suitcase from the real street outside, - so when it was snowing outside she came in from the street, she wheeled in with her suitcase, dragged a rack of clothing forward, poured herself a drink, sat down on a chair - then a big curtain closed behind and it began from there. So the question was how do you tell this story? We bought on what we needed to but the minutiae was lost and every gesture becomes the big. It was an interesting production - I know people who really, really liked it, but I thought we were really missing something. I even had a strong feeling of what I was missing one day walking along and looking in to people's rooms and seeing glimpses of their lives: someone's arm as they're ironing or someone's legs as they walk across the room. These little fragmented glimpses of the everyday life, the poetry that is in the every day. The living that is done with this massive force of desire through it, with the living that is done around it. At the same time [with the previous production] we had invented something that was essentially a theatre stage - Blanche on a theatre stage and people come and go from her, the actress having a nervous breakdown on a stage. It was an interesting liberating gesture, but the play is more complex and interesting than that. Not to diminish last time, because 28 29 30 31

Benedict Andrews directed Three Sisters at the Young Vic in 2012 Magda Willi, Designer Schaub端hne am Lehniner Platz is a famous theatre in the Wilmersdorf district of Berlin. A German term used in theatre referring to an early rehearsal with the director, designer and mock-up of the

set

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams I m all up for saying I want to look at it just from this angle. I say the play is better than do that before. For instance [in that production] she came in on page 12, or wherever Blanche arrives, all the prelude was cut and many of the more symphonic aspects of the play were cut, there was no Mexican woman, and we really reduced it right down. I think it was one hour fifty no interval32. But the symphonic aspects of it really interest me, and the sense of the minutiae. We had to find a sense that Blanche is still always trapped on a stage and I think that is even clearer in this production where we have these Francis Bacon cubes33 perpetually turning with the props of naturalism on there, b actress trapped in a room pretending that this is the end of the line and she has nowhere to go. I think Magda34 and I were also really interested this time in something we really do last time - last time I opened up into a sort of epic field and this time we were lived in too close proximity, both people inside the house and the people of the quarter. But literally every single moment of this production we ask bed, the head of her small camp stretcher is this close to bed and the membrane of the curtain is between. You feel at each point of production the basic concrete social circumstances that people live in, without then going into this chocolate box realism.

(Top)

32 33 34

. (Bottom) White Card Model, by Magda Willi

The Young Vic production runs at 3 hours 20 minutes, with an interval. Artist Francis Bacon often confined his painted subjects within linier cubes which isolated the figure Magda Willi, Designer

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams up a lot in rehearsals is this sort of addiction. Like a drug addiction - pimp/whore vibe ley has as much of an addiction - I think it is the story of someone who has a destructive addiction. Last time I thought k, swell, the revolve came from in the last production - this is the last turning of a circle: the end of an er he last turn of the die of this life of a women going mad; the last turn before she fully clicks to it and they can no longer be part of the community; t an this descent; this last turn. This production the roots, and roots. One of the big actions of the play is the stripping away of its central character until their secrets are revealed, u transparent, ranscendence in the final scene. You can say the play is Stanley destroying Blanche until he obliterates her, a destruction of this woman, tearing away her illusions; On the other hand the whole thing is an act of liberation, and maybe in the passage of Blanche through this circle of the underworld - maybe the aybe she lives in pure, pure illusion and a pure purely literary space at the end - a pure space of poetry. The beauty of the speeches in the final scene about the dying at sea - i , and this act of grace when everyone plays along with her gentleman caller coming. You feel the people in another world. Lear35, and also Big and Small36 that I did. In that, the character Lotta Cotta is also kind of on a pilgrimage - t Even though Blanche is stuck in a room - this is the interesting thing about our [Young Vic] set s o rooms, but she travels on it, s til another state is achieved on the other side of that, addiction. Maybe the addiction is when Blanche talks about her past, and when her past is sex as a form of annihilation, a blind annihilation, and - like an addiction which is a sort of escape from facing the tru . And she does that with alcohol and she does that with her relationship with men. We spoke about the relationship between memories and amnesia, and the trauma of that a her when Blanche arrives? Ten years have passed young woman does age 16 or so, Stella, when she leaves - to go completely out into the world with no security anymore and to leave her past. And on one hand it m you, I want resting that she then ends up finding herself in a place that is far as possible from her upbringing, where you could say people are essentially joyous and 35 36

