TGM third draft

Analysis of performance based on Act 2 Scene 8 from “The Glass menagerie”

In a story full of hopeless and desperate, Laura is a character provides the play with elements of hope, change, and despair. I transformed excerpts from Act 2 scene 8, when Laura and Jim are having conversation and it becomes a motivation to Laura to open herself and change her mind. Jim gives confidence and courage to Laura by saying that she is not different with other girls, and by emphasizing how special she is. This scene is definitely the most important part for Laura in the whole scenes of the book since Jim appears and changes Laura to a different person. Jim is the hope of the scene, and the most important character who has been changed Laura. The language and movement that Jim used have transformed Laura to gain more confidence to herself and start opening her mid toward Jim, and their conversation demonstrates a development  in Laura’s mind within the relationship between Jim and Laura. Playing Laura allowed me to gain new insights about her significant change: it enabled me to see how Laura has been strongly affected by Jim after Jim giving her confidence, and to notice the short but strong affection between two characters. 

Our performance begins when Jim asking Laura what has she done since high school in Act 2 scene 8. The scene established the affection between two characters and the process of Laura getting changed. During their conversation, Jim tries to give Laura some confidence and to realize herself that she should be proud of herself by saying “Yep-that’s what I judge to be your principal trouble. A lack of confidence in yourself a s a person.” (Tennessee, 60), “You know what my strong advice to you is? You’ve got to think yourself as superior in some way!” (Tennessee, 60)  Furthermore, Jim notifies to Laura that she is not different with normal people although she has a crippled leg through telling her that “Look around you a little what do you see? A world of common people!”(Tennessee, 60) After Laura listening to Jim, Jim’s advice and warmth have enabled her to overcome terrible shyness and introduce him about the glass collection which is her most cherished possession; she introduces him to the collection of glass animals by saying “Little articles of it, ornaments mostly. Most of them are little animals made out of glass, the tiniest animals in the world. Mother calls them the glass menagerie!” (Tennessee, 61) Since the glass menagerie is symbol for Laura herself, showing her glass collection to Jim represents her significant change and her affection to Jim at the same time.

In terms of performance, I mainly focused on demonstrating Laura’s significant change affected by Jim. Before Laura met Jim, she was a terribly shy girl who did not express herself and being afraid of getting focused by others. I, Laura, stared at floor instead of eye contacting Jim in order to describe how shy Laura felt in front of Jim. At the same time, I sat on the floor and talked silently to describe her timidity compared to Jim and her physically crippled leg. In comparison, Jim widely stretched her arms, said loudly and walked around the whole stage while talking to Laura to describe the personality difference between Jim and Laura, and to represent that Jim was fully engaged in the conversation and was confident to himself. Through the differences in tones and movements of Jim and Laura, I hoped to reinforce Laura’s terrible shyness, and to clearly show her significant change later.

Her shyness was clearly shown in Act 1 scene 2 during the conversation between Laura and Amanda, when Amanda asked Laura reason for not going school, and Laura answered by saying “I couldn’t go back. I threw up on the floor!”. (Tennessee, 17) Laura used her shyness to avoid from the situation and to retreat into her own world. Through the scene, I could notice her momentous change of her personality that she later had been overcame her insane shyness after talking to Jim and realizing how special she is. Laura started to open herself and to fully engaged in conversation by introducing her unicorn and saying “Little articles of it, ornaments mostly.”(Tennessee, 61) I , Laura,  stood up and walked closer to Jim to describe that she became more active and gained some confidence on herself. Especially when Laura spoke about her unicorn, I approached right in front of Jim and volumed up my voice to stimulate her change. After introducing her unicorn, Jim and Laura went on the bridge and danced together. I thought this bridge scene would be one of climaxes because it described well about the process of them falling in love. To stimulate their affection, I and Josh put romantic music on the background and we deeply eye contacted  to each other. Moreover, the light was only focused to us that audience could completely focus on the characters and were able to notice the characters’ attachment. 

