STAGE REVIEW : ‘Menagerie’ Avoids Peril of Overkill

Directors and actors too often go a little nuts with Tennessee Williams, taking his eccentric people and turning them into creatures so tortured and far-fetched that they don’t seem real at all.

Even Tennessee himself might peek out from under his plantation hat and say, “Suh, get a grip on yourself.”

Well, at the La Habra Depot Playhouse, director Marla Gam-Hudson holds herself and her actors down a bit, with some good results. Gam-Hudson comes away with a steady, generally well-performed La Habra Community Theatre production that gives us the force of “The Glass Menagerie” without a flood of theatrics.

There are a few missteps--as Tom, Mark Slama works the narration into a self-conscious dirge, and Sharon Sterling’s Amanda does get a bit fidgety at times--but Gam-Hudson locates the drama’s resonances by depending on the strength of Williams’ writing.

Arguably Williams’ greatest work, “Menagerie” is involving from the start. This story--of Amanda, a ruined Southern charmer, and her two children, the hungry Tom and his lame sister, Laura--confronts an audience with pure heartache; disappointment in what life has given makes the drama hum.

But at La Habra, that disappointment doesn’t leave the characters beaten. As Amanda, for example, Sterling has plenty of brassy resourcefulness to temper the desperation. These characteristics bring a degree of hope to everything--even after Tom makes his famous exit at play’s end, there’s a sense that she may be able to pick up the pieces.

Kathryn Byrd’s Laura isn’t only limp and longing, either. Byrd keeps appropriately on the fringe (this is, after all, more Tom’s tale than hers) until the second act, when her “gentleman caller” (Mark MacDicken) shows up. Byrd then shows her confusion and anxiety, but the portrayal is underplayed, not excessive and unnatural.

As for Tom, Mark Slama’s approach minimizes notions of Tom as merely a soulful dreamer looking for a way out so he can satisfy his poet’s heart. Slama’s Tom is a robust guy who seems more interested in adventure even than in his writing.

He is suffocating, but it’s not because his art hasn’t been explored. He can’t breathe because he is in a house of women; he wants to be released to a simpler, more demonstrative place. It is no accident that Williams has him leave to become a merchant seaman.

Rand L. Hudson’s somewhat abstract set of their home seems too cheery and comfortable for this poor, uneasy family, but it is nicely crafted. Besides, Jenson Crawford’s lighting helps to give important moments the necessary moodiness; the handling of the always-difficult candlelight scene is especially apt.

‘THE GLASS MENAGERIE’

A La Habra Community Theatre production of Tennessee Williams’ drama. Directed by Marla Gam-Hudson. With Sharon Sterling, Mark Slama, Kathryn Byrd and Mark MacDicken. Set by Rand L. Hudson. Lighting by Jenson Crawford. Costumes by Dave Temple. Sound by Cathy Furrer. Final performances Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m. at the La Habra Depot Playhouse, 311 S. Euclid Ave., La Habra. Tickets: $6 to $8.. Information: (213) 905-9708.