A Not-So-Fragile Bird: 'Nightingale'

MAJOR 20TH-CENTURY AMERICAN PLAYWRIGHT TENNESSEE WILLIAMS, born Thomas Lanier Williams, grew up in a family that was by no means normal.

His father, Cornelius, was a traveling salesman who, after years of moving from town to town, grew increasingly irritable and abusive. His mother, Edwina, the daughter of an Episcopal priest, was genteel but overprotective. Williams also had an older sister who suffered from schizophrenia and whose later institutionalization affected him deeply.

He himself was diagnosed with a paralytic disease at the age of 5, which left him more or less immobile for two years. It was around that time his mother handed him a typewriter and urged him to write stories. Williams didn't have to look very far for inspiration.

Williams' famously Southern Gothic dramas incorporate many of his family's disfunctional qualities. The lesser-known "Eccentricities of a Nightingale" — a rewrite of his 1948 play "Summer and Smoke" — is no exception.

Currently showing at Arlington's Gunston Art Center, "Eccentricities" tells the tale of nervous puritan Alma Winemiller, who's known by townsfolk as the "Nightingale of the Delta" for her love of song and flighty disposition.

Enter handsome bacteriologist John Buchanan, home again on break from university and for whom Alma's unrequited love simmers. Compelled to confront the situation, Alma must first confront her own self-doubt — a struggle compounded by her frustration with the fact that other people, including her rector father, find her strange.

Vanessa Bradchulis is astounding in her leading role as the babbling belle. The American Century Theater's production of the play has a great cast overall and a smart set and conveys both the sweet and sour of Southern society.

"Because we concentrate on plays other companies won't or don't do, 'Eccentricities' was perfect — a play that is acknowledged to be the equal of the more famous 'Summer and Smoke,' but seldom performed," says Jack Marshall, the company's artistic director, adding, "Almost all the little-known Williams plays are seriously flawed — this is the exception."

» Gunston Arts Center, 2700 S. Lang St., Arlington; through April 26, $23-$29; 703-998-4555.

Written by Express contributor Johnathan Rickman
Photo courtesy TACT