Femi Elufowoju Jr is currently directing two plays at the Arcola Theatre. In the downstairs studio is ‘Hoard’ by Bim Adewunmi and in the upstairs main space is this, a new staging of Tennessee Williams’s classic ‘The Glass Menagerie’. Both productions contain larger-than-life mother figures with an overactive interest in their children’s lives.
But while the matriarch in ‘Hoard’ feels mainly like a loving tribute to an eccentric collector, the portrayal of Amanda Wingfield (Lesley Ewen) as a shrieking, screaming, unbearably self-obsessed caricature of an older woman hits a real dud note. Along with being a decidedly one-dimensional interpretation of a fascinatingly contradictory, flawed and sad character, it also takes the heart out of Williams’s play by turning a slippery, heartbreaking tragedy into a shouty domestic drama.
The production keeps the original 1930s St Louis setting but re-imagines the impoverished Wingfield family as African American. In this context, Amanda’s youthful memories of cotillion dances and gentleman callers who were the sons of planters reference the often-forgotten wealthy black families and landowners living in the 1920s American South. It’s a very interesting idea for a staging, especially as this part of history is under-represented, so it’s shame the finished piece works so badly.
The arguments between Tom (Michael Abubakar) and his mother, which at one point become physical, are tense and uncomfortable to watch but anger is about the only emotion transmitted. On the whole, Naima Swaleh is sweetly naïve and believably anxious as Tom’s reclusive sister Laura, but the final ill-fated scene between her and Jim O’Connor (Charlie Maher) lacks any poignancy – and trust me, I could normally raise a tear or two just thinking about this scene, let alone seeing it performed. Basically, ‘the feels’ just aren’t here. And they should be.