The Two-Character Play

Last updated
The Two-Character Play
Written by Tennessee Williams
CharactersClaire
Felice
Date premieredDecember 1967 (1967-12)
Place premieredHampstead Theatre
London
Original languageEnglish

The Two-Character Play (also known as Out Cry in one of its alternate versions) is an American play by Tennessee Williams that premiered in London at the Hampstead Theatre in December 1967. [1] [2] [3] Williams himself had great affection for the play, and described it as follows:

Contents

"My most beautiful play since Streetcar, the very heart of my life." [3]

Background

After winning critical and popular acclaim with his earlier plays, Williams wanted to experiment and expand his writing style. His later creations had more in common with playwrights Samuel Beckett and the emerging Harold Pinter than with what the name Tennessee Williams had come to signify. Although the play is a marked departure from the naturalism of his classics, familiar themes permeate. Confinement due to mental illness, repression leading to social isolation and the tyranny and claustrophobia that come from impinging on one another’s psychological and physical space are all present in The Two-Character Play.

When the play premiered in its various forms, it was not well received by critics or audiences. At the time many audiences attended the theatre as a form of escapism. The Two-Character Play provided the exact opposite. Clare and Felice, the actors, as well as the characters they play, cannot, no matter how hard they try to delude themselves, escape from the reality of their deteriorating mental states. Consequently, the viewers themselves are confronted with the darker truths of what it is to be human.

It was very experimental for its time. The language is heightened. There are slabs of verbosity juxtaposed with pauses and stunted sentences.

The Two-Character Play is partially autobiographical. The actor Clare and especially the character Clare are loosely based on Williams’ sister, Rose, and the actor Felice and the character Felice on Williams himself. The "confining nature of human existence" was a major theme throughout his work and this play is seen to be his most personal interpretation.

It took Williams over ten years to write The Two-Character Play, longer than any other play, and it illustrates an innovation in his writing style.

Plot

The characters in this play, Felice and Clare, are two actors on tour; they are also brother and sister. They find themselves deserted by their acting troupe in a decrepit "state theatre in an unknown state". Faced (perhaps) by an audience expecting a performance, they enact The Two-Character Play – an illusion within an illusion, an 'out cry' from isolation, panic, and fear. ( Out Cry was the title of one version of this play, which premiered at the Ivanhoe Theatre in Chicago in July 1971. Out Cry later premiered on Broadway, directed by Peter Glenville and co-starring Michael York and Cara Duff-MacCormick, and which ran from March 1–10, 1973 at the Lyceum Theater after one preview on February 28.)

The plot is confusing and difficult to follow, with little sense of a resolution. The Two-Character Play has a concurrent double plot with the convention of a play within a play scenario. The characters of Clare and Felice are psychologically damaged from witnessing the traumatic murder/suicide of their parents. They have remained recluses in the family home since the incident and are attempting to make hesitant contact with the outside world. As the actors dip in and out of performance, improvising parts not memorised or not yet written, it becomes increasingly difficult to differentiate the actors from the characters and reality from illusion.

Performances

The London premiere featured Peter Wyngarde and Mary Ure, and its director was James Roose-Evans. Williams then revised the play, and the revised version, under the title of Out Cry, received its first performance in Chicago with Donald Madden and Eileen Herlie. [4]

The play was produced in San Francisco before it moved to Broadway. [5] David Merrick produced the play on Broadway in 1973, under the title of Out Cry. [6]

A 30th Anniversary production (of the 1975 version) was staged in Australia in 2005 at the University of Melbourne with siblings Stephen Ryan and Sarah Ryan playing the roles of Felice and Clare. For his performance as Felice, Stephen Ryan won the Murray Sutherland Prize for the most outstanding performance in a dramatic production at the University of Melbourne. San Francisco's Theatre Rhinoceros staged the show in January 2012.

The play was produced at London's Jermyn Street Theatre in October 2010. The production starred Catherine Cusack and Paul McEwan, and was directed by the then-Artistic Director of the theater, Gene David Kirk. [3]

The Two-Character Play opened Off Broadway to critical acclaim on June 19, 2013 at New World Stages. The production featured Tony-winner Amanda Plummer and Brad Dourif. [6]

The play was produced as a senior directorial at The College of William and Mary in October 2013. In October 2013, Spooky Action Theater produced the play, with David Bryan Jackson and Lee Mikeska Gardner, directed by Richard Henrich. [7]

In March 2014, the 292 Theatre on East 3rd Street in New York City mounted a production of The Two-Character Play which ran from March 19 through April 26, directed by Romy Ashby, and starring husband and wife Charles Schick and Regina Bartkoff.

In July, 2017, Playhouse Creatures Theatre Company, produced an acclaimed production in New York City (at the Duo Theatre on East 4th Street). The production was directed by Austin Pendleton, and starred Irene Glezos (as Clare), and Joseph W. Rodriguez (as Felice). This production transferred to The NOLA Tennessee Williams Festival (Playhouse Creatures Theatre Company and Southern Rep co-producing), in March/April 2018.

