The Glass Menagerie (MTC), at Southbank Theatre, The Sumner - 2 hours 20 minutes, including interval

With strong autobiographical elements, this classic American play, which premiered in Chicago in 1944, is a piece of memory theatre.

We are in St Louis in 1937 and Tom Wingfield (Tim Draxl) is both narrator and a central character. 

Photos by Pia Johnson

He is giving us his own nostalgic, emotional and subjective recollections of what went down.

Inspired by Tennessee Williams’ turbulent life, this portrait of a shattered family announced Williams as a major literary figure.

More than 80 years later, The Glass Menagerie retains its bite. 

With her husband long since gone to explore greener pastures, Amanda Wingfield (Alison Whyte) is living in a rented apartment with her adult children.

At 23, Laura (Millie Donaldson), who is painfully shy and crippled due to a childhood illness, is two years older than Tom, who works in a shoe warehouse.

Amanda was originally from a genteel Southern family.

She once attracted scores of suitors, but those glory days are but a distant memory and she is struggling to make ends meet.

She wants the best for her children, but is constantly riding them. It is talk, talk, talk from her.

Tom, who likes writing poetry, has had a gut full.

He longs to break free from the verbal assaults that regularly confront him at home and from the dead-end job he really doesn’t care for.

For her part, Laura, who maintains a menagerie of small glass animals, and plays old records on her gramophone, tries to keep the peace. 

Amanda fears Laura being left with no one to care for her and so prevails upon Tom to bring a male colleague home for dinner.

He accedes and that is where Laura’s former popular classmate Jim O’Connor (Harry McGee), on whom she had a crush at school, comes to the fore.

Jim, who has nicknamed Tom Shakespeare, works with him in the shoe factory. Tom regards Jim as his only work friend, but hasn’t told Jim that he has a sister.

Amanda makes a big fuss, but Laura – who is painfully shy and has an inferiority complex – at first struggles to even make eye contact with Jim. 

Still, with patience and resolve, Jim successfully navigates that divide, before The Glass Menagerie reaches a devastating conclusion.

With a black and white framed photograph of Amanda Wingfield’s long departed husband featuring prominently, MTC’s production is intense and unrelenting.

Highlighted by imposing characterisations, it is a most impressive, well-constructed and shattering work about crushed hopes and dreams.

Tim Draxl commands our gaze with his sharp portrayal of the narrator and Tom – the latter a bundle of pent-up energy. 

Alison Whyte raises the temperature from the get go in conveying Amanda as smothering and insufferable.

Millie Donaldson adeptly channels awkwardness and discomfort, along with a transparent fragility (like glass).

As Jim, Harry McGee is convivial and engaging.

In keeping with the narrative, set designer Kat Chan has given the apartment a deliberately claustrophobic feel.

Costume designer Matilda Woodroofe moves from drab to dramatic, with one layered gown impossible to unsee.

Paul Lim’s noteworthy lighting cues and incisive sound design from Marco Cher transport us to the heart of the action.

Director Mark Wilson has worked hard to ensure a vivid picture of struggle and torment is emblazoned in our minds.

The Glass Menagerie stands tall at Southbank Theatre, The Sumner until 5^th June, 2026.