Press Release : production photos
PRESS RELEASE
THE GLASS MENAGERIE by Tennessee Williams
including details of the cast
Friday 6th — Saturday 28th October 2000
After a busy summer season in Williamson Park and non-stop film programme, the Dukes present their first production of the Autumn season.
The Glass Menagerie is one of the great classic dramas of the twentieth century, and the play that signalled Tennessee Williams’ arrival on the world stage.
The Glass Menagerie is set in St. Louis, Missouri, in the 1930s. Long since abandoned by her feckless husband, Amanda Wingfield struggles to maintain the last vestiges of Southern gentility, looking wistfully back to her younger years when she received seventeen "gentlemen callers" in one afternoon. Her daughter, Laura is emotionally fragile and takes comfort in creating characters for her collection of glass animals. Tom, the teenage son, feels stifled by the family home and dreams of escaping his humdrum job to make a new life elsewhere.
Tension is raised when Amanda makes plans for Laura to receive her own gentleman caller.
The Dukes’ new production of this popular and well-loved play takes the lid off this claustrophobic world of hopes, dreams and memories. But, based on Tennessee Williams’ own early years, The Glass Menagerie is also full of humour and compassion.
After appearing in February’s critically-acclaimed production of American Buffalo as Bobby, Alun Raglan is back at the Dukes to play Jim O’Connor, the gentleman caller. Besides his theatre work, Alun has appeared as Julian Crassus in the recently-released Gladiator, and as Bledder in the new movie Atilla the Hun.
The rest of the cast are all newcomers to the Dukes and are looking forward to playing the complex characters who make up the Wingfield family. Justin Shevlin (Tom) has appeared in several Royal Shakespeare Company productions including Romeo and Juliet and Richard II. Justin’s TV credits include The Bill and The Plastic Man.
Amanda Wingfield is played by Veronica Roberts. Veronica is a well-known face on stage and screen particularly for her roles as Dorothy in Tenko (BBC) and Laura the nurse in Peak Practice (ITV). She has also appeared in The Glass Menagerie before but as Laura, alongside Gloria Graham in Sheffield and the Roundhouse, London in 1979. Other stage appearances include Rose in Dancing at Lughnasa, Margaret in
The Dearly Beloved, Shirley in Shirley Valentine and Under Milkwood at Bristol Old Vic (directed by Ian Hastings) plus many more.
Television credits include East Enders, The Bill, Maisie Raine and The Cuckoo Waltz.
Deborah Steel plays Laura, the nervous daughter. Deborah trained at Bristol Old Vic Theatre School and has appeared in Under Milkwood at the Kings Head, Islington, A View from the Bridge at the Leicester Haymarket, Pride and Prejudice at the Theatre Royal, Bristol, plus many others. For Television, Deborah has appeared in Highlander, Casualty and The Things You Do for Love.
Ian Hastings will be directing the production. Designer Penny Fitt, who transformed the Dukes’ Studio theatre into an authentic Chicago junkshop for American Buffalo, has triumphed again in the larger auditorium for The Glass Menagerie.
Ends 11.09.00
Production photos, released October 2000
left Justin Shevlin as Tom Wingfield; right Alun Raglan as the Gentleman Caller
Left, Alun Raglan as the Gentleman Caller, right, Deborah Steel as Laura Wingfield
Left, Alun Raglan as the Gentleman Caller, right, Veronica Roberts as Amanda Wingfield