The Glass Menagerie

Eamon Flack takes the reins for Belvoir’s production of The Glass Menagerie, and it’s a stunning return to form for the company.

By staying faithful to Tennessee Williams’ text, the cast and crew are able to draw out and capitalise upon the drama of the play, to create a work that is inspiring, because of the truth and lyricism of the dialogue itself; because of the filmic quality of the projections on screen, the titles, the grand music, and narrator; and because of the standout performance from Luke Mullins.

But Mullins can’t really do anything wrong, he imbues Tom Wingfield with a rawness and lust for adventure, a queerness, that stands next to the quiet yet passionate “crippled” oddity of his sister Laura and the nostalgia and deluded hopefulness of their mother Amanda. The role of Laura is Rose Riley’s Sydney debut; the new grad is finding her feet and stands up well to both Mullins and an assured and fiery performance from Pamela Rabe as Amanda. It’s their family dynamic that is so fascinating and so honest, the bleakness of the ending mirroring autobiographical details from Williams’ own life.

The use of a closed-in set, concentrating the action on a family in their kitchen, is possible thanks in part to the images on screen, with close-ups on both characters and a curtain fluttering in the breeze, making the experience of watching the play part-theatre, part-cinema, thick with tension and a sense of mood, of futility.

Belvoir Upstairs to Nov 1