Social worker plays brute: Theatre Calgary’s production of ‘A Streetcar Named Desire’ complex, emotional

The play itself first premiered in 1947, and even as generations come and go, the humanity laid bare by Tennessee Williams’ script remains pertinent.

“A Streetcar Named Desire” is on stage with Theatre Calgary for the next two weeks.

This is the second run of this show for most of the cast, being a co-production with Edmonton’s Citadel Theatre. That run of the show concluded in October and in between then and opening in Calgary, the cast had one single week of rehearsals.

Stafford Perry, who plays the role of Stanley Kowalski, said it has been a true gift to allow the story to simmer and the meanings to deepen between runs. He said the writing is so amazing that it was easy to pick up the lines again.

The short pitch of the story is that former aging southern belle Blanche Dubois is left homeless after the loss of their ancestral home Belle Reve. She is forced to shack up with her sister Stella and husband Stanley in a busy, crowded apartment block in New Orleans. Their apartment being only two rooms, it’s quite a shock for Blanche coming from a plantation mansion.

Stanley is, at the outset of the show, the complete antithesis to Blanche’s prime and proper idealistic character. He is working class, likes bowling, drinking, poker and wears his feelings on his sleeves; and in the first half of the show he is violent to Stella in a drunken rage.

Blanche is appalled by his action, but then left dumbfounded when Stella returns to him mere hours later.

Does a modern perspective on that moment differ from what audiences would feel at that moment in 1947?

Perry, while not moonlighting on the stage, works as a social worker focusing on violence prevention programming with young men. He said to write Stanley off as a villain does not do service to the script, the writer, or the complexity of human beings.

“I think the sensitivities now towards it, there is a clear realization that that is not acceptable in any way… That is something that has hopefully progressed since the late 40s,” he said. “But it also is not something that has disappeared within our society, and it is something that we need to keep looking at, making sure we are doing all we can to prevent violence and harm.”

Perry says part of that work is to try and understand what is happening and driving people, and help connect them to find support. To that end, Perry said he never intentionally portrays Stanley as the villain.

“It oversimplifies things that are not the truth around people,” he said, “We have all experienced harm, we have all caused harm and it’s extreme within Stanley’s case but we want to understand it so we can make sure that it doesn’t happen.”

The actor explains, the most important thing is connection and that is what he hopes people take away from the play.

“A Streetcar Named Desire” runs through to Feb, 23. The show is two hours and 40 minutes long with a 20 minute intermission

Ticket information can be found at theatrecalgary.com