50 Fun Facts About The Glass Menagerie

In The Glass Menagerie, which of Laura Wingfield's figurines is her favorite, later damaged by Jim O'Connor?

The unicorn stands for Laura herself: one of a kind, fragile and out of place among the ordinary horses. When Jim damages it, she says it will now feel less like a freak.

In The Glass Menagerie, what nickname did Jim O'Connor give Laura in high school after mishearing her illness?

Blue Roses is what Jim heard when Laura said she had been out with pleurosis. The name fits her: a flower that does not exist in nature.

In The Glass Menagerie, what product fills the warehouse where Tom Wingfield earns sixty-five dollars a month?

Shoes were Tennessee Williams's own drudgery too: his father put him to work at the International Shoe Company, a job he hated as much as Tom hates his.

In The Glass Menagerie, where does Tom Wingfield say he spends his nights, though Amanda suspects he is lying?

The movies are Tom's nightly refuge, his stand-in for the adventure his job never offers. Late in the play he says he is tired of watching other people have it.

The Glass Menagerie is set in a cramped apartment facing an alley in which American city in the 1930s?

St. Louis is where Tennessee Williams's own family settled when he was a boy, moving from home to home around the city, so the Wingfields' address was ground he knew well.

At the close of The Glass Menagerie, what does narrator Tom ask Laura to do as he bids her farewell?

Blow out her candles is Tom's last plea, and when Laura does, the stage goes dark. Years after leaving, he admits he has never managed to stop thinking of her.

Which Hollywood star played the gentleman caller Jim O'Connor in the 1950 film of The Glass Menagerie?

Kirk Douglas played Jim in the first film ever made from a Tennessee Williams play. The playwright disliked the casting, and the director later wished he had hired unknowns.

Which Hollywood actor directed the 1987 film of The Glass Menagerie, the last feature he made as a director?

Paul Newman directed his wife, Joanne Woodward, as Amanda, putting on film a stage production that had begun at the Williamstown Theatre Festival.

In The Glass Menagerie, which structure is both the Wingfield apartment's entrance and Tom's smoking spot?

The fire escape is where Tom narrates from, half in the family's life and half out of it. Williams gives the name a second meaning: everyone inside is desperate to get out.

The sister of Tennessee Williams, the model for Laura in The Glass Menagerie, underwent which operation in 1943?

A lobotomy left her institutionalized for the rest of her life, and Williams learned of it only afterward. He later directed a share of his royalties toward her care.

In Scene 3 of The Glass Menagerie, what does Amanda Wingfield sell by phone to pay for sprucing up the apartment?

Magazine subscriptions for a women's journal are her sideline, pitched to fellow club members. One of them hangs up on her in the middle of the sales talk.

In Scene 3 of The Glass Menagerie, which Civil War novel does Amanda liken a new serial to in her sales pitch?

Gone with the Wind is her yardstick: she promises the new serial will grip readers just as Scarlett O'Hara's story did. Amanda, a displaced Southern belle, is selling her own lost world.

In Scene 3 of The Glass Menagerie, which English novelist's work does Amanda refuse to allow in the apartment?

D. H. Lawrence was one of Tennessee Williams's own literary heroes. Amanda will not have his novels under her roof, and Tom snaps back that he is the one paying the rent.

How does Tom Wingfield accidentally smash some of Laura's figurines at the end of Scene 3 of The Glass Menagerie?

He hurls his coat across the room after his arm snags in the sleeve, and it strikes the shelf of ornaments. Laura cries out as though she herself had been hit.

In their Scene 3 quarrel in The Glass Menagerie, what does Tom call Amanda as he tries to leave?

A witch is the insult that stops the fight cold, and it stuns Amanda into silence. She vows not to speak to Tom again until he apologizes.

In Scene 4 of The Glass Menagerie, which trick by Malvolio the Magician does Tom envy most?

Exiting a nailed-up coffin without pulling a single nail is the trick Tom calls the most wonderful. He sees his own boxed-in life in it, and no clean way to get out.

