Theater review
A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE
Two hours and 45 minutes with one intermission. At BAM, 651 Fulton Street in Brooklyn, through April 6.
Audiences are boarding “A Streetcar Named Desire” — or, rather, a train called Q — in droves to experience “Gladiator II” star Paul Mescal onstage in Brooklyn.
And, as brutish Stanley Kowalski, the part made famous by an early-career Marlon Brando, the 29-year-old Irishman does not disappoint.
Mescal is a human wrecking ball as he snarls and barrels around the boxing-ring stage like it’s a sweaty tribal ritual.
But while the crowd has come for Paul, at the end of Tennessee Williams’ classic play, which opened Tuesday night at BAM, they leave raving about Patsy.
That’s Patsy Ferran, the unbelievable 35-year-old British actress who’s been lavished with acclaim in London for years, but is not yet well known stateside. That ends today.
Ferran, small and deceptively sweet, makes an unlikely — and perfect — Blanche DuBois in director Rebecca Frecknall’s superb revival from Britain.
Consider that the last celeb at BAM to tackle the part of the fading Southern belle who guzzles booze to numb her mysterious pain was the ever-intimidating Cate Blanchett. That celebrated Aussie actress defaults to Tár-ifying.
Not Ferran’s Blanche. Not at first, anyway. Like an exotic poisonous plant, she lures us in with a bubbly charm only to leave us paralyzed — in fear and pity. That she looks the role’s actual thirtysomething age makes the character’s ruined life sadder than I’ve ever known it to be.
Blanche, who grasps the old South’s dying chivalry as hard as she does a liquor bottle, has arrived in New Orleans to live in suffocatingly close quarters with her sister Stella (Anjana Vasan) and her rough-and-ready husband Stanley after she’s hit with money issues.
Her problems, however, are much bigger than cashflow. Blanche is hiding dangerous secrets from her past that are hinted at by a graceful dancer (Jabez Sykes) who haunts her memories.
Her only chance at domestic not-quite-bliss is Stanley’s sturdy and reliable friend Mitch (Dwane Walcott). Needless to say, though, “A Streetcar Named Desire” is no rom-com. For happiness, try “Mamma Mia!” in August.
Stanley and Blanche are gunpowder and match. And while a drummer pounds upstage, sometimes joined by an ethereal singer, explosive Ferran and Mescal go thrillingly head-to-head.
I can’t remember Mescal ever being so loud before. The Oscar nominee is typically soft-spoken, bashful almost, in so many films and TV shows. He was even polite in “Gladiator.” But the guy wails “Stellaaaaa!” here with the roar of a provoked grizzly.
Ferran, meanwhile, is mesmerizing as she descends further into madness.
Good for Frecknall. The director has quickly redeemed herself after that unfortunate “Cabaret” on Broadway last season.
There are some consistencies to her style. Just as in the Kander and Ebb musical, the scenery here is very spare, though not ostentatiously modern. The French Quarter heat and humidity is palpable, just as it should be in a Williams play.
Departing from that ghoulish Broadway production, however, her “Streetcar” is ferociously alive, all the way from from lights up to “I’ve always depended on the kindness of strangers.”
Frecknall’s entire cast is tight as the aforementioned drum. But it’s the blistering Blanche that I can’t shake from my mind.
The “Streetcar” audience most definitely can depend on the brilliance of Ferran.
