Stars of 'Streetcar' make drama production riveting

~ The four student actors who portray the lead characters are the dynamos that power the show.

Southeast Missouri State University's Department of Theatre and Dance is known for its quality productions, and the department's latest ranks right at the top.

The department's production of the Tennessee Williams' classic "A Streetcar Named Desire" is without doubt one of the best pieces of theater I've seen on a local stage. The word to use is riveting: Even if I wanted to turn away during the three-hour performance, I couldn't. Why turn away, anyway? With such an interesting story supplied by one of America's greatest playwrights and great student performances there's no need to even blink.

With the classic nature of "Streetcar," a plot synopsis is hardly necessary. But for those not familiar with the play, "Streetcar" tells the story of a fading Southern debutante, Blanche DuBois (Elisa Curtis), who seeks escape from her tragic life by living with her sister Stella (Whitney Lamora) in New Orleans. The conflict is supplied by Stella's overbearing, suspicious, physically violent husband Stanley Kowalski (Stephen Fister), whose brutish ways immediately clash with the frail and damaged Blanche.

Scene changes

Part of the beauty of this production is not in the primary action but in what happens during scene changes. Director Dr. Robert Dillon and the assistant director, student Anthony Poston, don't forget the Big Easy flavor in "Streetcar." Between scenes prostitutes, trouble-making sailors, homeless drunks and other denizens of the French Quarter use the stage as their playground, creating their own narrative of life in a city of vice. They move against a beautiful backdrop created by scenic designer Dennis C. Seyer. Coupled with detailed costumes by Rhonda Weller-Stilson, the scenery has the effect of transporting audiences to 1940s-era New Orleans or at least the one we know from pop-culture osmosis.

But the dregs of New Orleans are just the garnish.

The four lead characters and the student actors who portray them are really the dynamos that power this production of "Streetcar."

Curtis does a fine job as Blanche DuBois, a role that seems much easier to do badly than to do correctly. Those familiar with "Streetcar" know Blanche is a walking contradiction. To everyone else she exudes confidence (even outright pretentiousness), but really she's haunted by a fall from grace that threatens to destroy her fragile psyche. Curtis nails the emotions and makes you feel the Blanche in yourself.

Her counterbalance, Stanley, is extremely compelling in the capable hands of Stephen Fister. Fister has always been a physical sort of actor at Southeast, and he uses those talents to breathe life into the ball-of-rage Kowalski. You can see the tension building between the two polar opposites -- Blanche's Old South ideas versus the new society of Stanley, an immigrant's son who works in a factory.

Of course, "Streetcar" has always been known as a social commentary on the clash between old and new ways of living and thinking, and that commentary shines through in Southeast's production.

Even if you haven't actually seen or read the play, you can see the inevitable tragic and brutal end coming, but you just can't turn away. You won't walk away from this production feeling good, but you will walk away feeling and thinking. I guarantee you can find a little of yourself in both Blanche and Stanley.

But those characters wouldn't be nearly as strong without support from Whitney Lamora as Stella and Cody Heuer as Mitch. Lamora turns in possibly the most convincing characterization in Stella, who unlike her sister has embraced a new life, even though it cost her some of her pride. And Heuer seems to nail the quiet, timid Mitch, even when he reveals the darkness that lies below that surface.

msanders@semissourian.com

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