1973 Glass Menagarie with Hepurn, Waterson and Moriarity

[SNAFU]

Posted: 6/7/14 at 12:22am

Where are television movies like this today? Just watched it on Netflix. Was not familiar with the play. Amazing! Kept the "play" feeling but worked also as a made for TV movie. Hepurn was able to hide herself in character and to see a young gangly Waterson acting with Moriarity seemed a harbinger to the Law and Order Series.

[Gothampc]

Posted: 6/7/14 at 10:28am

The 1960s, 70s and 80s saw a prolific amount of theater played on PBS. If you search Netflix for the "Broadway Theatre Archive" you'll find all of those shows that played on PBS with young stars such as Dustin Hoffman, Bernadette Peters, Blythe Danner, Colleen Dewhurst and the list goes on and on.

I'm not that thrilled with this version of The Glass Menagerie. I think Hepburn was too patrician to play southern belle Amanda Wingfield. Hepburn was more suited to playing Eugene O'Neil.

[SNAFU]

Posted: 6/7/14 at 12:37pm

Well to be honest, until last night I was unfamiliar with The Glass Menagaie. One of the very few Williams Plays I never got around to reading or seeing.
I really wish televison would do more things like this. I guess they did with The Normal Heart.

[EricMontreal22]

Posted: 6/7/14 at 12:45pm

I have huge issues with this version--I think I *may* prefer the Paul Newman directed 80s version, but either way the play has never been adapted well to film/TV.

[Gothampc]

Posted: 6/7/14 at 1:11pm

"but either way the play has never been adapted well to film/TV."

It's a deceptive play. It has many layers and I don't think anyone has gotten it right yet. I've seen several stage versions as well. Several years ago, the Roundabout did it with Julie Harris, who I thought would be brilliant in the role. She turned in a mediocre performance.

I always wanted to see a production with Brenda Blethyn. I think she has the ability to play the "blowsy" aspect of Amanda while still retaining the Southern charm.

Amanda and Blanche DuBois are both versions of Tennessee Williams' mother. They live in the world of their own thinking rather than in reality. Both were raised as southern belles but knocked off their pedestal by brutish men.

Maybe one day we'll see a production that develops all the layers correctly.

[SNAFU]

Posted: 6/7/14 at 2:04pm

Heading to The Drama Bookstore, this is going to be my next read.

[GavestonPS]

Posted: 6/7/14 at 11:37pm

As I remember the history, Goth, Tennessee Williams' mother was born in Ohio to an Episcopal minister. She herself took on the demeanor of Southern Belle, which is one of the great ironies in the history of American literature. (Since, as you point out, she became the model for our stereotypes of Southern women.)

And a clue as to how one might approach Amanda. I say "might" because I don't think any production has an obligation to replicate Mrs. Williams.

But your sentence "too patrician to play a Southern Belle" confuses me. Who do you think Southern Belles were? Field hands?

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 6/8/14 at 12:09am

Block Goth and you will never again have to deal with the confusion of an ex-gay who bargained with God at the advent of the AIDS epidemic. Srsly.

[PalJoey]

Posted: 6/8/14 at 12:27am

I liked her better as Eugene O'Neill's putative mother in Long Day's Journey Into Night.

[Gothampc]

Posted: 6/8/14 at 11:10am

"But your sentence "too patrician to play a Southern Belle" confuses me. Who do you think Southern Belles were? Field hands?"

Perhaps patrician is the wrong word. Katharine Hepburn was never good at hiding herself in a role. The clipped diction, the regal posture always had her playing upper crust educated characters, spinsters, royalty and crusty New England types. She never played the coquette. There's a reason why she wasn't in Gone With The Wind or Jezebel, she just didn't fit the Southern Belle image.

The Glass Menagerie is a story about how America had just come out of the war and the grinding poverty, and the weariness and the effect the war had on the nation and how the nation had to rebuild itself.

Amanda grew up in a pampered life of parties and being taken care of. She knew how to flirt, but she's not smart enough to know how to survive in the new world order. Her husband has deserted her, her children are confused about how to move forward. The only job she can get is demonstrating bras in a store and selling magazine subscriptions. In some ways, this play mirrors the British aristocracy when they started losing their estates and didn't know what to do.

Hepburn comes across as too smart, too straightfoward and too independent to be believed as Amanda Wingfield.

Updated On: 6/8/14 at 11:10 AM

[GavestonPS]

Posted: 6/8/14 at 7:58pm

Goth, I'll take your word for it because I saw the Hepburn film when I was a teenager and didn't know the play.

