Big Easy blues

Long before he became a prima donna punchline known for phoning in his overpriced performances, Marlon Brando set the stage – and then the cinema – on fire with his electrifying method acting. Perhaps the greatest proof of this talent is evidenced in A Streetcar Named Desire (1951), directed by Elia Kazan and adapted from Tennessee Williams’s Pulitzer Prize–winning 1947 play of the same name. Set in a steamy New Orleans apartment, the narrative concerns fading Southern belle Blanche DuBois (played by Vivien Leigh) as she arrives to stay with her younger sister Stella Kowalski (Kim Hunter) and Stella’s brutish, working-class husband Stanley Kowalski (Brando). Blanche hides a troubled past and clings to delusions of gentility, but her refined airs clash violently with Stanley’s raw, animalistic energy. Tensions escalate into a battle of wills and desires, culminating in violence and Blanche’s mental breakdown. The powerhouse cast also includes Karl Malden as Mitch, Stanley’s friend and Blanche’s would-be suitor, whose disappointment adds to her unraveling.

To listen to a recording of our CineVerse group discussion of A Streetcar Named Desire, conducted last week, click here.

In the early 50s, this film would have certainly been controversial for its unflinching treatment of sexuality and violence. From the start, there is a strong carnal undercurrent running throughout the story that would have been difficult to get past the censors. The implied rape of Blanche by Stanley is shocking and disturbing, while hints of female lust and nymphomania – Stella’s longing for her husband, the sexual tension between Blanche and Stanley, and Blanche’s own repressed desires – push the boundaries of what audiences at the time expected on screen. Stella endures both physical and verbal abuse, and Blanche’s backstory includes the suggestion that her husband was homosexual, a revelation that, combined with her taunting of him, may have contributed to his suicide. The bleak and tragic ending only intensifies the discomfort: Blanche has been assaulted and committed to a mental institution, and Stella will presumably take Stanley back (her vow in the final scene to never return to her husband rings hollow to the ears of modern audiences).

At its heart, Streetcar is built on an ideological clash between the past and the present. Blanche represents the old South, a pretender living in denial, a pseudo–southern belle yearning for a time that has passed. Stanley, by contrast, embodies the new South, one shaped by capitalist and industrial forces, a primal presence standing as the antithesis of the gallant white knight who once saved damsels in distress. Between them stands Stella, exuding fertility and representing a new Southern attitude – one in which women tolerate the brutality of men, having shed the gentler accents and illusions of their upbringing. Together, these three characters dramatize the struggle between decaying traditions and hard-edged modernity.

Blanche and Stanley, in particular, operate as opposing forces locked in a Darwinian struggle over Stella’s loyalties and over the symbolic survival of their respective “species.” Blanche’s attempts to “save Stella from the brutes” and to restore a bygone Southern culture place her directly in conflict with Stanley’s raw, unapologetic dominance. Critics and scholars have often pointed to this tension as emblematic of a survival-of-the-fittest contest. Stanley ultimately wins: The birth of his son signals his line will continue, while Blanche is expelled from the environment altogether. In the end, Stella chooses the flesh over the spirit, staying with Stanley and sealing Blanche’s fate.

The casting deepens and enriches these themes. Leigh is the spot-on choice for Blanche, bringing with her the association of Scarlett O’Hara and the old South from Gone With the Wind. Leigh’s own emerging struggles with bipolar disorder may also have informed her layered, tremulous performance. Kim Hunter is also perfectly cast as Stella, her plain appearance underscoring her earthy sensuality and quiet strength. Brando, meanwhile, is a force of nature: His physicality, emotive body language, and dangerous allure create a believable and complex character. Historians widely see his performance as a turning point in film acting, ushering in a new era of nuance, detail, and range. Roger Ebert noted that American actors before Brando often portrayed violent emotions with restraint, holding back a certain modesty. Brando shattered that restraint, paving the way for Montgomery Clift, James Dean, Jack Nicholson, Sean Penn, and others who embraced rawness as the new standard.

The movie’s visual and aural design amplifies its psychological intensity. Tight, claustrophobic interiors close in on the characters, increasing the sense of pressure and conflict. Viewers can feel the sweat, heat, and grime of New Orleans – there is no romanticizing here, only a seething sauna of sexuality and confrontation. Even the score reflects the characters’ inner lives: brief musical cues infused with New Orleans–style jazz conjure an atmosphere of brooding desire and unrest.

Beneath these surface elements run themes of illusion versus reality and old values versus new values. Blanche’s misleading letters, her purple shade over the light fixture, and her pining for Belle Reve all reveal her clinging to a fading ideal of Southern manners and gentility. Yet this gentility is met not with sympathy but with brutality, indifference, and ignorance. The story also explores different kinds of desire – sexual, emotional, and social – along with the search for identity and the power of sexuality to either destroy or redeem. Through these intertwined threads, the film presents a world where the past and its illusions are crushed by the unstoppable force of the present, leaving its characters trapped between longing and survival.

Similar works

• Sunset Boulevard (1950)
• Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958)
• Baby Doll (1956)
• Suddenly, Last Summer (1959)
• Sweet Bird of Youth (1962)
• Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966)
• Reflections in a Golden Eye (1967)
• Last Tango in Paris (1972)
• Closer (2004)
• Blue Jasmine (2013)

Other films by Elia Kazan

• A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1945)
• Gentlemen’s Agreement (1947)
• Viva Zapata (1952)
• On the Waterfront (1954)
• East of Eden (1955)
• Baby Doll (1956)
• A Face in the Crowd (1957)
• Splendor in the Grass (1961)