Nelly Fallower's <i>Streetcar</i>
1990; University of Missouri; Volume: 13; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1353/mis.1990.0036
ISSN1548-9930
Autores Tópico(s)Theater, Performance, and Music History
ResumoNELLY FALLOWER'S STREETCAR IE. S. Goldman AS G? WAS HER TURN to direct, NeUy FaUower had the choice of plays and chose Streetcar. There foUowed the usual bitching about how everybody'd seen it and why not something experimental for a change, of which NeUy disdained to hear a word whUe she budgeted, cleared the schedule with the house committee, ordered the script. She was on the verge of making the cast call when she had a stunning idea. "What kind of Stanley Kowalski do you think Barden Brigham would make?" she asked Don. "You're kidding, I hope. A preacher for a part as physical as that?" "Brigham isn't physical? Do you want to trade genes with me?" When the Upper Westham crowd spüt off from the venerable old church of the sea captains and converted Crabtree's Rink to a house of worship (thereafter known kindly as St. Crabtree's, Church of the Good Skates) the first minister lasted only two years before Barden Brigham was caUed. The women regarded weU the young (thirty, hm? thirty-two?) man with the ascetic profile who might have chosen HoUywood or Broadway but instead had gone the course at Chicago Divinity. His somewhat blond hair feU in the thicknesses of unbraided mooring Unes around a head set low on broad shoulders. His voice wandered at ease through lower registers. He had the flat forward walk of an Indian on the hunt. Quite a minister the Good Skates had hired themselves. Don FaUower remained skeptical. "He's a minister. Stanley is Marlon Brando." "Which is more plausible—that a pitiful school teacher goes to pieces for an UUterate hunk or for a physical minister?" "Blanche was ready to go to pieces for anybody. The last five times I saw Streetcar she invited in the deUvery boy. Stanley shot at the target of opportunity. AU Tm saying is that the part isn't written for a minister." "WeUUU—that's how you read it. Read it with Barden Brigham in mind and see what you think. Would you?" "What I think is that you have the box office in mind." 174 · The Missouri Review "At my age, good box office for a badly cast play is not interesting. Read it." Preferring to leave theology to others whUe she worshiped the deity in his aesthetic aspect, NeUy's usual practice Sunday mornings was to rise late, breakfast with the theater pages of two newspapers and whatever magazines were current, and dress at leisure. This morning the necessity to audition the new minister, whom she had heard speak only briefly at the "Welcome Barden Brigham and FamUy" dinner, induced her to church. In such matters, Don deferred to her. He went along to hold the hymnal. He could have used the time to sketch houses for the Sea Winds Condominium booklet. He was running late on that. As the FaUowers tucked themselves in, Brigham came forward to the pulpit to speak the opening words. Behind his softly spoken prayer she detected a volume of voice on caU. His arms fiUed his sleeves. His neck fiUed his coUar. She deduced a figure muscled close to the bone. He stepped away from the pulpit and stood unobtrusively in the background whUe four verses of a hymn written for Ima Sumac's range stumbled in broken octaves through the congregation at the organist's donkey pace—Good God, woman, get moving. With an actress' quick study, she impatiently picked up the stanzia ahead and glanced at the Order of Service for what came next. The swords into plowshares thing. Today they would be against war. Boredom was not too high a price to pay for the opportunity to audition Brigham, but when they seated, and the president of the congregation had materiaUzed in their midst with announcements and disappeared again, Brigham came forward from the shadow, entered the pulpit, and launched Isaiah at her—spears into pruning hooks in a rising phrase that drove into her throat, and neither shall they learn war anymore—each word a blow deUvered in his mightiest voice. "My good God what a reading!" she muttered. The next morning NeUy...
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