Costumes, Props, and Lighting in A Streetcar Named Desire

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through sound, music and light. To set the background and the mood of the scene, they are used. The "perpetual Blue piano," the jazz music played by the Negro entertainers and the call of street vendors always remind us of the place where this tragedy is set, a multi-ethnic neighbourhood of New Orleans, where people are not rich, but life is simple and full of colours. During the play, sound and music constantly give the audience a good sense of environment. This common joyfulness provides a broad contrast with her social background at the arrival of Blanche in scene one. She is aristocratic, well-mannered and delicate, and so Williams tells the audience from the very beginning of the play that she will not be able to adapt into this new world that is far too different from hers. In this way, the atmosphere created by sound and music gives us a glimpse of the play's tragic end. Light is a significant motif in the play, which is an aspect of the text and used in stage effects. From ...

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action.." (Blanche p.55 scene 3). "Soft people have got to shimmer and glow- they've got to put on soft colors, the colors of butterfly wings, and put a paper lantern over the light It isn't enough to be soft. You've got to be soft and attractive. And I-I'm fading now! I don't know how much longer I can turn the trick" (Blanche p. 79 scene 5). In the more desirable, dimmed sun, where the passing of time is not quite as visible, Blanche can now even look at herself. She does not have to embrace its fading beauty under this precept. n the play she is constantly taking luxurious baths, which reflect her necessity to cleanse herself of her awful dealings, to rid her body of the grit of ...

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