King Lear, Benedict directed an Icelandic translation in Reykjavik in 2010 Big and Small, directed by Benedict at the Barbican, London in 2012

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams full of life but there is really only drinking, gambling, homemaking, sex. as having a ki nd she lives in a sort of blind heaven. Like someone who is addicted to opiates or narcotics she lives in this permanent bliss of forgetting, but when that is taken away or threatened s the background of Belle Reve, the family, and the mythic context of that. In the play, , it represents the end of one American culture, the death of one American culture, and [Stella] comes into a new postwar American culture. I find it very fascinating that these great plays - Miller and Tennessee sort of pre-empts it as well - these great muscular American dramas come at the point where the Empire is shifting and America is becoming the dominant global culture and these plays are forged in the confusion and conflict and change of that. There are still great contradictions in this society where the white southern wealth came from the exploitation of a whole slave class of society, and there was a massive gap between welfare and an underclass. Then what you show is a new class emerging an immigrant class of which Stanley is. In olack, 37 -h s based on the American dream, a here [in the UK] I think, where there still really is a sense that you feel this kind of class difference, vigour and part of the American muscle, whatever, that anyone can become anything. So in order to do that, he has to believe that he can pull down that old southern class, a that old southern class in this, and what Belle Reve is, is dead dead dead dead, and Blanche is the last survivor - these culture. But a diseased, fly blown, sick culture. This again is an easy thing to forget - that this is really part of it. It was a sick diseased corpse that Blanche held on to, and it was incestuous and abusive and all of the sexual relationships were linked to economics but also to loss. This addiction that we talked about that all goes back to this wound that is the death of one class.

Natasha Nixon with Clare Burt in rehearsal

Blanche comes to a place, where the first thing Tennessee Williams wrote hite woman sitting on the steps - a relationship in the past that had only been one of exploitation, is now

â&#x20AC;&#x153;I am not a Polack. People from Poland are Poles. They are not Polacks. But what I am is one hundred percent American. I'm born and raised in the greatest country on this earth and I'm proud of it. And don't you ever call me a Polack Stanley Kowalski, Scene 8) 49

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams seemingly altered (for whatever traits the black woman has, the traits of extreme hunger herself or sex as a commodity) - immediately Blanche walks into a place that is culturally her opposite. A new America based on sex, and based on the selling of sex, which is what America is from the 20th century - a kind of dream factory, and a pornography factory, and a military factory. And you have all of these components in this ex soldiers, a brothel down the street - sex is power. Active forgetting, which I think is another American thing, is a kind of collective public forgetting. A belief in the good life. A belief that with gambling anyone can win or be lucky. So you have all these seeds of what the American myth is, and these people as the junkies inside it. The desire junkies inside it. Has it been weird for you to transition it into a contemporary world? Not at all. I

e doing it,

the desire junkies and the qualities of America, somebody could choose to exaggerate all of those things extremely and to put that on the top. Therefore it becomes ironic somehow. Streetcar in production somewhere in America and i culture interest is how it comes from underneath, and the myth - this is the poem of all the people and always hard and interesting for me, challenging, is that all my productions to some degree are an experiment to begin with. You may know from watching me work in the rehearsal room literally that each day you begin with not knowing what will happen. Sometimes yes, . The Young Vic is a very special invitation b space, y ted to interrogate or activate the audience relationship. I telling it what to do and you will be reacting to it and the actors will be reacting to it. One thing I ended up learning the other day when I was watching the stage revolve, was something Gillian38 did when she was gripping the edge of the door, just tapping her fingers on the edge. I Gillian is clever and she knows people, what is really clear is this is - we keep talking about Blanche but too, they are just kind of tooth and nail fighting, but their finger nails are scraping off the edge of the cliff as the her try and do that. So we want the plays that can still be living. Antigone different lives and hands and dug up in different ways. You want the play to come back to life in front of you and to feel like a new play - to feel like it is taking place for the first time with the urgency and shock and splendour of its first time, and the kind of directness and truth of its first time. Actually you want it to speak to the present and speak to our present and our moment as well - you want it to address us directly about being human now, what it means to have hunger, what it means to be a daughter, what it means to be in a war. But back to the moment of its first creation. So with Three Sisters39 absolutely aware at every moment of it a complete fantasy, p in Russia now, whatever that is, i , these words were written in 1900 we know what the coming storm they talk about piece of literature - w know about the storm that was coming to wreck their lives. And w to recreate 38 39

