STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE

Most important moments:

1. Poker night
2. Blanche's arrival
3. The end
4. When Blanche confesses to Mitch
5. When Stanley is telling Stella about Blanche.
6. Birthday party
7. Stanley rapes Blanche
8. Blanche threatening Stanley with the broken bottle.
9. Blanche and Mitch meeting

What's the dramatic purpose of these scenes?

1. Blanche being dragged away by doctors - Extreme pity.
2. Stanley rapes Blanche (off-stage) - Puts audience in Stella's position, ambigiuity and uncertaintity and is the climax of the play therefore, creating tension.
3. Birth of Stanley and Stella's child - changes the dynamic of their relationship, Stella would pick her child and the father of her child over Blanche.
4. Stanley hits Stella - disgust/shock, and foreshadows later violent events.
5. When Mitch tries to have sex with Blanche - changes opinion of mitch (character development)
6. Blanche and Stella's meeting - characterisation (learning about them)
7. Stanley exposing Blanche - tension/suspense.
8. Stanley and Stella finding out about Blanche losing the family home - backstory.
9. Blanche telling Mitch about her past husband - backstory, also.

BLANCHE:

• Fragile 
• Lost
• Lonely
• Lively
• Insecure
• Delusional
• Guilty
• Flawed
• Ashamed
• Confident (A false confidence, perhaps?)
• Vulnerable
• Unstable
• Haunted
• Desperate (for love, attention)

Reaction as an audience: Sympathetic, no stable emotional attachment however and frustrated.

STANLEY:

• Confident
• Unhinged
• Arrogant
• Powerful (power struggle with Blanche due to his low social status)
• Superior
• Violent
• Affectionate towards Stella.

STELLA:

• Fairly stable
• Rebel
• Forced to stay with Stanley (baby, money, home, stigma attached to single parents)
• Strong sexual desire for Stanley
• Vulnerable

MITCH:

• Sensitive
• Caring
• Shy
• Changes - becomes angry and slightly violent. (like Stanley)