Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Williams' "revision" of "Summer and Smoke", November 3, 1998
By A Customer
Tennessee Williams wrote "Eccentricities" in hopes that it would be produced in London in 1951. Unfortunately, the original version of "Summer and Smoke" was already in rehearsal. This new play cannot really be called a revision, as it consists almost entirely of new dialogue and situations. Certain characters from "Smoke" are absent (the Gonzales', Nellie, John's father) while another is added to "Eccentricities" -- John's mother. How does the play compare to "Summer and Smoke?" It is tighter, simpler, more direct, and the character of Alma is clearly more of a social outcast. However, Alma's transformation of John Buchanan is absent here, which keeps him in the background. "Eccentricities" is really Alma's play, whereas "Summer and Smoke" was a story of John and Alma. For fans of Williams, I recommend reading both and comparing -- a rewarding experience for any lover of the theatre and especially admirers of this fantastic author.
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
"I may be eccentric but not so eccentric I do not have the need for ordinary human love.", March 12, 2009
Written in 1964 as a revised version of 1948's Summer and Smoke, Eccentricities of a Nightingale, like several other Tennessee Williams plays, focuses on a neurasthenic young woman for whom time has stood still. Unmarried, Alma Winemiller fails to belong to the local society of Glorious Hill. Though she is a singer and teaches music, her exaggerated gestures and her personal tics make her an object of pity and even mockery within the town, and her minister father often reprimands her for her peculiarities, which he believes reflect badly upon his position. Her mother, mentally ill, is hidden upstairs, and Alma and her father fear Alma may have inherited her mother's illness.
Alma has always been in love with young John Buchanan, physician son of the Winemillers' family doctor, who lives across the street. On one of his rare visits to Glorious Hill, Alma, in desperation (and suffering from a panic attack), pounds on his door late at night for help. Buchanan, feeling sorry for her, calms her down and eventually invites her to a movie. Alma is so anxious to experience love that she arranges for them to go to a hotel, where rooms can be rented by the hour, afterward.
The play is stunning in its focus on character. Alma, flighty, nervous, and apologetic, is the perfect foil for Dr. Buchanan, who, though surprisingly tender, is still honest in telling her that he does not love her. Likewise, the two mothers are foils for each other. Mrs. Winemiller is a completely out-of-control woman, while Mrs. Buchanan, is the consummately controlling Southern mother, trying to manage her son's life. The effectiveness of the play depends on the dynamics among the various characters and how much they are unique individuals as opposed to southern stereotypes.
Though the play is fascinating, it is dated. Supposedly based on the character of both Williams's mother and sister, Alma is so whiny and self-conscious that it is difficult to identify with her for the entire play, though her attempt to seduce Dr. Buchanan is both brave and pathetic. The passage of forty years since the play was written, however, has turned it into a relic of the past, rather than a vital and modern experience illustrating universal truths. The lives of these women, most of whom never dreamed of independence, are more pathetic than appealing to a modern audience. n Mary Whipple
The Glass Menagerie
A Streetcar Named Desire
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (Signet)
Camino Real (New Directions Paperbook)
Baby Doll
The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone (New Directions Bibelot)
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0 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Eccentric, January 23, 2004
This is a love story. What would happen if you loved someone who could never recipricate the feeling. That is what happens to Alma. This play explores this quest for love and the damages it can do on a small town girl. This story does not have that usual happy, well wrapped up ending that most of us expect stories to have.
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