Tennessee Williams' "A Streetcar Named Desire" - Contrasting the play with the 1951 movie production

Seminar paper from the year 1999 in the subject American Studies - Literature, grade: very good, University of Paderborn (American Studies), course: Proseminar: New Orleans in Literature, 11 entries in the bibliography, language: English, abstract: This paper will compare and contrast the written form of Tennessee Williams' play $6WUHHWFDU1DPHG'HVLUH1 with the 1951 movie version.2 It will explain and discuss the major differences between the two, focusing on the issue of censorship as it was an important factor in the development of the play from its Broadway form into a film. As this paper will show this was due to the fact that during the 1940s and 50s the world of theater in America was much more permissive than that of film. This paper will also examine Williams' concept of a 'plastic theater', an innovative approach by him which utilized music, sound effects, movement and lighting to express abstract themes. His idea of a 'plastic theater', was closer to the world of film than to the traditional form of the stage and is evident in $6WUHHWFDU1DPHG'HVLUH. It influenced the adaptation of the play to the big screen. [...]