[Jef Hall-Flavin]

March 2016

To me, the mythopoetic Orpheus Descending contains facets of every driving force behind Tennessee Williams' writing. Its characters, themes, symbols, theology, and humanity, speak of his origins and his destinations as a poet-playwright. In truth, it's a very difficult play, but (like some of Shakespeare's best), its dramaturgical messiness is also its great allure.

​

Nick Potenzieri's 2010 production in a small Provincetown church inspired me, and it's where I first saw Irene Glezos' powerhouse performance as Lady Torrance. The church setting reconciled the overt Christian symbolism with the Greek myth that fuels the plot, while giving resonance to the dense poetic speeches. 

Foregoing naturalism, I set the play in the underworld, ruled by Hades: a crumbling, subterranean cathedral into which the title character descends. The un-dead townspeople were under the spell of a demonic and racist Jabe Torrance, from whom Lady could not escape. A key to this production was the transitional figure of Uncle Pleasant, a black Choctaw shaman... a silent ferryman living between the world of the living and the dead. It is against this backdrop that we watch the failed rescue attempt of a doomed and powerful love.