Gillian Anderson, Blanche Du Bois Young Vic Production, 2012

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams this picture to still feel the charge of Tennessee Williams writing A Streetcar Named Desire in in 1945/46. This double movement is absolutely the property of theatre. I think often this discussion of updating a play is so banal because it misses that it is literature, and literature echoes. In the same way I can pick up a poem from 1920, and read it about my life now and play should do the same thing - not reduce it either way.

Corey Johnson

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams Part 5: Meet the Creative Team Interview with Magda Willi, Designer

Can you talk about your creative process for this production? On this project we started quite a long while back. Also, when I work somewhat different when I work with worked together before, at the Schaub端hne in Berlin - we did about seven shows there - so already we had a way of exchanging ideas. start exchanging ideas, images, compiling things, making a big collection which is our Streetcar pile, world and by working through the images and reconfiguring them, we this particular production.

And then of course we speak

We did this piece text, and it was an exciting process and we were happy with the show, so it was a big decision for us this time - do we want to go further into that direction or do we want to take another direction? actually having all the things that are in the text, being able to play the naturalism and making the poetic terms that Williams uses in the text you know how the items are often ,t So we started off with the two directions parallel to each other, thinking both ways, testing the abstract realms and at the same time working on a naturalistic path, and at some point Benedict said But working with that idea in the Young Vic it soon became apparent that it does not work for the Young Vic space, just something that becomes very uninteresting, spatially in this theatre I find. I love this theatre very much despite th feels very intimate and you never feel far away, and of course wonderful for a designer 40 , and to really involve the space in the design - so working on the space we found that playing in the round was the best way of happening in this play onstage. And that is quite different from designing for a space where the space is already set, like a being able to use the space within in the design? Yes, because, for example, in this production it became very interesting and important to us that we had this whole complete circle of audience surrounding Blanche on her island and in The Quarter or the neighbours , and the city and everybody around it surrounding her. In the play she ends up there because there is nowhere else she can go, so literally there is no way out. So to us the energy of having the audience all the way around was very useful and exciting

The Young Vic is a fully flexible space, which means the seats can be moved into almost any configuration.

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams I was trying to translate the thing spatially. just when you actually put an apartment in, and you just a back wall and a floor but it should actually have all walls that are there to make it as filmic as possible. T s when it becomes difficult in this space, because of sightlines, because of the amount of people you want to get in there. just wonderful having people on three sides or in a panorama or in a traverse, but to have a small space with walls on all sid good, it feels like a trap. So for a moment there was this moment of despair make e had looked at a version of slightly abstracting the naturalism, but we just wanted either/or for some time - we were trying several things. I suppose the one thing that stuck with us from the last production in Berlin is the revolve, which was something we were excited about in the last version. There we had just a black floor with an inset revolve, so you and it was just slowly spinning, and that change of angles or change of perspective is continuous throughout the scene - that was something that we found exciting to work with. I , onto, and continuous, and something to do with losing yourself, going mad. dynamic which feels right for this show. We tried versions when we had a front-on situation with a revolve, and with a central one - and central, just because of the space, seemed much more exciting. So we worked out this sculpture which feels right. We chose these steel beams and this metal which is very, I suppose, traditionally a masculine material and is something very hard, not human, not f hope, makes the humans in there, or Blanche, even more fragile and more human because

normally is? -

I hope

middle of the space, very exposed, and it turns around itself like a little dancer on a music box - y s definitely something sculptural about it. But there is something sculptural about most sets. Why did Benedict initially want a totally naturalistic set? I think something also exciting about having it all. We once did a show together, Drunk Enough to Say I Love You by Caryl Churchill, and there we had a complete room, as complete as it could be. It was behind glass and was like an aquarium; you could look in and watch the people. Everything was there; we had everything made, even the curtains were printed. It ended up being a kind of hypers exciting. I suppose into just having a n always looking for that artistic step where you take the reality that you show onto a different level which is in the best cases - an interesting kind of artificiality. In the

