Indigo Leigh plays the iconic Blanche DuBois in ‘A Streetcar Named Desire’

UPDATE: According to an announcement posted to Facebook June 9 by show director Jeremy Seghers, this production of “A Streetcar Named Desire” at Timucua Arts Foundation has been cancelled.

When Indigo Leigh sat in her high school AP Literature class in rural Wisconsin reading “A Streetcar Named Desire” for the first time, she immediately knew the story would hold a special place in her heart.

Now, several years after sitting in that high school classroom, Leigh will be bringing the principal role of Blanche DuBois to life for a 75th anniversary, reimagined performance of Tennessee Williams’ iconic classic “A Streetcar Named Desire,” directed by Jeremy Seghers, at the Timucua Arts Foundation June 23-26.

“It’s been a different experience for me because of the scale of the work. It’s an interesting challenge, but one I’m incredibly excited for,” Leigh says.

“A Streetcar Named Desire” follows Blanche, a former socialite that has been left no choice but to move to the gritty French Quarter of New Orleans with her estranged sister Stella and brutal brother-in-law, Stanley. Blanche quickly gets a taste of reality after leaving her once-prosperous life to a stuffy apartment in a rough part of town.

Over the course of its 75-year history, Williams’ play has been revived time and time again, both in film and on the stage. Some of Hollywood’s most legendary actresses have taken on the complex role of Blanche, including Vivien Leigh, Jessica Lange, Cate Blanchett, Ann-Margaret and Jessica Tandy, who originated the role on Broadway.

Indigo Leigh, who is a transgender woman, will have that part of her life included into Blanche’s. Leigh says despite what some might see as a large change to the character, the story remains true to its underlying meanings and remains fairly unchanged.

“(Being trans) is a small aspect of her life that does play a part into our storytelling, but I think what it mostly does is it paints more of a picture of what’s already there,” Leigh says. “We aren’t adding bits, and we aren’t changing dialogue, but what we are doing is taking this script and seeing what happens when you put it through a non-cisgendered lens.”

Williams was a gay man, and frequented queer social circles within New York City and New Orleans. He often included references to this aspect of his life in his work, along with his struggles with substance abuse and mental illness. As a gay man in the 1930s, his less-than-glamourous struggles in life are often a main focus in his plays.

Leigh says she believes Williams wrote “A Streetcar Named Desire” with the intention of creating relatable characters for the audience, regardless if an audience member is gay or straight, transgender or cisgender, black or white. She also notes that at the time the play takes place, New Orleans was not known for being the tourist destination it is today. Instead, it was often frequented by the types of people who were considered outcasts of society.

“(Williams) was representing the people he found in his life. The drag queens, and the trans women, and the other queer people in his life representing them through what I like to call ‘big ladies’ like Blanche,” Leigh says. “They’re multifaceted people representing and telling the stories of the trans and queer people he knew in his life.”

Leigh says these multifaceted characters, such as Blanche, are not necessarily the heroine of the story. Instead, these characters bring their true selves to the table, representing various inner struggles and traumatic experiences with other characters. In turn, it brings out the best (and sometimes worst) in their counterparts.

“It’s so interesting to me because in the end of it, it’s a human story that regardless of gender, these characters were written and queer-coded so these people could see themselves on stage and in media where they couldn’t visually see themselves,” Leigh says. “But they were afforded the opportunity to feel like their story was being told, and their feelings of being held on the outskirts of society because of their queerness is related to characters like Blanche.”

This performance of “Streetcar,” playing in the intimate theatre at Timucua Arts Foundation, is a new experience for Leigh due to the close quarters of the building. With its intimacy, she says the cast can play into the emotion of the characters and give the audience a more truthful experience that they wouldn’t get in a large theater or movie set.

“We are afforded a luxury that any little thing will be seen,” she says. “If you shift your eyes, someone will see it. Because a lot of the action happens within different places of the theater, action is happening all around, so depending on where you sit, you might go away with a different perspective of what a moment in the show meant.”

The Timucua Arts Foundation location also provides a more immersive and interactive facet to this version of the play, Leigh advises, as the actors will be using practically every inch of the building during the performance, from the staircase to the bathrooms.

“Doing this site-specific immersive theater was so thrilling to me because where I came from, that was not something I did,” Leigh acknowledges. “Getting to actually be a part of a production that is so much more than just a proscenium stage, and so much more than a traditional sort of setting, has inspired me so much.”

Leigh says while it is turning 75 this play is a timeless piece of art that can be told countless different ways but the only thing she can hope for this production is that each member of the audience will leave feeling something, whether it be heartbreak, anger, betrayal or anything in between.

“I think so many moments have multiple meanings, and that’s how Tennessee Williams wrote them to be,” she says. “Nothing is cut and dry, and this play is far from realism.”
Leigh will be performing alongside Steve Angulo as Stanley Kowalski and Lily E. Garnett as Stella Kowalski.

Additional reporting by Jeremy Williams.

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