The Two-Character Play was the first play produced by the Texas theatre company Bliss Out Productions in April 2023. The production was directed by Jax Schuck and starred Carly Geary and Blake Kump.

Related Research Articles

<i>A Streetcar Named Desire</i> 1947 play by Tennessee Williams

A Streetcar Named Desire is a play written by Tennessee Williams and first performed on Broadway on December 3, 1947. The play dramatizes the experiences of Blanche DuBois, a former Southern belle who, after encountering a series of personal losses, leaves her once-prosperous situation to move into a shabby apartment in New Orleans rented by her younger sister Stella and brother-in-law Stanley.

<i>The Rose Tattoo</i> Play by Tennessee Williams

The Rose Tattoo is a three-act play written by Tennessee Williams in 1949 and 1950; after its Chicago premiere on December 29, 1950, he made further revisions to the play for its Broadway premiere on February 2, 1951, and its publication by New Directions the following month. A film adaptation was released in 1955. The Rose Tattoo tells the story of an Italian-American widow in Mississippi who has withdrawn from the world after her husband's death and expects her daughter to do the same.

<i>Cat on a Hot Tin Roof</i> Stage play by Tennessee Williams

Cat on a Hot Tin Roof is a 1955 American three-act play by Tennessee Williams. The play, an adaptation of his 1952 short story "Three Players of a Summer Game", was written between 1953 and 1955. One of Williams's more famous works and his personal favorite, it won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1955. Set in the "plantation home in the Mississippi Delta" of Big Daddy Pollitt, a wealthy cotton tycoon, the play examines the relationships among members of Big Daddy's family, primarily between his son Brick and Maggie the "Cat", Brick's wife.

<i>Sweet Bird of Youth</i> 1959 play by Tennessee Williams

Sweet Bird of Youth is a 1959 play by Tennessee Williams that tells the story of a gigolo and drifter, Chance Wayne, who returns to his hometown as the companion of a faded movie star, Alexandra del Lago, whom he hopes to use to help him break into the movies. The main reason for his homecoming is to get back what he had in his youth, primarily, his old girlfriend, whose father had run him out of town years before. The play was written for Tallulah Bankhead, a good friend of Williams.

<i>The Glass Menagerie</i> 1944 play by Tennessee Williams

The Glass Menagerie is a memory play by Tennessee Williams that premiered in 1944 and catapulted Williams from obscurity to fame. The play has strong autobiographical elements, featuring characters based on its author, his histrionic mother, and his mentally fragile sister. In writing the play, Williams drew on an earlier short story, as well as a screenplay he had written under the title of The Gentleman Caller.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Brad Dourif</span> American actor (born 1950)

Bradford Claude Dourif is an American semi-retired actor. He is known for voicing Chucky in the Child's Play franchise (1988–present), portraying Gríma Wormtongue in The Lord of the Rings film series and his Oscar-nominated role as Billy Bibbit in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975).

<i>Gas Light</i> 1938 British thriller play by Patrick Hamilton

Gas Light is a 1938 thriller play, set in 1880s London, written by the British novelist and playwright Patrick Hamilton. Hamilton's play is a dark tale of a marriage based on deceit and trickery, and a husband committed to driving his wife insane in order to steal from her.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Frank Langella</span> American actor (born 1938)

Frank A. Langella Jr. is an American actor known for his roles on stage and screen. He eschewed the career of a traditional film star by making the stage the focal point of his career, appearing frequently on Broadway. He has received numerous accolades including four Tony Awards, a Drama Desk Award and a Screen Actors Guild Award as well as nominations for an Academy Award, a BAFTA Award, an Emmy Award, and two Golden Globe Awards.

The Night of the Iguana is a stage play written by American author Tennessee Williams. It is based on his 1948 short story. In 1959, Williams staged it as a one-act play, and over the next two years he developed it into a full-length play, producing two different versions in 1959 and 1960, and then arriving at the three-act version that premiered on Broadway in 1961. Two film adaptations have been made: The Oscar-winning 1964 film directed by John Huston and starring Richard Burton, Ava Gardner, and Deborah Kerr, and a 2000 Croatian production.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Amanda Plummer</span> American-Canadian actress (born 1957)

Amanda Michael Plummer is an American actress. She is known for her work on stage and for her film roles, including Joe Versus the Volcano (1990), The Fisher King (1991), Pulp Fiction (1994), and The Hunger Games: Catching Fire (2013). Plummer won a Tony Award in 1982 for her performance in Agnes of God. She most recently appeared in the third season of Star Trek: Picard (2023).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ben Gazzara</span> American actor (1930–2012)

Biagio Anthony "Ben" Gazzara was an American actor and director of film, stage, and television. He received numerous accolades, including a Primetime Emmy Award and a Drama Desk Award, in addition to nominations for three Golden Globe Awards and three Tony Awards.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jermyn Street Theatre</span> Theatre in London, England

Jermyn Street Theatre is a performance venue situated on Jermyn Street, in London's West End. It is an Off West End studio theatre.