Benedict is a particularly visual director. Does that change the relationship that the director has with the designer? Is it closer? it s it s closer, just different. I enjoy it - I think it s great to have a director who cares so much about things, and you really have an ally in all design

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams things. We build the aesthetic together, and you always build the world together with the director, but I suppose with Benedict just a lot of it is through visual input, whereas maybe with other directors they have other things that move them or are important to them. There are pictures that Victoria41 [the costume designer] collected as well, it is not just him and I. Probably only a very small part of the images are an actual visual reference, but they are more sort of atmospheric or sometimes even on a meta-level. I think really they are most important to us as a base to feed from more than for anyone else. Having known Benedict for some years I just completely understand what he needs as well. Often people think of the creative process as the rehearsal room, but obviously the creative even bigger process beforehand. Is that the case? s really kind of defining the world and setting the starting point, and then of course a whole other thing happens that we can never foresee when we do the design, which is one of the things that is so exciting about theatre. It would be awfully boring if I made a design and then it would stand there and be exactl great about theatre, because then the actors come and they go in there, in the space, and they make it theirs and they use it in their very own particular way. T exciting. What are the challenges for a designer working with a revolve like the one used in this production? Well, kind of me setting the challenge to everybody else, [the Production Manager] and the production team to s a challenge going to Benedict, although obviously he took the decision together with me, but he has to work with the actors and be dealing with the fact that they constantly have to be present for ever, and also it allows the actors to really focus on each other and get directly at each other. T done a run through

It s still possible that after half an hour everyone will just be really

now how going to be. We are hopeful and positive, but possible audience will be annoyed. Some things that we find exciting they might find just terribly annoying. Obviously we sat in front of the model, turning this thing around and looking in, and thinking, yeah, this could be cool, but still so different smaller in comparison to the object.

Victoria Behr, Costume Designer

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams Part 5: Meet the Creative Team Interview with Ben Foster, Stanley Have there been any surprises in terms of what There are surprises every night, every time you -hunting machines, humans, we like our patterns. What Tennessee built is an extraordinary piece of music, so if we think of it as a pass or a chemical wash the photograph becomes clear, it starts to become sharper and sharper. What struck me the deepest is how alike Stanley and Blanche are, and he would be carted away if he did Stella. If we look at a king and a queen Queen of the Nile T rs from different kingdoms, and ing now, PTSD42; so rather than separating the two [Stanley and Blanche], I was more interested in finding the likenesses. Each performance, each read at home before a performance, it becomes shadow

which seems a bit simplistic. Do you feel Stanley has any redeeming features? He has nothing but redeeming features - I think every human being has redeeming features. There are many essays written about Stanley being an unforgivable man anybody who said, it depends on where your philosophy, where your humanities live, and my job is to not to condone those actions, but to find a way into them. I not an uncommon act unfortunately. In terms of redeeming, not so black and white - the comic book concept of a good guy or a bad guy is bullsh*t. Stanley is a man who served his country and a man who loves his wife more than life itself - his inability to process these wounds of war, and taking it out on his wife, is unforgivable, but t are diffi -beater, but if we look at mental illness and if we are considering Post Traumatic Stress Disorder as nd of treatment that he needs. His , and clearly these traumas and these triggers are being unfortunately landed on those around him. I suppose to answer the big qu to Blanche] Blanche has episodes as well and her triggers spin her out. The way she expresses those traumas are different, but both Stanley and Blanche are very powerful,

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, a medical term used to describe symptoms which may occur in a person after a traumatic experience

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams American Greek tragedy, have many faults. Our realities so whether or not we want to deal with them, they will define how we evolve.