In Scene 4 of The Glass Menagerie, what souvenir of his night out does Tom give Laura at dawn?

A rainbow scarf is his gift, a prop he says the stage magician waved over a bowl of goldfish to turn them into canaries.

In Scene 4 of The Glass Menagerie, what is Laura sent out to buy when she slips on the steps outside?

Butter is the errand, and Amanda invents it to get a few words alone with Tom. Laura's stumble on the way out briefly breaks the silence between mother and son.

After Tom apologizes in Scene 4 of The Glass Menagerie, what does Amanda make him promise never to become?

A drunkard is what she fears he will turn into, because his father drank. Tom gives his word over black coffee, barely an hour after stumbling home at dawn.

In Scene 4 of The Glass Menagerie, what must Tom find before Amanda will let him go?

A husband for her daughter is Amanda's price for Tom's freedom: a replacement breadwinner. He grudgingly agrees to look for a likely man at work.

In The Glass Menagerie, where does Laura mostly spend her days while pretending to attend business college?

Walking in the park through the winter was how she filled the hours, with detours to the zoo and the art museum. She could not face her mother's look of disappointment.

What happened to Laura Wingfield at Rubicam's Business College that made her quit in The Glass Menagerie?

She threw up as the first timed typing test approached and never went back. Amanda finds out only after fifty dollars of tuition has been wasted.

In The Glass Menagerie, in which Southern state did Amanda Wingfield grow up as a much-courted belle?

Mississippi is also where Tennessee Williams was born, and Amanda's small-town stories echo his own mother's past. She claims seventeen gentleman callers arrived there in one afternoon.

In The Glass Menagerie, what did Laura think everyone heard when she came late to high school singing class?

Her leg brace clumped so loudly, she thought, that the whole class turned to look. Jim tells her he never even noticed it.

In The Glass Menagerie, what does Laura Wingfield retreat to and play whenever she feels anxious or cornered?

The Victrola plays the worn records left behind by the man who deserted the family. Laura retreats to it after confrontations, and again in the moments after Jim says he is engaged.

In The Glass Menagerie, what nickname does Jim O'Connor, Tom's one friend at the warehouse, give him?

Shakespeare is Jim's friendly tease for a co-worker with literary dreams. Because Jim liked him, the other men at work, once hostile, began to warm to Tom too.

What job does gentleman caller Jim O'Connor hold at the warehouse where Tom works in The Glass Menagerie?

Shipping clerk is a modest post for a former high school hero, though it pays twenty dollars a month more than Tom earns. Jim takes night classes to climb higher.

At the end of Scene 5 of The Glass Menagerie, what does Amanda call Laura outside to make a wish on?

The moon gets two wishes that night: Amanda has already made hers beside Tom, for her children's success. In tears, she tells Laura to wish for happiness and good fortune.

What is the name of the dance hall across the alley from the Wingfield apartment in The Glass Menagerie?

The Paradise sends its swing music and colored lights drifting over to the Wingfields. Tom says its dancers were chasing thrills while Europe slid toward war.

What does Amanda Wingfield wear to receive the gentleman caller in Scene 6 of The Glass Menagerie?

A dress from her girlhood is what she pulls out: the frock in which she once led the cotillion. She greets Jim as though she were still a debutante.

In The Glass Menagerie, what does Tom Wingfield pay for with the money meant for the electricity bill?

Seamen's union dues go out in place of the light bill, so the apartment goes dark in the middle of the dinner party. Tom has quietly decided to ship out.

In The Glass Menagerie, Jim O'Connor signs Laura's saved program from which Gilbert and Sullivan operetta?

The Pirates of Penzance was the school show Jim starred in, and Laura went to all three performances. Too shy to ask for his autograph then, she kept the program for six years.

In The Glass Menagerie, which night-school course does Jim O'Connor urge Tom to take alongside him?

Public speaking is Jim's ticket upward, he believes, along with a class in radio engineering. Tom shrugs off the pitch; he is already planning a very different future.

