Storyboards

Works Cited

Posthuma, Johnathon. The Glass Menagerie. Cond. Teresa Ter Haar. Perf. Brian De Young. Dordt College. Dordt College, 2011. Youtue. Youtube. Web. 29 Oct. 2013.

"The Glass Menagerie." SparkNotes. SparkNotes, n.d. Web. 29 Oct. 2013.

West, Kanye. Graduation. Kanye West. Jon Brion, Warryn Campbell, Mike Dean, DJ Toomp, Eric Hudson, Brian Miller, Nottz, Patrick Reynolds, Gee Robertson, Kanye West (also Exec.), Kyambo "Hip Hop" Joshua (also Exec.), 2007. Youtube. Youtube. Web. 29 Oct. 2013.

West, Kanye. Late Registration. Kanye West. Kanye West, Jon Brion, Devo Springsteen, Just Blaze, Warryn Campbell, 2005. Youtube. Youtube. Web. 29 Oct. 2013.

Williams, Tennessee. The Glass Menagerie: A Play. [New York]: New Directions, 1949. Print.

AP Prompt and Thesis

Prompt:

1990. Choose a novel or play that depicts a conflict between a parent (or a parental figure) and a son or daughter. Write an essay in which you analyze the sources of the conflict and explain how the conflict contributes to the meaning of the work. Avoid plot summary.

Thesis:

In Tennessee William’s The Glass Menagerie, Amanda’s desire to prevent Tom from becoming like his father and her desire to force Laura to become more like Amanda creates conflict, illuminating the fact that the more Amanda tries to shape the lives of her children, the more they deviate from what she wants, exemplifying that only a shattering of an individual's “glass menagerie” - their idealized perception of reality -  is enough to create a change in a character’s personality.

Synopsis

The Glass Menagerie Synopsis

A General Synopsis: The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams is an autobiographical "memory play," , anchored by the aging southern belle Amanda Wingfield, who hopes for her son Tom to fulfill her dreams of finding the perfect “gentleman caller” for her shy and damaged daughter Laura.

Playwright Background Information

Playwright Tennessee Williams was born on March 26, 1911, in Columbus, Mississippi. After college, he moved to New Orleans, a city that would inspire much of his writing. On March 31, 1945, his play, The Glass Menagerie, debuted on Broadway. Williams described his childhood in Mississippi as pleasant and happy, but life changed for him when his family moved to St. Louis, Missouri. His new urban home forced him to leave his carefree boyhood, and as a result Williams turned inward and started to write. His parent’s marriage was often strained and his home, at times, was a tense place to live. This situation, however, did offer fuel for the playwright's art. His mother became the model for the foolish but strong Amanda Wingfield in The Glass Menagerie.

Primary characters:

• Amanda - The mother of the family, a southern belle with a bubbly personality. Amanda is paranoid and often lives in her past.
• Tom - Son of Amanda and narrator of the piece. Tom craves “adventure,” and goes to the movies every night. He wants to run away because he is fed up with his family’s oppressive dependence on him
• Laura - Daughter of Amanda. She has one leg shorter than the other (disability) and is painfully shy. She dropped out of high school and business college and is obsessive about playing her “victrola” and with her glass collection.
• Jim - The “gentleman caller” set up by Tom for Laura. A high school hero who is ambitious. However, he turns out to be engaged to “Betty.”
• The Father: Never actually appears, but is talked about. His portrait hangs in the apartment and he left the family years ago because he “fell in love with long distances”.

Setting

• The family currently lives in a cramped apartment in a lower-class part of St. Louis in the years 1930s, the time of Depression. Tom, from an indefinite point in the future, remembers the winter and spring of 1937.
• Fire Escape: Used as a way of escaping life in the apartment.

Key Plot Moments.

• Family resides in St. Louis with Tom working at a warehouse and Amanda, who never states where she works, involved in different organizations and activities such as DAR. Laura, who secretly dropped out of school, helps her mother around  the house and plays with glass figurines.
• Amanda confronts Tom about him being too much like his father. She confesses she is worried about him, while Tom states that he is out late at night at the movies because he craves adventure. Amanda then pleads Tom to find Laura a “gentleman caller” or future husband.
• Tom brings a “gentleman caller” named Jim for dinner one night. Jim went to high school with Laura and was her secret crush.
• Jim and Laura dance after dinner in the living room, but breaks Laura’s glass unicorn horn that was part of her figurine collection. Jim confesses to Laura that he is engaged, abruptly gets up and leaves.
• Amanda blames Tom for bringing Jim over to dinner despite Tom not knowing Jim was engaged. Tom becomes very upset and reaches his breaking point. He packs up his stuff and leaves the house to end the play.