, and we all

You mentioned the PTSD. Did that play a big part for you in terms of creating the character? That was one of the first conversations that Benedict and I had. Although this production of Streetcar it s modernised in the way that it s not stuck in the 40s, New Orleans - Bene come back from war in Afghanistan, and have friends in that world. T that everyone coming back is suffering the same, but for our purposes that filter of a man traumatised by war became a key for us for understanding spine, and rationalising some of the more violent, the hideous, acts that he performs against these women. Are there any other challenges to playin in the text, the music is in the text. The interpretation of the filters really getting most surprising is including not just including but celebrating so easy to forget that when y well, he does this, . You can go deeper and deeper and say, well this man is charming in his own way and does have his own sense of humour and loves his life he loves his life perfect.

his world, in the peak of his health, and he loses his future when Belle RĂŞve43 goes away and its tied up with this I think I unde , she meaning his wife recognition, an animal recognition, of meeting your match. Gillian has done is empower Blanche. Her performance is a very strong a glamorous warrior.

Ben Foster 43

The plantation Stanley expects to inherit through Stella.

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams entirety. Yes makes her all the more a worthy a

ays tracking. Fortunately the stage tracking for the rest of my life

that would be good! Matinees are fun!

In terms of playing the character and working in that kind of space does it make a difference? This is my second professional play and my first in-the-round, and my first on a moving 44 place here [The Young Vic], is just an extraordinary work space. When I came a few months ago and saw View45 - I was knocked out. So the first introduction into this theatre was View, and it [the theatre] feels like a boxings a very Quaker theatre has its own requirements energetically, they ask for different things, and we need to keep our heads bowed and service the space. Each theatre has its own perso privileged to be able to spend time here, for a brief time its fleeting theatre, this transient space that we get to share in this group experience. -the-round and -wheel, the language pin-wheels beautifully. I ng round the way that we would when the first stories were told in a cave, the stage itself becomes the bonfire and we all sit around in the dark and watch the lights and the shadows. A Often when you read about Bene , Certainly he stages texts in an unexpected way. Does that unconventional sense of what he does translate to the rehearsal room, and, if so, how does it translate? Does it affect the rehearsal process in an obvious way or not? , and interested, and wellcome across. We shared a lot of picture references and music references, essays. We gather you put it in the blender and see what comes out. What was so striking about Benedict in the rehearsal process was that , re feeling our way through the role and his ability to hold fragments and see them in the context of a greater whole is extraordinarily impressive. H the fragment of a scene the way a musician would feel that this part of the melody was very important, and keep trying to explore it hook important to him, the dance of that. H , and he

44 45

David Lan, Artistic Director of the Young Vic of A View From The Bridge by Arthur Miller, directed by Ivo van Hove

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams interesting you should mention the musicality of the play. Is it very different working in that way? He talks about choreography as well. Very much so. not about nailing it, about finding it and refining it, and refining it, and refining it. Watching him direct the others and watching him in the room, he is playing the words on - his fingers move in the percussion of the sound and where it needs to hit in his mind. That may change for the actor, for the scene as it revolves, but he is playing the piece.

does that fit with this kind of approach? not how I traditionally work , but sa different animal and the scripts have a tendency to change. The films th about building, build of the words you all go out and do field work and bring interviews back and we start , to make these people who are something else. There feels like a width to that kind of research, and with this play drilling in - we keep going into it. re different animals as well - how we go about getting those things is less important than sharing a language and fortunately we had a very quick rapport. I trying to serve the thing - you either do it with love or you , and love can be difficult and I love Benedict! You and Magda46 have both talked about the use of images as reference points for creating the production. I make workbooks for myself, images and then soundtracks and sketches. We just start kind of keep your arms open. I similar to falling in love or falling out of love, where when you turn on a radio and it feels like this song was supposed to be on because play or a film or any kind of art project, one becomes more open - and following those grace points in the universe become the touchstone of your character. It might show up with a piece of rubbish on the street, Other than creating your workbook, do you have any personal processes that you use outside the rehearsal room for creating the character? I wanted this Stanley to be veryman . What Marlon Brando did, and Elia Kazan [Broadway director] did with Tennessee, it s sealed. But a great text liv great text twenty-two years old! You o what excited me the most was the thought of making Stanley EveryStreet. of time in New Orleans, , , guy in a polo shirt, - and that became how do you find this. The archetype or the godhead of Stanley can only exist if grounded in a reality that makes sense to him. I wanted him to be any guy. That, Benedict and I got on book very quickly about.

