Modernizing Streetcar: A Contemporary Spin on Characters and Themes - Essay Example

In my opinion, the four characters’ circumstances would be quite different in a modern-day setting considering the differences that have taken place since. For instance, women's empowerment and movements for women’s rights could not condone the ill-treatment of women depicted in the play. Equally, the men depicted in the play would find the tolerance of gay relationships of modern times, for instance, intolerable. Therefore, I believe that if the play took place today, there would be stark differences in the plot adapted to modern standards of social development and advancements. Herein, I review some subtle differences that would manifest in the role of the main characters Blanche, Mitch, Stanley, and Stella, if the play were to take place today.

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First, Mitch and Blanche share a common sentiment about Blanche’s late husband's gayness as an act of disgust. However, I believe that the modern-day adaptation of the play would paint the image of Allen Grey as a gay man, positively. For instance, the fact that he took his life for being embarrassed about himself due to his sexual orientation would be replaced by a scene where he comes out publicly. Thus, Mitch and Blanche would have something positive to say about Grey’s sexual orientation rather than dreading it.

Secondly, the setting of the play takes place at a time when masculinity was toxic and women’s rights were trampled upon. I believe that a modern adaptation would drop attributes of toxic masculinity that characterize the film such as physical violence against women portrayed by Stanley’s character. Although there are men who are violent against women in modern times, it is not tolerated. Therefore, the modern adaptation of the play would probably depict Stanley being arrested for assault and jailed for physically attacking both Stella and Blanche on different occasions.

The place of women in the play is also subservient to that of men. For instance, Stanley castigates Blanche claiming the inheritance of Belle Reve, which ought to belong to Stella and her sister Blanche as they are the heiresses to their DuBois family home and plantation, Belle Reve. A modern-day adaptation of the novel would probably be careful to conceal the existence of plantations as they are associated with slavery and the suffering of African-American people in the USA. Moreover, as a member of the extended family, Stanley does not deserve a right to the inheritance more than the women heiresses. The modern adaptation, therefore, would also twist the plot to accommodate modern ideas in empowering women to own property as well as exclude the fact that the inheritance was a plantation, which has a negative connotation with the dark past of slavery.

Essentially, the play would resemble a modern way of life if it were structured for the setting of the 21st century. From the discussion, three main differences would characterize the play if it were written today. First, no allusion to slavery would be found in it, for instance, by changing the inheritance of the DuBois from a plantation to say, a mansion estate. Equally, it would present the women as heiresses to the property with more rights to it than Stanley for instance. Secondly, tolerance for sexual orientation would be prominent in the modern adaptation as well as the intolerance for violence against women as I have espoused earlier. Thus, making the play fit the modern context of societal context.