Key Quotes

• "I'm going to the movies" - Tom (7.135)
• "Blow out your candles Laura - and so goodbye..." (7.137)
• “Poor little fellow, he must feel sort of lonesome.” (7.122)
• “Well, if he does, he doesn’t complain about it. He stays on a shelf with some horses that don’t have horns and all of them seem to get along nicely together.” (7.122)

Symbols/Motifs

• Abandonment; the words and images on the screen; music. Picture of the father.
• Laura’s Glass Menagerie-Laura’s collection of glass animal figurines represents her personality. Like the glass figures Laura is delicate, fanciful, and somehow old-fashioned.The menagerie also represents the imaginative world to which Laura devotes herself—a world that is colorful and enticing but based on fragile illusions.
• The Glass Unicorn-represents Laura’s peculiarity. The fate of the unicon’s fate foreshadows Laura’s fate in Scene Seven. Laura cannot become normal without somehow shattering.
• “Blue Roses”- Jim’s high school nickname for Laura, symbolizes Laura’s unusualness yet allure. Associated with Laura’s attraction to Jim and the memory of their unusual acquaintan. Also, recalls Tennessee Williams’s sister, Rose, on whom the character of Laura is based.
• The Fire Escape- an escape from the frustration and dysfunction in the Wingfield household. Laura slips on the fire escape in Scene Four which highlights her inability to escape from her situation. Tom, on the other hand, frequently steps out,foreshadowing his eventual getaway.

Themes

• The difficulty of accepting reality
• The impossibility of true escape
• The unrelenting power of memory

Stylistic Devices

• Williams found realism to be a flat, outdated, and insufficient way of approaching emotional experience.
• The Glass Menagerie is fundamentally a non realistic play.
• Distortion, illusion, dream, symbol, and myth are the tools by which the action onstage is unraveled.
• A screen displays words and images relevant to the action for example “[Screen Image: Blue Roses.]” (2.44)
• Music intrudes with melodramatic timing
• The lights rise or dim according to the mood onstage, not the time of day
• The play’s style is expressionistic—underlying meaning is emphasized at the expense of realism.
• The play’s lack of stylistic realism—Tom’s memory, yet it still has some elements of reality to make it relatable.
• Emotions like Tom’s boredom, Amanda’s nostalgia,Laura’s terror, the tension between Tom and Amanda and the quiet love between Tom and Laura are conveyed realistically.
• Similarly, the lower-middle-class life of the Wingfield family is portrayed with a great deal of truth to historical and social realities.

Rationale

The 1990 Open Question AP prompt was fitting for Tennessee Williams’ The Glass Menagerie because one of the unifying themes of the text was the conflict between Amanda Wingfield and her children to illustrate that only a shattering of an individual's “glass menagerie” - their idealized perception of reality -  is enough to create a change in a character’s personality. Amanda is constantly nagging Laura to be more outgoing, more like she herself was as a young woman in Blue Mountain. With Tom, Amanda’s main worry is that he will turn out like his father - a drunkard who abandons his family - so she constantly tries to keep him at home. However, despite having a modicum of success with Laura by showing her that there is more to life than old records and glass, Amanda fails to break Tom’s idealization  of a life of adventure, and he ends up leaving the family out to dry when he joins the Merchant Marine.

Another point in favor of choosing this prompt that it addresses the complexity of the relationship between the characters in the text. Although Laura did become more outgoing, it was not a direct result of Amanda’s constant nagging, but rather a consequence of Jim (the “Gentleman Caller”) kissing her, and breaking her “glass menagerie.” Prior to this occurrence, Amanda’s attempts to change Laura (signing her up for business school and sending her to the church’s “Young People’s League”) backfired by causing Laura to lose confidence in herself and close herself off to socialization even more. Also, the more Amanda tries to control Tom, the more he tries to gain independence by staying out late at the movies, and eventually not paying the bills and leaving the family entirely.