Magda Willi, the designer.

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams Part 5: Meet the Creative Team Interview with Frankie Finney, Deputy Stage Manager (DSM) Fi I sit in rehearsal as a point of contact for the director. I take notes of all the props and make sure they are passed on to my Stage Manager and the props department then either they come into rehearsals, or the designer can choose what she might want. write down all of their moves. I write down all the blocking for the show person who knows the show the best what entrances and exits the actors are using. I relay all that information to the Stage Manager [SM] and the Assistant Stage Manager [ASM] so that when we go into technical47 they know where the actors are going to enter and exit from, and I do all the setting lists for where each prop needs to be then they take over in tech. I do almost a second role as we go into technical rehearsals and running the show where I cue48 the show - so I call all the lighting cues and sound cues and fly cues and, in this case, revolve cues. I have points in the script that I know that a technical element needs cuing49 LX because quicker to say. So you have to be very precise? You have to be very focused, you have to have ears like a bat because often the conversation will be happening with the director and actor on the other side of the rehearsal room, and , or an entrance, or a cue point or a costume and you have to We also create a document called Rehearsal Notes every day, and I write into that document what props and costumes might be needed ple are walking around in bare feet the Production Manager needs to know to do a Risk Assessment of that situation to make sure we know ass or anything like that. Every night the Rehearsal Notes goes out to all departments and the director can also check it is correct. I just a hopefully nothing gets missed. But you do have to focus all the time. In Streetcar rehearsals you seem to be up on your feet a lot. Is that different from rehearsals for other productions? Yeah, it does depend on the production. Sometimes you can have the ASM in rehearsals to assist you and they would be the ones doing a bit more of the running around, so that you can concentrate a bit more on getting the blocking down or getting the sound cues or whatever. But because of the amount of props that are in the show the ASM, Sophie, was very busy with the SM, Laura, getting all of the props together. Also because of the amount of costumes that are used on stage so many live changes happen on stage rather than backstage it meant all the costumes had to be pre-set on the set, which was an extra layer rmally have to deal with. Benedict likes to have all of the props and costumes - at least a very good example of them, if not the actuals - in rehearsal as soon as possible, which means you are up and about a lot more because you are constantly having to re-set, re-set, re-set when they go over a scene - whereas a lot of

ss, before the dress rehearsals. They are used to focus on, and rehearse, all technical aspects of the show, such as sound and lighting. 48 This is to tell the technical operators when to change light, sound, etc. 49 For example, there is a change in the lighting state, or the revolve speed changes.

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams Benedict more than a lot of directors are, I think. Are there any key moments where the use of props and costume are really critical? Yeah, the suitcase moment50 we had to re-set a lot, where Ben51 pulls the clothes out - they have very specific lines about what things are so he had to practise that a lot and it means we have to pack the suitcase really precisely to make sure everything he gets is in the right order. I take photos technology, iPhones, are genius - so we take a lot of photos of things are set because then you know exactly the same when you put it back. The other one which was quite a fun one to re-set, was the scene after the fight, the next morning52 where Stella is clearing everything up. Vanessa53 had to really practise to make sure we had the right time for her to clear all the g cards, all the beer cans. So we spent a lot of time messing the set up so she could clear it up, which was sort of the more fun way round of doing it! All directors have different ways of blocking. Benedict is very precise, almost choreographic. Does this make a difference to your role? easier because you know exactly what the actors are going change, so although he is precise it will change a lot throughout the rehearsal period. Even in tech we were changing stuff still, so you do spend a lot of time rubbing out and re-writing things! Yeah, he does almost choreograph the show, I think - he does a lot of opera as well and I think that influences his plays a lot, the way he works. What are the challenges of working with the revolve? been a massive challenge actually because we had a limited time in rehearsals so we this constantly moves so we could never really pin down where it stairs, so we can work back and forwards from those points, but been a massive, massive challenge to get it to work. The speeds were changing as Benedict decided what he wanted them to look like in previews54 which obviously affects the whole timing of everything. And obviously the actors were getting more and more familiar with the text, which meant their dialogue sped up, which has changed where the revolve needs to be as well. So we had to continually adjust the revolve to make it work, which we It has been really interesting from a lighting point of view as well for Jon55 - he had to light the show without ever really knowing where the revolve was going to be, which was a massive challenge for him. This means there are a few live moving light follows, because we where the revolve is going to be. It has settled down a little bit now the show is running - but if somebody drops a line, or they skip, or suddenly they come in with loads more energy and they do a scene like a minute faster, it makes a huge difference to where the revolve needs to be -on effect, not just for that scene but for the whole act. So, yeah, been a really big challenge!

