ipl-logo

Streetcar Named Desire Mood

1019 Words5 Pages

The frequent use of stage effects in Tennessee William’s A Street Car Named Desire makes it evident that the themes are not simply expressed just through dialogue, but also music and sound. The authors intent is to use these effects to set mood of a specific scene- or the whole play; to propose an idea, or an action; to show feeling of a character, and to let the audience know what he or she is thinking. These elements are not perceptible to the eye such as a prop but hearing and analyzing the sound and music in this play can create dramatic devices and ideas. It is the sound designer’s task to read the text, analyze the authors indications, collaborate with the director, and to mix or edit sounds. Williams used metaphors in his stage directions …show more content…

A Street Car Named Desire takes place in the year of 1947 in the location of New Orleans. The play write mentions specific sounds that influence my approach to designing this play for the setting of New Orleans. For example, the beginning of the play states “In this part of New Orleans you are practically always just around the corner, or a few doors down the street, from a tinny piano being played with the infatuated fluency of brown fingers. This "Blue Piano" expresses the spirit of the life which goes on here”. (Williams) To take the audience and transport their minds into this new setting, I used the adjective tinny as a starting point. Tinny I feel is like it is coming through a telephone or tin can. From a book written about the film’s score writes “The blue piano’s unbounded permeation of the warm air in William’s production notes for the play’s first scene as corresponding to the French Quarter’s special character”. (Davison 82) To expand, I took that word and applied it to how it would sound on a piano. A piano, which has a metallic tone, is probably in need of tuning often found in bar rooms where jazz is played. This piano underline the scruffy, broken atmosphere of this part of New

Show More
Related
381 Words | 2 Pages

Williams is known for his powerfully written psychological dramas. Through the language used in this play one can easily recognize the conflict between the sensitive, neurotic Blanche Dubois and the crude, animalistic Stanley Kowaliski. By analyzing the dialogue of this text, the reader can easily understand the way in which the lines are meant to be projected and one can clearly see their emotions and feelings at any specific time of the events (Kolin 52). Concerning language, there are two levels of language are used in A Streetcar Named Desire, the words spoken by the characters in the play and the text of the stage directions. The dialogue is used to enable the reader to create an image of the characters, to decide if it’s

Read More
1085 Words | 5 Pages

The play “A Streetcar Named Desire” is about an emotionally unstable lady named Blanche. She moves in with her youngest sister and her husband because the landlord took the land away from Blanche because they could not pay for it anymore. After being their for a while Blanche starts remembering her horrible past which is something she was trying to do in the first place. The husband of Stella, Stanley Kowalski was also someone that made Blanche’s life miserable for complicating everything and harassing her in every possible way. Death is one of the most symbolic terms in this play.

Read More
491 Words | 2 Pages

Williams’ characterization of Blanche as a character of many layers and different emotions is particularly evident in this scene as he presents her in different lights through different mediums. In this scene, Blanche is presented as afraid. This effect is achieved through Blanche’s actions, which are revealed to us by stage directions. “She looks fearfully after him” this explicitly unveils to the audience Blanche’s reaction to Mitch’s arrival as well as his attitude.

Read More
1946 Words | 8 Pages

But not for long to hold each desperate choice.(P.XII) In this play, ‘A Street Car Named Desire’ depicts the shattering of souls, the destruction of a young woman who years to lead the mythic life of the South before the war. She meets with nothing but despair and frustration. She seeks asylum in her sister’s house but is raped by her brother-in-law and ends up in asylum. Williams characters exhibit qualities that are pathetic.

Read More
1166 Words | 5 Pages

Tennessee Williams is one of the most recognized playwrights that lived during the mid-twentieth-century (“Tennessee Williams”). After finishing college, Williams decides to move to New Orleans, where he writes A Streetcar Named Desire. His career starts to take off as he begins to write more plays (“Tennessee Williams”). A Streetcar Named Desire talks about the life of a woman, Blanche DuBois, who is very secretive about her past and does not expose her true intentions of coming to live with her younger sister Stella. As the play goes on Stanley, Stella’s husband, starts to dig into the dark past that terrorizes Blanche when they begin to have a conflict with each other.

Read More
465 Words | 2 Pages

In "A Streetcar Named Desire, Tenessee Williams provides the readers with a detailed discription of how he wants to see the play staged by using stage directions . These stage directions help reinforce various themes and helps readers to understand the scenes in greater detail. In the play, "A Streetcar Named Desire", the stage directions are vital in conveying the story to the reader and without the explanations things are said or done the reader would not be able to understand what is happening in the story. The directions affect all aspects of a story. Music is one of the stage direction used and if read carefully, it is clear that Williams uses music to establish the mood of many scenes.

