Sheringham Little Theatre

> Sheringham Little Theatre

This is no pleasant streetcar ride, but a bumpy descent into darkness, where desire shows an unforgiving and brutal face.

Directed with flair by Hazel Taylor, this production by Cromer & Sheringham Amateur Operatic and Dramatic Society is a tribute to a great play by one of the 20th century's greatest playwrights, Tennessee Williams.

A refugee from a ruined life, Blanche Dubois, arrives in search of solace at the grubby French-quarter New Orleans home of her sister Stella and Stella's Polish-American husband Stanley.

She finds some comfort with Stella, but clashes with Stanley. Their relationship becomes an explosive cocktail of attraction and repulsion, with Stella caught between overwhelming physical desire for her husband and a wish to protect her vulnerable sister.

With clever staging, use of music and sound effects, this play is high on atmosphere. There is always menace lurking in the shadows during the hot steamy Louisiana nights.

Janet Hignett's central performance as Blanche is a tour-de-force: she is magnificent. Martin Rodwell is powerful as the passionate poker-playing, beer-swilling, bawling Stanley and Amanda Howell as sweet Stella conveys all the ambivalence of her situation.