Jim was the only character in the book who broke through into Laura’s own world and encouraged her by saying “You know- you’re different than anybody else I know? Did anybody ever tell you that you were pretty?” and “I’d teach you to have confidence in yourself. Being different is nothing to be ashamed of. Because other people aren’t such wonderful people.” (Tennessee,63) However, Jim later broke the horn of the unicorn and the hopes were shattered; it further foreshadowed the tragic of their relationship. As Jim broke the unicorn on the bridge, the music faded away and I went down on the floor and hold the body part of the unicorn with depressed face. I had to make really miserable face since the unicorn was one of Laura’s most favorite, and this scene further became a really significant scene because the unicorn symbolized Laura, and her tragic life that affected to her mom Amanda as well. Although Jim broke the unicorn, Laura forgave and comforted him by saying “ It’s no tragedy. Glass breaks so easily no matter how careful you are. I’ll just imagine he had an operation. This horn was removed to make him less-freakish! Now he will feel more at home with other horses, the ones who don’t have horns..” (Tennessee, 63) While I  was saying this sentence, I tried to be looked really kind and gentle to Jim by staring with smiling eyes in order to show audience that Laura could easily forgive him since she already fell in love with him and she started showing herself toward Jim. After Laura making funny jokes and forgiving Jim, Jim thought that Laura was so humorous and attractive; therefore, Jim tries to build her up with confidence and realize how special and beautiful she is. He even gave her nickname called “Blue roses” by saying “They walk all over the earth. You just stay here. They’re as common as weeds, but you, well you’re Blue Roses!” (Tennessee, 63) Throughout the book, her nickname “blue roses” strongly symbolized Laura herself since the image of blue roses emphasis Laura’s unusual qualities that she is bit different from other girls, as well as her translucent beauty and shyness. While Jim building her confidence up, I was standing in front of him, listening to him with big smile on face to represent that Laura had already been changed due to Jim’s love and advise given to Laura. Moreover, the bright yellowish color of light was focused on only two of us on the stage; therefore, the warm mood could represent their strong love and audience could fully focus on two of us. After Jim gave her nickname, he kissed her. However, I and Josh decided to replace kiss to hug in order to be more appropriate in school. After a moment of hug, Jim quickly pushed Laura and turned away. Jim further told Laura the truth that he had been engaged with another girl named betty by saying like “I go out all the time with a girl named Betty. Oh, she’s a nice quiet home girl like you, and Catholic and Irish, and in great many ways we get along fine.” (Tennessee, 64) While listening to Jim, my face seemed like she was really shocked, but then it slowly turned dark and I finally stared at floor again with sigh to describe Laura and her sad and miserable state. After Jim asking Laura to say something, I gave the broken unicorn to Jim with saying “A souvenir” (Tennessee,64) therefore showing the audience that Jim would still remain in Laura’s mind and to show her appreciation for Jim to making good memories and giving advice to her. 

Unfortunately, Laura never had chance to fully develop herself since Jim took away the tenderness that Laura needed, but Jim was still a most influential character who made her feel insecure and build up her confidence. During the scene, the development and complexity of Laura’s uniqueness was described through the symbols of blue roses and the unicorn. Since neither blue roses nor unicorns exist in today’s world, it strongly showed how Laura transformed all things that are of this world, and lived inside of her own world. Especially unicorn was needed to understand the development during the play; the fragility and translucence  of the unicorn portrayed personalities of Laura, as do the blue roses which was a nickname given by Jim.Since Jim left Laura and broke the unicorn, the hope is lost for these objects and for Laura as well.

Playing Laura was a challenging and interesting experience. At first, I found it difficult to analysis and  to show her significant change made by Jim. However, then I found it really interesting to act and show all the progress their getting fall in love to each other, and how Jim has been largely affected into her life. The dictions or tones of the text provided me insights on how I could well describe Laura’s personality, shyness, and she later becoming changed to be more active. The analysis of Laura’s language not only gave me inspiration on my performance decision, but it also provided me better understanding of Laura herself and her relationship with Jim in the play. 

Citation:

Williams, Tennessee. The Glass Menagerie. W. Ross MacDonald School Resource Services Library, 2017.