<i>The Milk Train Doesnt Stop Here Anymore</i> Play written by Tennessee Williams

The Milk Train Doesn't Stop Here Anymore (1963) is a play in a prologue and six scenes, written by Tennessee Williams. He told John Gruen in 1965 that it was "the play that I worked on longest," and he premiered a version of it at the Festival dei Due Mondi in Spoleto, Italy, in July 1962.

<i>This Is Our Youth</i> Play written by Kenneth Lonergan

This Is Our Youth is a play by American dramatist and screenwriter Kenneth Lonergan. It premiered Off-Broadway in 1996 and since been produced all over the world, including the West End, Broadway, Sydney and Toronto.

Billy Bishop Goes to War is a Canadian musical, written by John MacLachlan Gray in collaboration with the actor Eric Peterson. One of the most widely produced plays in Canadian theatre, the two-man play dramatizes the life of Canadian World War I fighter pilot Billy Bishop. One member of the cast plays the part of Bishop in word and song, although he is also called upon to dramatize 17 other parts; the second cast member provides all the accompaniment on the piano and also sings.

<i>The Seven Descents of Myrtle</i> Play by Tennessee Williams

The Seven Descents of Myrtle is a play in seven scenes by Tennessee Williams. It started as a short story, The Kingdom of Earth, which Williams began in 1942 while in Macon, Georgia, but did not publish until 1954, in the limited edition of his story collection Hard Candy. Williams subsequently adapted the story into a one-act play, "Kingdom of Earth," published in the February 1, 1967, edition of Esquire magazine. He then expanded that play into a full-length seven-scene version, premiered the following year in New York with the title The Seven Descents of Myrtle and published on October 31, 1968, by New Directions as Kingdom of Earth. Its title character is reminiscent of another Williams' heroine, Blanche Dubois in A Streetcar Named Desire.

<i>Out Cry</i>

Out Cry is a play by Tennessee Williams, his rewrite of The Two-Character Play which he had written in 1966 and which was staged in 1967 and published by New Directions Publications in 1969. Williams began rewriting the play after its publication, and Out Cry premiered at the Ivanhoe Theatre in Chicago on July 8, 1971, with Eileen Herlie as Clare and Donald Madden as Felice. It debuted on Broadway at the Lyceum Theatre with a preview on February 28, 1973 and ran from March 1 to 10; the production was directed by Peter Glenville and starred Cara Duff-MacCormick as Clare and Michael York as Felice. Out Cry was published by New Directions in 1973 – by which time Williams had already rewritten the play into a third version, again titled The Two-Character Play, which New Directions published in 1975. In a 1971 interview Williams said of the first version of The Two-Character Play, "I wrote it when I was approaching a mental breakdown and rewrote it after my alleged recovery. I was thoroughly freaked out."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Arian Moayed</span> Iranian-American actor (born 1980)

Arian Moayed is an Iranian-American actor, screenwriter, and director. Moayed received two Tony Award nominations for Best Featured Actor in a Play for his performances in Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo (2011) and A Doll's House (2023), and two Primetime Emmy Award nominations for his role as Stewy Hosseini in HBO's Succession.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Matthew López (writer)</span> American playwright and screenwriter

Matthew López is an American playwright, director and screenwriter. His play The Inheritance, directed by Stephen Daldry, premiered at London's Young Vic in 2018, where it was called "the most important American play of the century." It transferred to the West End later that year, and opened on Broadway In 2019. The Inheritance is the most honored American play in a generation, sweeping the "Best Play" awards in both London and New York including the Tony Award, Olivier Award, Drama Desk Award, Evening Standard Award, London Critics Circle Award, Outer Critics Circle Award, Drama League Award, WhatsOnStage Award, and the Southbank Sky Arts Award.

References

  1. ↑ Kolin, Philip C (editor), Tennessee Williams: A Guide to Research and Performance. Greenwood Press (Westport, Connecticut, USA), 1998 ( ISBN   0-313-30306-1), p 180.
  2. ↑ "Williams Drama Baffles Critics". New York Times. 1967-12-13. Retrieved 2016-05-25.
  3. 1 2 3 Dominic Cavendish (2010-10-29). "The Two-Character Play, Jermyn Street Theatre, London, review". Telegraph. Retrieved 2016-05-25.
  4. ↑ Saddik, Annette J, Tennessee Williams and the Theatre of Excess. Cambridge University Press (Cambridge, UK), 2015 ( ISBN   978-1-107-07668-6), p 17.
  5. ↑ Lawrence van Gelder (1975-08-22). "Stage: Williams' '2 Character Play'". New York Times. Retrieved 2016-05-28.
  6. 1 2 Ben Brantley (2013-06-21). "Brother, Can You Spare My Sanity? Amanda Plummer and Brad Dourif in Tennessee Williams Rarity". New York Times. Retrieved 2016-05-25.
  7. ↑ Jessica Goldstein (2013-10-01). "Two-Character Play benefits from actors' shared history". Washington Post. Retrieved 2016-05-25.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.