What does Jim O'Connor announce is the root of Laura's shyness during their talk in The Glass Menagerie?

An inferiority complex is Jim's confident diagnosis, delivered while barely listening to what Laura says. His cure is for her to find the one thing she excels at.

In The Glass Menagerie, what are Jim and Laura doing when her favorite figurine is knocked to the floor?

Dancing a waltz to music drifting in from across the alley, they bump the table where the ornament sits. Laura, who insisted she could not dance, takes the accident calmly.

After Jim admits he is engaged in The Glass Menagerie, what does Laura do with her damaged favorite figurine?

She gives it to him, pressing the ornament into Jim's hand as a souvenir. Then she turns back to her record player without another word.

In The Glass Menagerie, what is the name of the fiancée Jim O'Connor reveals after kissing Laura?

Betty is out of town, which is the only reason Jim was free to accept the dinner invitation. He says nobody at the warehouse knows about the engagement.

After the gentleman caller leaves in The Glass Menagerie, what does a furious Amanda accuse Tom of doing?

Playing a joke on them is her charge: she believes he knowingly brought home another woman's fiancé. Tom says he had no idea, and walks out for good soon after.

Which flowers does Amanda carry in Scene 6 of The Glass Menagerie, recalling the year she met Mr. Wingfield?

Jonquils were her craze the spring she met the man who would desert her. She comes in clutching a bunch of them, chattering about parties long past.

In which city did The Glass Menagerie premiere in December 1944, months before it reached Broadway?

Chicago nearly saw it close after opening night, until two local reviewers championed it in print and audiences followed. Their raves carried the production to New York.

Which stage veteran made a celebrated comeback as the first Amanda Wingfield in The Glass Menagerie?

Laurette Taylor had barely worked for years because of alcoholism, yet her Amanda became the yardstick for every actress since. She died less than two years after the Broadway opening.

Which honor did The Glass Menagerie win as best American play after opening on Broadway in 1945?

The Drama Critics' Circle Award came from New York's reviewers, and Williams won it four times in all. His first Pulitzer arrived three years later, for a different drama.

Which term did Tennessee Williams coin for The Glass Menagerie, whose narrator admits it is not realistic?

Memory play was Williams's own label: Tom narrates events as he recalls them, so the lighting is dim, music drifts in and details bend to feeling rather than fact.

Which device in the script of The Glass Menagerie was dropped from the original Broadway staging?

Projected titles and images were meant to flash on a wall between rooms, underlining each scene's point. The first production cut them, but the instructions remain in the published script.

What did the 1950 film of The Glass Menagerie add that Tennessee Williams thought betrayed his play?

A happy ending shows Laura cheerfully awaiting a new suitor, the opposite of the stage version's bleak close. Williams called the film dishonest and the worst adaptation of his work.

Which screen legend took her first television role as Amanda in a 1973 ABC production of The Glass Menagerie?

Katharine Hepburn had been wary of the small screen, but agreed in order to work again with Anthony Harvey, her director on The Lion in Winter. The broadcast drew high ratings.

Which actress played Laura in the 1950 film of The Glass Menagerie and reprised the role on radio in 1954?

Jane Wyman won praise even from reviewers who disliked the film; The New York Times singled out her sensitive performance while panning the picture's broad comedy.

In his closing speech in The Glass Menagerie, what does Tom say got him fired from the warehouse?

Writing a poem on a lid, the top of a carton from the stockroom, cost him the job. After that he drifted from city to city, as his father had before him.

What does Amanda tuck into Laura's bodice to fill out her figure before the dinner in The Glass Menagerie?

Powder puffs go into the top of Laura's new outfit while Amanda hems it. Laura protests that the whole evening is starting to feel like bait for a trap.

Which Spanish town does narrator Tom name in The Glass Menagerie to evoke the violence abroad in the 1930s?

Guernica, bombed in the Spanish Civil War and painted by Picasso, is Tom's shorthand for the storm gathering overseas while young Americans chased swing music.