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• Early Williams is Just a Shadow of His Best

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Tennessee Williams, American playwright; cropped from photo of Williams with cake for 20th anniversary of "The Glass Menagerie" Courtesy of the Library of Congress.

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Fugitive Kind »

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• Krannert Center for the Performing Arts »
  500 S. Goodwin Ave. Urbana, IL 61801
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While it is admirable for an academic repertory theater group like the University Department of Theatre to seek and revive little-known, early works of great 20th century dramatists such as Tennessee Williams’ 1937 Fugitive Kind, it’s rather obvious why this play is not too frequently performed.

With rambling dialogue, slow dramatic narrative development, a strange mix of styles and rather clichéd characters — that seem borrowed from a second-rate attempt at mimicking a politically charged Clifford Odets tale — this production of Fugitive Kind is a noble attempt at pumping life into a play that lacked uniqueness. It also lacked the perceptiveness of Williams’ mature classics such as Streetcar Named Desire, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof or Night of the Iguana.

Set in a flophouse in a big Midwestern city during the last days of 1936 at the height of the Depression era, Fugitive Kind tells the moody story of a lonesome hotel clerk, a collection of alcoholic losers, a rebellious college student, an obsessive Jewish hotel proprietor and an on-the-run gangster who comes into their lives. Part of the play’s general weakness is the lack of truly interesting characters. Terry Meighan, the gangster who claims to be a victim of the corrupt social system, is a clichéd one-dimensional tough guy, pretending to be someone who can bring hope to the lonesome hotel clerk.

Director Tom Mitchell and his large ensemble cast of 25+ actors give it the old college try, doing their best at realizing the play’s collection of Williams’ later, familiar themes. These include dysfunctional family members coping with a domineering parent, lonely and lonesome souls talking about dashed life goals but realizing they’re just pipedreams, and those just seeking various escapes. While successfully portraying characters trapped in their worlds of misery, this production also captures Williams’ moodiness and the symbolic, poetic descriptions of such things as the haunting sounds of holiday cathedral bells and the effect of snow on the environment. Also included to set the mood is the atmosphere of a melancholy transition into a new year. These feelings are evoked by a mostly drab, wooden-table-and-chair décor, effectively placed in scenic design by Sarah E. Ross, of a Depression-era, last-resort hotel.

Acting standouts include Amanda Drinkall as the central character, hotel clerk Glory Gwendlebaum, who is a timid, unsprouted flower who finds a hopeless chance at love. Christopher Daley’s hotel attendant, Chuck, and Ron Thomas as hotel owner Mr. Gwendlebaum are also convincing and sincere.

This Fugitive Kind should not be confused with the 1960 Sidney Lumet film of nearly the same name; that was an adaptation of Williams’ Orpheus Descending. The University’s production of Fugitive Kind runs until Nov. 4 at Krannert’s Studio Theatre.

For ticket information, contact the ticket office at 333-6280, or go to the online ticket office at krannertcenter.com.