The Glass Catastrophe by James Curley

            From the open set, to the standing on chairs, to the poor decision in props, The Glass Menagerie failed, and did not meet expectations. This play was directed by Brian Mertes, was shown March 11, 2015, and took place in Providence, RI through the Trinity Repertory Company in the Chace Theater.

            The Glass Menagerie was interesting to say the least and had potential, but failed to reach the finish line. A main aspect of why I did not like the play was its open set, I got distracted from time to time and I think this did not go well with the play, because the audience tended to be more focused on the moving of props and what was happening in the booth for the music, that some of the dialogue and important scenes were lost. Finally an aspect that took the cake was the lack of explanation. An example of this was Tom and his “going to the movies” saying. This antic left the audience questioning, where is he going? Why is he going? What’s his secret? This lack of explanation led to a very important part and one of the main messages lost, and this could have been cleaned up with some simple explanation or just Tom saying where he was going. The Glass Menagerie had minimal but some positive ideas, but given the opportunity, do not see this play, under any circumstances.

            Overall The Glass Menagerie was an abysmal play, and should be revamped before shown again. It brought physical pain, to see these actors trying to attempt the awkward play style. To see these mediocre and decent actors stuck with this terrible play style it was disheartening because they were good actors, just stuck with an atrocious director. To top off the play’s success, many audience members fell asleep. This play has potential but if shown in this fashion again it will leave audience members with the wrong interpretation of The Glass Menagerie. Definitely do not see this play unless it is given a serious face lift.