In choosing the scenes to use for the video presentation, we tried to choose scenes that would exemplify the familial conflict and explore the complexity of the play. Scene 1 introduces the conflict between Amanda and Laura by showing Amanda’s fear of Laura becoming an “old maid” and the conflict between Amanda to Tom when she micromanages Tom’s every move.  Scene 4 further develops the conflict between Amanda and Laura as Amanda expresses her concerns about Laura’s lifestyle to Tom. By expressing her concerns about Tom’s night-owl habits and tendency to drink, the scene adds more tension to the relationship. This scene was chosen because it is the main turning point for family, with Tom agreeing to find Laura a “gentleman caller,” and the revelation that Tom is unhappy in the apartment and has plans to leave. Scene 7, contrary to expectations, does not resolve the conflict, but brings it to its logical conclusion. Laura’s gentleman caller is revealed to be engaged to marry somebody else, and Tom leaves the family in the dark (literally - he neglects to pay the electric bill). The encounter with Jim was not a complete failure, as the symbolism of the glass menagerie is brought full circle, with the breaking of the unicorn coinciding with the breaking of Laura’s perceptions of herself (that her “clump” is horrible and she is inferior to others).

The portrayal of the selected scenes was made doubly important by the time constraints, so stylistic choices had to be very deliberate and effective. Some of the more important choices were camera angle, lighting, and the modern lens through which we reenacted the play.

A common camera angle we used was the over the shoulder shot. This angle allows the viewers to focus on a specific character, allowing for a greater degree of acting and plot interpretation by the actor. Similar to this angle, the point of view shot allows the audience to “become” a character, in that they can experience a conversation from the point of view of the character. Once in scene 7, the point of view is that of the glass unicorn lying broken on the ground, allowing the audience to more closely feel and understand the conversation between Jim and Laura. The basic, mid-range shot is frequently used to accurately and objectively convey the goings-on of the play. When the camera is below the characters, looking up, the characters become more powerful, as seen once when Tom and Amanda are arguing in scene 4. The effect on the interpretation of this sequence is that the audience can see two strong-willed characters in conflict, and feel the tension the way a little kid feels the tension when their parents are arguing.

For most of the play, the lighting is natural, and the camera angles are relied upon to explore the nuances of the plot and theme. Scene 7, however, is an important outlier. In scene 7, the lighting is dimmer, almost like mood lighting, to emphasize the intense emotional battle going on within Laura - she is terrified by Jim because of her shyness, but she likes him. Then, once out of her shell, she is crushed to find out he is engaged to another girl. Similarly, in the sequence on the floor around the broken glass unicorn, the lighting is from below, illuminating Jim’s and Laura’s faces. This difference is important in that it draws more attention to an important part of the play, and highlights Laura’s realization that she is not inferior to others. She sympathizes strongly with the unicorn because its horn sets it apart from other horses, while her clump sets her apart from other people. The breaking of the horn symbolizes her acceptance of her difference.

The modern lens through which we reenacted and interpreted the play was the reality show Keeping Up with the Kardashians. This was fitting because of the family conflict that appears in both the play and the show, and the fatherless families in both. In addition, the mother of both families is a strong character that tries to control her children, perhaps illuminating an effect of a missing paternal presence.

The Glass Menagerie Video

Summer Reading Creative Project

Text: Deborah Levy’s Swimming Home.

 Essence: Water paves the path for character transformation from life to death.

 Brief Summary of Text: Kitty Finch is first found swimming naked in the Jacob family’s pool and is greeted by several characters who are sharing a villa in Italy for the summer. They all wonder who this strange, mental girl is at first, but as the week goes on, all but a few of them fall under her spell. Kitty takes a special interest in Joe Jacobs—renowned poet as well as a husband and father. Joe finds out that the reason for Kitty’s arrival was so she could give him some poetry of her own to read. She feels connected to him through his poetic words and wants him to feel the same. After reading her poem, he does feel a connection to her, but continues to hide it. By the end of the novel, Kitty has made Joe acknowledge his feelings of sadness and depression, but the tables are turned when he is found dead in the same pool in which Kitty was discovered.

