Stage

A Streetcar Named Desire.

by J. Cooper Robb

Death of a Salesman, Long Day’s Journey into Night, Angels in America. For some reason, Philadelphia’s professional companies have historically steered clear of the great American classics. The Walnut Street Theatre takes the plunge with the company’s majestic though imperfect revival of Tennessee Williams’ masterpiece A Streetcar Named Desire.

First staged at the Walnut in 1947 before its Broadway run, Streetcar is set in New Orleans’ seedy French Quarter. Stanley Kowalski (Jeffrey Coon) and his wife Stella (Sandra Struthers) reside in a small, run-down apartment. Although the couple’s backgrounds differ (he’s an uncouth brute, she a member of a now decayed southern aristocracy), their physical attraction to each other is palatable. Or as Stella tactfully puts it, “There are things that happen between a man and a woman in the dark that make everything else seem unimportant.” Chief among the “things” is Stanley’s temper which he shows in frightening flashes of uncontrollable rage.

Disrupting the couple’s love nest is Stella’s sister Blanche (Susan Riley Stevens), a wounded soul who seeks refuge in the memories of a more genteel past filled with cool mint juleps and dashing lovers.

Director Malcolm Black’s huge production gives Streetcar the full treatment, an admirable approach in the increasingly minimalist world of American theater. But the approach also lends itself to excess. In a production in which no emotional firework goes undetonated, Black’s directorial flourishes are occasionally unnecessary.

In one of the play’s most famous passages Blanche recalls her husband’s suicide. Under Black’s direction, sound designer Christopher Colucci punctuates the memory with intrusive sound effects that disrupt the hypnotic effect of Williams’ words. And though the numerous street scenes provide a clear sense of the play’s environment, Black’s staging gives them far too much importance and they soon become onerous.

Where it counts, however, the Walnut’s Streetcar delivers. Although the production sporadically slides into melodrama, the performances of Stevens and Coon effectively establish the play’s central conflict.

Throughout Streetcar, Williams’ juxtaposes the dichotomous themes of death and desire, and reality and illusion.

Blanche is intimately acquainted with death having buried a husband and most of her family. These deaths have left her fragile and vulnerable and she repeatedly retreats from reality into a world of illusion. She is a highly sexual woman, but her desires are both misplaced and repressed.

Stanley conversely is about as gentile as a saber-tooth tiger. Like an animal he acts on impulse. He is crude but also cunning, and he attacks Blanche with a predator’s instincts.

Coon suggests Stanley’s bestial nature in an intensely physical performance that is among the best of his career. His baseness stands in stark contrast to Stevens’ heightened emotionalism.

In the end Blanche is no match for Stanley and the intolerant society he represents. She experiences a brief moment of hope in her relationship with the equally lonely Mitch (Scott Greer), but the outcome of Williams’ extraordinary play is as inevitable as it is devastating.

» Footlights

Current Affairs “Everything actually has to happen doesn’t it?” wonders Beth (Janice Rowland), one of the two adulterous characters in Craig Wright’s gem Orange Flower Water, which can currently be seen in a solid production from Luna Theater Company. A tale of two couples and the extramarital affair that disrupts their lives, Flower is an extraordinarily natural look at the difference between what we imagine will happen, and what really happens as a result of the choices we make. “Every time you touch me it’s like being raped,” Beth tells her husband Brad (Chris Fluck). Needless to say their marriage is not good. Nor is the union between Cathy (Amanda Grove) and David (Damon Bonetti). But when David and Beth embark on an affair, they’re ill-prepared for the consequences their romance brings. Director Gregory Campbell’s production doesn’t match his spectacular 2008 staging of Wright’s Grace, and while Bonetti, Fluck and Rowland are creditable, only Grove delivers the nuanced performance the play demands. Nevertheless if you favor unflinchingly honest, beautifully written theater, this perceptive work from one of America’s top playwrights is worth your time. (J.C.R.) » Through Feb. 14. $20-$35. Walnut Street Theatre, Studio 5. 825 Walnut St. 215.704.0033. www.LunaTheater.org