In Scene 2, where Stanley star Ben Foster, Stanley 52 Scene 4 (the fight happens at the end of Scene 3) 53 Vanessa Kirby, Stella 54 The first public performances, where the company can make changes to a production as they learn how it works with an audience. 55 Jon Clark, the Lighting Designer 51

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams You mentioned your ASM and sourcing props. Obviously every director has very specific ideas about props - can you tell me a bit about sourcing props for this production? It is very interesting because the creative team work in so many different countrie Stage Management Team seen in another country and then try and find it, either here, or see if we can get it shipped from so things in the rehearsal room interesting challenge as well! The bunting56 was quite tricky because we needed something that could rip every night. They mple one to put up in the rehearsals, I love these c , and unfortunately when we then went to buy the bunting all the shops had sold out of that particular type. I know the ASM spent a long time chasing party shops around this country, and then their suppliers. It gets torn every night so you need a good two hundred of them but they found it. T A lot of it is in the text. But also Benedict really wanted the big Scene Ten57 to be almost as if like a wedding night, to have that feel. So he wanted a white cake and Blanche, obviously, in her big ball gown and got his silk pyjamas on from his wedding night - Benedict wanted that kind of simile to be there. But also Blanche 58 , so a lot of it came from the script. e really was one other than that things are not too eyecatching un - so all the make-up needed to be nothing that would draw the eye. Nothing could be too tall because of sight-lines going into smaller versions of things distract, because there are a few tricky sightlines sometimes. Magda and Benedict like things to be quite plain - so the bedding and

56 57 58

Where Stanley attacks Blanche Scene Eight, page 196

A Young Vic / Joshua Andrews co-production

Inside: A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams Part 5: Meet the Creative Team In the Press

Benedict Andrews discusses directing A Streetcar Named Desire with the Financial Times http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/f01dcf00-06b3-11e4-ba32-00144feab7de.html#axzz37k9gRX60

"Sparks are flying... in a good way!" the Independent on Sunday meets Benedict Andrews during rehearsals http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/theatre-dance/features/a-streetcar-named-desirebenedict-andrews-gives-blanche-and-stanley-a-twist-9615907.html

The Architectural Review speaks to Set Designer Magda Willi http://www.architectural-review.com/view/a-streetcar-named-desire-interview-with-set-designermagda-willi/8666672.article?blocktitle=Top-Stories&contentID=11974

Gillian Anderson and Ben Foster tell The Telegraph about playing Blanche and Stanley http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/theatre/10959606/Gillian-Anderson-and-Ben-Foster-on-AStreetcar-Named-Desire-Were-not-doing-a-full-on-sex-show....html

"What I love about Stella is that she knows herself so well" Vanessa Kirby talks to the Mail on Sunday http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/you/article-2694382/A-sweet-star-named-Vanessa.html

"I was the inspiration for Blanche DuBois" legendary theatre critic Blanche Marvin talks the Independent on Sunday http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/theatre-dance/news/critic-claims-i-was-theinspiration-for-blanche-dubois-9630885.html

"From Gillian Anderson to Vivien Leigh: Streetcar's Blanche DuBois in pictures" on The Guardian http://www.theguardian.com/stage/gallery/2014/jul/16/gillian-anderson-streetcar-named-desireyoung-vic-in-pictures

A hot prospect: Gillian Anderson tells The Sunday DuBois since high school http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/culture/arts/article1429044.ece

If you are reading a paper copy of this pack, you can access an online version via the Young Vic website which will allow you to click through on the links above. http://www.youngvic.org/taking-part/schools-colleges/resource-packs