1973 Prompt: An effective literary work does not merely stop or cease; it concludes. In the view of some critics, a work that does not provide the pleasure of significant closure has terminated with an artistic fault. A satisfactory ending is not, however, always conclusive in every sense; significant closure may require the reader to abide with or adjust to ambiguity and uncertainty. In an essay, discuss the ending of a novel or play of acknowledged literary merit. Explain precisely how and why the ending appropriately or inappropriately concludes the work. Do not merely summarize the plot.

 Thesis: In Deborah Levy’s Swimming Home, the ending of the novel ties back to the beginning, and informs the reader that the real reason Kitty Finch came to Italy was to try and save Joe Jacobs from his secret depression.

 Explanation of Project: In the very beginning of Deborah Levy’s Swimming Home, Kitty Finch’s “head emerged from the water, its mouth open and gasping for breath” (7). When Kitty comes out of the pool she is baptized, and given a second chance to live. The young girl is on a mission to find Joe Jacobs and give him her poem so that he can validate the connection she feels they have. The end of the book is a complete contrast to Kitty’s rebirth. Joe, “words and spluttering […] utterances […] disappeared into the water” (148) instead of emerging from it. In my project, I connected the water theme in the beginning and the end by playing a sound effect of someone swimming at the beginning and end of my ‘mash-up’ of songs.

 Water is an important theme not only at the beginning and end, but also throughout the novel. When Nina Jacobs menstruates for the first time “She finally jumped into the pool” (68). Isabel Jacobs also periodically swam in “the cold green water” (46). These swimming scenes take place during the slower paced parts of the book. In my project, the sound of a person swimming is hidden underneath all of the other sounds. This sound effect is most evident when the slower songs are playing—just like in the book. I chose to use a variety of contrasting songs within my project. The book is choppy and jumps from character to character.

While some characters thought that “The arrival of Kitty Finch was bad news” (73), others were head-over-heels for the girl, and wanted to “marry Kitty Ket” (79). Much like the novel, these songs reflect the various characters’ thoughts, and move very abruptly from one another. I did not put a slow song directly after a slow song. Instead, as this ‘mash-up’ goes from song to song, it goes slow to fast, or fast to slow; this imitates the pacing of the book.

Besides the theme of water in the novel, Levy discusses the complexity of depression and loss. Kitty and Joe both battle depression, and Kitty even mentions that “Life is only worth living because we hope it will get better” (4). The small portions of songs that I used in my project all have lyrics that somehow relate to this theme. Some songs discuss the struggle of having no one to help in a time of need, and others talk about a deep sadness in the world. In addition to their relation to the theme, the lyrics also relate to a central topic in the book. The entire reason Kitty came to Italy was to find Joe, the famous poet. She had read nearly everything he ever published, and now she wanted him to read a poem that she had written herself.

The reason I chose to do a ‘mash-up’ of various songs is because I believe that song lyrics are the same thing as poetry, only put to music. Both poetry and song lyrics convey a persons feeling in a more sophisticated, flowing manner, and both are worded in a way that a person would not ordinarily speak. Since water is a very significant symbol in Swimming Home, I wanted to do something visual with water while the song played. Since the end of the story is tied so exactly to the beginning, I showed the journey from beginning to end using water.

When Kitty first talks to Joe, she says “I have come to France to save you from your thoughts” (26). At first, Joe refuses to admit to Kitty’s accusations that he is suffering from his depression. With each day that Kitty stays with him, Joe believes her more and more. By the end of the book Joe finally admits to himself that he is quite unhappy, and the only thing he can think to do about it is to commit suicide. To show Joe’s gradual transformation in the novel, and how Kitty was the one who led him to his eventual downfall, I used two cups to represent these two characters. As the song started playing, I poured water from the ‘Kitty’ cup into the ‘Joe’ cup. The ‘Joe’ cup was filtered with a paper towel that had red food coloring on it. As the water from the ‘Kitty’ cup is slowly transferred to Joe, the water gets more and more red, signifying the downfall of his character. By the end of the song the water from Kitty’s cup is all in Joe’s cup, because Joe is dead.

Through the use of both an aural and visual presentation, the audience is able to see the transformation of characters and the major themes in the novel.