But I later saw Jessica Tandy--of all people!--play Amanda on Broadway. Perhaps she wasn't the definitive Amanda, but she very neatly captured a Midwestern woman who put on "Southern airs" when it suited her purpose. As I hinted above, it told us something very important about Amanda's true character, without reducing my sympathy for her.

[SNAFU]

Posted: 6/8/14 at 8:24pm

I will disagree that Hepurn came across as too smart to be Amanada. As I am reading the play now, Amanda doesn't come across as unintelligent, but more overwhelmed with the changing world and being left on her own. She is clinging to an ideal as she watches her children look for a way to escape. I might agree with you on the independant complaint though.

[Gothampc]

Posted: 6/9/14 at 9:31am

"Perhaps she wasn't the definitive Amanda, but she very neatly captured a Midwestern woman who put on "Southern airs" when it suited her purpose."

In my understanding of the play, Amanda is not a Midwestern woman putting on airs. She is a Southern woman who was moved "up North" by her husband and couldn't adjust to the culture change. When she talks about going to the cotillion (or whatever it was), she's thinking back to a time when things were perfect in her life. I don't see that as putting on airs but holding on to the past.

Perhaps unintelligent is the wrong word. She just doesn't have the "know-how" to raise herself up to a profitable job. She's demonstrating bras at minimum wage.

[madbrian]

Posted: 6/9/14 at 9:43am

I'd love to see Judith Light as Amanda.

[SNAFU]

Posted: 6/9/14 at 11:26am

Wow Madbrian, so would I!

[Gothampc]

Posted: 6/9/14 at 12:08pm

"I'd love to see Judith Light as Amanda."

20 years ago maybe. Amanda should be no more than 45 years old. When I saw Julie Harris play the role, I thought she was too old.

In the script, Tom joins the military. So conceivably, he should be no more than 25 years old. So if Amanda is much more than 45-50, it doesn't add up age-wise.

[madbrian]

Posted: 6/9/14 at 12:43pm

But with Quinto aged 37 and Keenan-Bolger 36, casting Amanda at 45-50 for this production wouldn't have worked.

[Gothampc]

Posted: 6/9/14 at 1:43pm

"But with Quinto aged 37 and Keenan-Bolger 36, casting Amanda at 45-50 for this production wouldn't have worked."

Then they should have cast younger. You can't join the Merchant Marines when you're 37.

Actually the kids should be closer in age to Amanda. It does say in the script that Laura is two years older than Tom. If Amanda had the kids when she was 16 and 18, then Tom could be 25 and Amanda would only be around 43 years old.

Actually it is difficult when producing older works because people's perspective on age has changed.

[madbrian]

Posted: 6/9/14 at 1:49pm

Agreed. Then we better hurry up and schedule the next revival with Toni Collette.

[Gothampc]

Posted: 6/9/14 at 2:06pm

I desperately wanted a production with Brenda Blethyn. I think she would have had the right mix of southern belle and nagging mother. Alas, she is too far gone. Put together her performances in "Little Voice" "Secrets & Lies" "Anne Frank" and her Broadway version of "Night Mother" and you pretty much have everything that is needed for Amanda.

I'd go for a revival with Emma Thompson or Cate Blanchett.

I'd also like to see a production with Viola Davis if she could handle the more outrageous and annoying aspects of the character.

Updated On: 6/9/14 at 02:06 PM

[Brian07663NJ]

Posted: 6/9/14 at 2:13pm

When the current revival was still open I got thie 1973 version from Netflix to watch to see if I really wanted to go see it live on stage. Although I appreciated watching it from the comfort of my couch - I didn't feel compelled to go see it on stage.

[Gothampc]

Posted: 6/9/14 at 2:18pm

When it's done correctly, it can be an astounding night of theater. Unfortunately, too many directors take it too lightly and don't explore all the different layers.

[EricMontreal22]

Posted: 6/9/14 at 3:06pm

I think one reason the recent revival apparently works so well--and so few film adaptations do (any of them?) is because of the memory play aspect. I saw a regional production a year back that re-inserted all of Williams' projections, and I thought it worked wonderfully.

[NoName3]

Posted: 6/9/14 at 3:14pm

I remember seeing this in 1973 and thinking it paled in comparison with a version shown on CBS just six or seven years earlier with Shirley Booth, Hal Holbrook and Barbara Loden. Booth was brilliant as Amanda, Hepburn very miscast. This version has never been released on any form of home video and I hope it still exists somewhere. It's very possible after all these years I might not be as impressed with it as I was then, but at the time I thought it was superb.


Updated On: 6/9/14 at 03:14 PM

[Gothampc]

Posted: 6/9/14 at 3:31pm

Apparently there was also a version with Helen Hayes and Montgomery Clift, which I think may have been a radio version.
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