Read More
943 Words | 4 Pages

The transitions between the scenes where you can hear cars passing by or a man complaining in the background, helped the audience to feel like they were in the city instead of a theater. During the Fourth of July scene, the noise of the fireworks in the background was not too overpowering, taking away from the acting and the rest of the elements of the scene. However, it was also loud enough for the audience to exist in the moment of the play with the actors and feel like the fireworks were occurring in reality. Moreover, the parts of the scene where the air conditioner noise was turned on and off significantly aided the audience in feeling and experiencing the world of the play in an alley way. These sound elements would definitely be present in the play's environment, bringing the audience that much closer to experiencing the play as it would be

Read More
1188 Words | 5 Pages

Music is a universal language among humans in that it is used to communicate or evoke various sentiments. Depending on the context, music creates meaning and provides a more in-depth view of a situation. Nowadays, music is crucial in moviemaking as producers use it as a way to manipulate the viewer’s emotions and add complexity to the settings. Similarly, Tennessee Williams employs different kinds of music- that of the “blue piano”, Varsouviana polka, and “Paper Moon”- in A Streetcar Named Desire to expose the character’s innermost thoughts and emotions and to describe how the deception and decay that pervades through the play affects the characters’ perspectives of the outside world and the actions that they take.

Read More
1697 Words | 7 Pages

A Streetcar Named Desire Literary Analysis The late 1940’s were characterized by the emergence out of World War II that led to a dependence on the idea of The American Dream, which meant men were working harder to achieve a more comforting lifestyle and opportunity while women were still fighting the oppression of caused by unequal representation. This idealistic dream is illustrated throughout Tennessee Williams’ “A Streetcar Named Desire”, which has a rigid dichotomy between illusion and reality revealed throughout multiple characters and their dysfunctional lives that are a direct result between fantasy and actuality. Illusion is taken advantage of as an alternative to the unfair circumstances that the characters in “A Streetcar Named

Read More
991 Words | 4 Pages

In the conceptual arena of stage plays, elements such as lighting and set enhances the mood of the play through direct visual impacts; similarly, non-visual elements are also a significant part of theatrical works in terms of thematic dramatization and allowing the audience or readers more room for interpretation. In A Streetcar Named Desire, the use of non-visual elements on stage, namely the blue piano and the Polka tune, is significant in enhancing the mood of the play and establishing the layered personality of protagonist Blanche Dubois. From melody that intertwine with the stage directions to the protagonist 's poetic soliloquy that punctuate the dialogue like arias, Tennessee Williams ' skillful usage of non-visual elements in the

Read More
959 Words | 4 Pages

A Streetcar named Desire written by American playwright Tennessee Williams is a Marxist play that depicts the socio economic status of the characters and people living during that time. The play was written in 1947, two years after the second world war. The historical time leading up to the Second World War known as the Interwar period from 1918-1939 was an era classified with economical difficulties for a majority of American citizens. After the new economic system based upon capital emerged succeeding the Industrial Revolution, the United States saw a massive prosperity in the early twentieth century only to be demolished by the stock market crash of 1929 also known as Black Tuesday (source). These unsuccessful stock markets were one of the signs that showed that the new system, which depended on an extensive labor force and an open and unregulated market, was not as reliable as previously thought, this period was known as the Depression.

Read More
1547 Words | 7 Pages

Tennessee Williams wrote “A Streetcar Named Desire” (Williams, 1947) It is based in New Orleans a new cosmopolitan city which is poor but has raffish charm. The past is representing old south in America 1900’s and present is representing new America post world war 2 in 1940’s. Past and present are intertwined throughout the play in the characters Stanley, Blanche, Stella and mitch. Gender roles show that males are the dominant and rule the house which Stanley is prime example as he brings home food and we learn of one time when he got cross and he smashed the light bulbs.

Read More
1397 Words | 6 Pages

Psychologist Sigmund Freud developed an idea that there is more than one aspect to the human psyche. The human psyche rather is structured into three separate parts including: id, ego, and superego. In a similar manner, Tennessee Williams has three main characters in his Southern Gothic play, A Streetcar Named Desire. In addition to the human psyche as the three mentioned categories, Freud introduced psychoanalysis, which is the belief that people could be cured through developing their unconscious thoughts or motivations into their conscious decisions, receiving insight (McLeod). Characters are shaped by their thoughts and actions, as this is present in A Streetcar Named Desire.

Read More
399 Words | 2 Pages

In addition the string and wind instruments have soft tones that couple with her voice to give the version a dreamy feel. In comparison, Kamakawiwo’oles timbre is pure, soft and breathy, that also gives a dreamy feel in the beginning of the piece. As the song continues however the Ukulele begins to dominate with a lusher and fuller timbre. In contrast, the timbre of the piano in Tatum’s version differs greatly from the soft timbre of Kamakawiwo’oles voice, because it is dense and has strong articulations.

Read More
1160 Words | 5 Pages

In a play, sound is used to help illustrate its emotional content as a result of a play being limited in its point of views. Therefore, sound in a Streetcar Named Desire is significant in its dramatic effect in reinforcing the protagonist, Blanche’s, inner conflict to the audience. By garnering this significance of sound, its effect is additionally contributed to the theme of the play due to it highlighting details of the play's scenes for the audience to ultimately recognize specifics that, in succession, applies to the construction of the theme. Therefore, Tennessee Williams emphasizes through the employment of sound, the deterioration of the protagonist, Blanche, through featuring diegetic and non-diegetic sound that illustrate Blanche's

Read More

More about Streetcar Named Desire Mood

Related Topics

Open Document