Tennessee Williams’ The Glass Menagerie, which opens at The Globe tonight, is also the theatre’s contribution to the Dunedin Fringe Festival.
Directed by Joseph Cecchi, the classic American drama about love, bitterness and abandonment, against the backdrop of the Great Depression, features a simple staging for Williams’ poetic language.
"The language is so magnificent, and so poetic, it has become part of the vernacular — all of the characters have fantastic lines," Cecchi said.
The Glass Menagerie is an intimate family drama, set in one room, which explores the lives of faded southern belle Amanda Wingfield (Jude Conway), her fragile daughter Laura (Kimberley Buchan), her frustrated son Tom (Dylan Shield), and "the gentleman caller" Jim O’Connor (Cheyne Jenkinson).
Friends of the Globe Theatre chairman Keith Scott said it was exciting to be starting the Globe’s 60th year with a play that featured in it’s first year.
"It’s great to be harking back to that history, and to be continuing our tradition of presenting classic theatre," Scott said.
The Globe archives showed there had been 429 productions at the theatre since its first play, Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, opened in May, 1961.
Created by Patric and Rosalie Carey in their house at 104 London St, The Globe had hosted performances of an extraordinary range of plays, many by Dunedin-based playwrights.
Scott estimated about 2000 people had been involved in productions, either as cast or crew, or front-of-house, over the years.
The 60th anniversary season will include several productions held over from 2020, due to the Covid-19 pandemic, including The Glass Menagerie, a young directors’ double-bill, and a school holiday show.
The Glass Menagerie will be staged from today to March 21, and March 24 to 27, with most shows at 7.30pm. There will be a matinee on Sunday, March 21, at 2pm.
