‘The Glass Menagerie’ at ASU
Appalachian State University junior performance majors Luke Schaffer and Laura Strausbaugh play Laura Wingfield and Jim O’Connor, Wingfield’s ‘gentleman caller’ in Tennessee Williams’ classic play, ‘The Glass Menagerie.’ Produced by the ASU Department of Theatre and Dance, performances run Feb. 13 to 17 at Valborg Theatre on campus.
The Appalachian State University Department of Theatre and
Dance will present Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Tennessee Williams’ highly acclaimed
masterpiece, “The Glass Menagerie,” in the state-of-the-art Valborg Theatre on campus.
The
performance has a five-day run Feb. 13 to 17 at 7:30 p.m. nightly and a 2 p.m. matinee on Feb. 17.
Ticket prices start at $8 for students, $13 for faculty, staff and seniors and $15 for adults.
For more information, visit http://theatre.appstate.edu/events/glass-menagerie or call the Valborg
box office at (828) 262-3063 or (800) 841-ARTS.
“The Glass Menagerie” takes the audience on
an emotional journey through one man’s troubled memories.
Director Derek Gagnier, an
associate professor of theater and coordinator for the bachelor of arts degree in performance, is
presenting the play in such a way that the audience is viewing it as it is being written, which
reinforces Williams’ intention that it be staged as a “memory play.”
“We are using the idea
that writing conveys details, feelings and ideas in varying degrees of clarity,” Gagnier said. “The
lighting, set and costumes will reflect this. The play will seem like the recollections of a young
man coming of age, having to face the realization that to be happy, he must abandon his beloved
family. It’s as if we are witnessing him purging his conscience by writing the events on
paper.”
Many believe the play was a semi-autobiographical piece for Williams, who was raised
in an environment very much like the one presented in the work. Gagnier called the play “poetic,
romantic and heartbreaking.”
“It is one of the best plays on which I’ve ever worked,” he
added.
Williams was an American playwright, screenwriter, poet and novelist, whose career
spanned from 1936 to his death in 1983. During his lifetime, he wrote some of the most beloved plays
in the history of American theater, including “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof,” “A Streetcar Named Desire”
and “The Rose Tattoo.” He received numerous awards and honors, including the Tony Award for Best
Play, two Pulitzer prizes for Drama and the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Valborg Theatre is
located on the north side of Chapell Wilson Hall on Howard Street. The door faces the back of the
Turchin Center for the Visual Arts on King Street. Parking is available after 5 p.m. on campus in
faculty lots and the College Street parking deck near the Belk Library and Information Commons.
);)
);)
