Interior: Panic/Portrait of a Madonna (Double Bill)

Synopsis

Interior: Panic: Blanche Shannon is no one else but Blanche DuBois. The situation is familiar; the cramped quarters in New Orleans, with her sister and her husband, and Blanche's desperation and need for rescue by her own 'gentleman caller' are all there. Portrait of a Madonna: The central character, Miss Lucretia Collins is a sexually frustrated, neurotic, middle-aged spinster. Lucretia is living in a small dingy apartment and every night, she believes that Richard (the man she once loved) breaks into her room to 'indulge his senses'. Miss Collins has called down to the manager to report that she has an intruder. The porter and the elevator boy come up to ?investigate'. The elevator boy, a cocky young guy who thinks Miss Collins is a creature of fun and the porter, an infinitely compassionate man, who sees the deep pain behind Miss Collins' fantasy.

Our Review:

15 March 2013

“I always start off like this,” clarifies Leonie Scott-Matthews proudly, welcoming us newcomers into the enclave she has governed for 45 years. The 60-seat Pentameters Theatre feels like a cross between a harem and a Victorian parlour, owing to the upright piano lined with photographs and cuttings.

Scott-Matthews has assembled an illustrious family in her years of producing fringe theatre. While all this serves to raise our expectations for innovative direction and performances in the two plays (one half of the double-bill has never before been performed in England), the décor also ties the plays to the Pentameters’ production 30 years previously, following the death of Tennessee Williams.

Sebastien Blanc directs Interior: Panic, evidence of Williams’ aggregate method of writing, as it contains an early imprint of Blanche Dubois. Both he and Jaymie Addicott (as Blanche) are advocates of the Meisner acting technique, which produces &#...

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