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The Moulding Into Being of Tennessee Williams' the Night of the Iguana

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The Moulding Into Being of Tennessee Williams' the Night of the Iguana REYNOLDS, DAVID D. The Moulding Into Being of Tennessee Williams' The Night of the Iguana. (1977) Directed by: Dr. Herman Middleton. Pp. 187 The intent of this thesis is to examine the merits of Tennessee Williams as a playwright with practical examples drawn from a produc- tion of The Night of the Iguana and its concluding critical analysis. The first chapter discusses the author's life and style of writ- ing as a major influence on American drama; the justification of the choice of the play; a description of the setting and its function; an evaluation of the mood inherent in the script and the production; and an analysis of the characters. The second chapter is a detailed record of an interesting and successful production of The Night of the Iguana performed in the theatre of the W. Raymond Taylor Building on the campus of the Univer- sity of North Carolina at Greensboro during the premiere season of the UNC-G Summer Repertory Theatre. The performances were at eight-thirty on the evenings of June 28, 30, July 5, 13, 18, 21, and at two-thirty the afternoon of July 8. Included in the prompt book are notations of movement, composition, picturization, characterization, stage business, rhythm and tempo, sound and lighting cues, and special effects cues. The material is supplemented with floorplans and production photographs which help clarify the director's interpretation of the script. The third chapter concentrates on a post production analysis of the play. Areas of expansion include interpretation and the finished product; actor-director relationships; director-technician relation- ships; audience response; and the director's concluding observations. THE MOULDING INTO BEING OF TENNESSEE WILLIAMS' THE NIGHT OF THE IGUANA by David D. Reynolds A Thesis Submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School at The University of North Carolina at Greensboro in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Fine Arts Greensboro 1977 Approved by APPROVAL PAGE This thesis has been approved by the following committee of the Faculty of the Graduate School at The University of North Carolina at Greensboro. Thesiis Adviser /Jo-^A^^Jl^jSKiJ^T^ Committee Members L^a^H^ ■^-4, A Z>n ! Acceptance by Committee 11 DEDICATION I would like to dedicate this thesis to my wife Midge and my daughter Tracie Michelle who make life worthwhile; also, to my parents, Mr. and Mrs. M. W. Reynolds, whose encouragement and financial assist- ance made the effort possible. iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Without the advice and assistance of the thesis committee: Dr. Herman Middleton, adviser; Dr. David Batcheller and Mr. Tom Behm; the scenery and lighting designed by Ron Burns; the technical direction of Herschel Harper; the dedication of each member of the cast and crew; and the tireless typing of my wife Midge, this thesis or a production of The Night of the Iguana would never have been moulded. IV TABLE OF CONTENTS Page APPROVAL PAGE ii DEDICATION iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS iv LIST OF TIGURES vii CHAPTER I. THE FOUNDATION 1 The Playwright, The Style, The Works 2 The Beginnings 2 The Author 3 The Works 5 The Style 6 The Early Years 7 The Playwright's Objective 8 The Playwright's Devices 10 The Playwright's Themes and Symbols 12 The Protagonist 13 The Moral Development 15 The Stylistic Conclusions 15 The Choice of Play 16 The Setting 19 The Mood 21 The Characters 22 The Stage Is Set 26 II. THE PROMPT BOOK 28 Act I, Scene 1 29 Act I, Scene 2 66 Act II 109 III. THE FINAL EVALUATION 164 The Audience Reacts 165 The Technical Accomplishments 168 The Actors 173 The Production 178 The Conclusion 179 546790 Page BIBLIOGRAPHY 181 APPENDIX I. The Program, UNC-G Summer Repertory Theatre 183 II. The Reviews 184 III. The Rehearsal Schedule 186 vi LIST OF FIGURES Page Figure 1, (Diagram) 30 Floorplan for The Night of the Iguana Figure 2, (Diagram) 47 Shannon, Maxine, Judith, Charlotte Figure 3, (Diagram) 55 Shannon, Maxine, Hannah, Nonno Figure 4, (Diagram) 58 Shannon, Nonno, Maxine, Hannah, Pedro, Pancho Figure 5, (Diagram) 71 Hannah, Wolfgang, Nonno, Hilda, Maxine, Frau Fahrenkopf, Herr Fahrenkopf, Shannon Figure 6, (Diagram) 85 Hannah, Shannon, Nonno Figure 7, (Diagram) 91 Maxine, Wolfgang, Hilda, Frau Fahrenkopf, Herr Fahrenkopf, Nonno, Hannah, Shannon Figure 8, (Photograph) 100 Wolfgang, Herr Fahrenkopf, Hilda, Frau Fahrenkopf, Maxine, Shannon, Nonno, Hannah Figure 9, (Photograph) 108 Shannon, Nonno, Hannah Figure 10, (Diagram) 110 Shannon, Nonno, Maxine, Hannah Figure 11, (Photograph) 112 Shannon, Maxine Figure 12, (Photograph) 118 •Judith, Shannon, Hank, Jake Figure 13, (Diagram) 120 Pancho, Pedro, Nonno, Hannah, Judith, Shannon, Jake Figure 14, (Diagram) 128 Wolfgang, Herr Fahrenkopf, Shannon, Frau Fahrenkopf, Hilda, Hannah, Nonno vii LIST OF riGURES (Continued) Page Figure 15, (Photograph) 161 Nonno, Hannah, Maxine, Shannon Figure 16, (Photograph; 163 Hannah, Nonno VI 1 i THE MOULDING INTO BEING OF TENNESSEE WILLIAMS THE NIGHT OF THE IGUANA CHAPTER I THE FOUNDATION CHAPTER I THE FOUNDATION The Playwright, The Style, The Works The Beginnings The Night of the Iguana was chosen to be performed in repertory with the comedy Charley's Aunt and two one-act operas The Medium and Amelia Goes to the Ball by Menotti during the premiere season of the UNC-G Summer Repertory Theatre. This new venture was inaugurated dur- ing June and July of 1973 in conjunction with both sessions of summer school. The company was intended to be staffed by graduate students from UNC-G and other institutions. The latter members were contacted through auditions of the Southeastern Theatre Conference in Pensacola, Florida during March of that year. Remaining roles and technical posi- tions were to be filled by student and community talent from auditions in Greensboro in early June. The following study details the research and actual practices involved in moulding the drama The Night of the Iguana into a finished production. A new epoch in the history of American theatre began with the opening of Tennessee Williams' poetic drama The Glass Menagerie in New York in 1945. With this play, Williams succeeded Eugene O'Neill as the chief producer of form in American drama. His great influence, especially concerning the interpretation of character and dramatic action, can be examined in the works of Europeans John Osborne, Harold Pinter, and Jean Genet, as well as in the writings of Americans William Inge, Paddy Chayefsky, and Edward Albee. Since the first decade of his Broadway activity, Williams has been the most popular playwright in the life of the American theatre, and one of the most widely per- formed dramatists in the history of the Western stage. Despite the critical controversy which has attended his career in the theatre, Williams has won substantial acceptance as a serious writer. According to Esther Jackson, the emergence of Tennessee Williams as a major dramatist is a significant development in American cultural history: In an important sense, the theatre of Tennessee Williams is an aspect of a second American Renaissance, which, like the first, followed a great war. In the same way as the theatre of Eugene O'Neill seemed to emerge out of the heightened national conscious- ness which marked the close of World War I, so the theatre of Tennessee Williams seems to have been an expression of a new sense of identity which American arts and letters reflected at the con- clusion of World War II. Certainly by 1945, the political, social, and intellectual climate of America had become more favorable to the idea of a distinctively American drama than it had been at any time before. Moreover, by mid-century the theatre had succeeded in establishing many of the conditions necessary for popular acceptance of an American dramatic kind.' This study will attempt to detail various practices and procedures that have been incorporated into Williams' writing style, a style which has had such a notable effect on the American theatre of recent decades. His style was most essential in bringing to the stage the acclaimed theatrical work The Night of the Iguana. The Author Tennessee Williams was born March 26, 1911, in a small hospital T Esther Merle Jackson, The Broken World of Tennessee Williams (Madison, Wisconsin: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1966), p. vii. near the Episcopal rectory of his maternal grandparents, the Reverend and Mrs. Walter E. Dakin, at Columbus, Mississippi. At his christening, "Tenn" was named, after his paternal great-grandfather, Thomas Lanier Williams.^ He was the second child born to Cornelius Coffin Williams and Edwina Dakin Williams. Williams grew up in St. Louis, the son of a traveling shoe salesman. His childhood was marked with many illnesses which promoted the great attachment to his mother. His world became increasingly feminine, and he began to be repelled by the relative crudeness of the masculine gender. The illnesses, primarily diphtheria, had their compensations since they kept him out of school and in the o comforting warmth of the family. As a result of his infirmities and being forbidden by his mother to go outside and play, he felt his shy- ness growing and his life turning inward. In his own words he was con- sidered "delicate and sissified." Williams began attending the University of Missouri in 1929. After an extended interruption while he worked for a shoe company, among other endeavors, he graduated from the University of Iowa in 1938. Some of the plays he wrote during those years were produced locally. His first national recognition came in 1939 when he received a citation for a group of related one-act plays, American Blues, in a Group Theatre play contest. Battle of Angels of 1940, his first commercial production, closed in Boston after a losing struggle with censorship and its own inadequate elements.
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