The Story
"Orpheus Descending" to Show at PBK
Two actors from the play "Orpheus Descending." Courtesy of Richard Palmer.
Richard Palmer, a theatre professor at the College, continues his penchant for directing plays by famous playwrights with the spring mainstage show “Orpheus Descending,” by Tennessee Williams. Over the last four years Palmer has directed Arthur Miller’s “A View from the Bridge,” Shakespeare’s “The Merchant of Venice” and Christopher Marlowe’s “Dr. Faustus.” It is only natural that this impressive line-up would call for a performance of a work by Tennessee Williams, one of the most acclaimed playwrights in American literature.
“Orpheus Descending” is a retelling of the Greek Orpheus myth set in the modern rural South and is known as one of Williams’ darker and more complex plays. Orpheus is known for the fateful trip he took to the underworld to beg for his wife to be allowed to return to the world with him. Orpheus’ music softens the heart of Hades and Persephone, and they allow his wife, Eurydice, to return with him. However, they stipulate that he must walk in front of her and not look back until they leave the underworld. Tragically, he looks back at her, and she vanishes from him. Williams adapts this myth to the South of the early1960's, with all of the cruelty, racism, conformity and sexual Puritanism of that time period.
“Orpheus Descending” tells the story of Val Xavier, a wanderer who comes upon a small southern town looking for work and a new start. Val, a mysterious character who sports a snakeskin jacket and a guitar, finds a job in a general store owned by a woman named Lady Torrance. Lady, a middle-aged woman with a haunting past, has an older husband who is slowly dying. She is taken with Val and finds herself conflicted between her moral southern tradition and her intense passion for Val. Surrounded by a cruel, racist world, Val and Lady struggle with their loneliness and social pressures, which inevitably invites tragic consequence.
The play utilizes Williams’ signature selection of secondary characters to the greatest degree. David Cutrere, the impudent, spineless older beau of Lady, frustrates the audience with his inability to extract himself from his racist community. David’s younger sister, Carol Cutrere, is a ghastly character with a powdery white complexion and dark eyes who admits she is an exhibitionist looking for attention and sexual assurance. Beulah Binnings and Dolly Hamma provide the stereotypical southern gossip known to malign outsiders such as Val, as well as point out the sexual suggestiveness of Carol and Lady.
Val is played by junior Rolfe Shifflett, a tall, long-haired and muscular actor who pulls off a good southern accent and does much to create the sexual tension implicit in the play’s dialogue. Junior Kerry Stinson, who plays Lady, has an ease with the character and delivers her lines with restraint and proper insecurity. Emily Rossi, who plays Carol, is a sophomore actor who does as much as her frightening make-up allows.
The set is spectacular as well, with incredible depth and daunting rafters. The colors and furniture fit the southern style perfectly, and the lighting is subtle, creating, perhaps unintentionally, ominous shadows that underscore the Orpheus underworld myth. Junior Stage Manager Tim Kaufmann deserves a nod as well; the sound, set and lighting unify the stage spectacularly.
Orpheus Descending runs on the PBK main stage from Thursday, April 26 through Sunday, April 29, with shows at 8 p.m. the first three nights and a 2 p.m. matinee on Sunday. Tickets are available at the PBK box office for $5 for students and $8 for non-students. There will also be a reception following the opening night performance.