Cat on a Hot Tin Roof by Tennessee Williams

What story do these characters tell? How does their presence comment on the themes of the play? The maids, Sookey and Lacey, and field hands have almost no lines, practically no stage time, and most do not have names.If Brick and Maggie do have a baby, will the birth of this baby really change things in the Pollitt family? And yet, Maggie still is dying to have one, as though having a baby would be the solution to all of her problems. Really, we can't even tell the no-neck monsters apart. We think that we can all agree that Cat on a Hot Tin Roof could very well be a campaign for why it's good not to have babies.You have 60 seconds to pick an all-star cast of Hollywood actors to perform in Cat.

What role do Tennessee Williams' stage notes play in shaping the story and characters? Are these stage notes important? Choose one of Williams' stage notes and discuss how you would translate it to the stage (in other words, how would you make this stage note come alive in a play?).

Wowsa, we almost drown in a sea of stage notes when reading this version of Cat.

In this, the original version of Cat, how do you feel when you end the play? Do you agree with Kazan that it needs a different ending? Director Elia Kazan suggested that Tennessee Williams craft a more redemptive ending to the play.

Cat has two prominent alternative endings.

However, she tells Brick at the end of Act One, 'I'm honest! Give me credit for just that, will you please?'(II.1146) Is Maggie honest?

Maggie the Cat definitely knows how to get what she wants through manipulation, flirtation, and insinuation.Do you believe Tennessee Williams here? What do you think this play is about? I'm trying to catch the true quality of experience in a group of people, that cloudy, flickering, evanescent-fiercely charged!-interplay of live human beings in the thundercloud of a common crisis' (II.1135-1140). Tennessee Williams says in a stage note in Act II, 'the bird that I hope to catch in the net of this play is not the solution of one man's psychological problem. Still others believe Cat comments on American history. Others disagree completely and feel that it is a commentary on the changing American concept of family. Some people feel Cat is about a man who struggles with his sexuality.Do you agree with this criticism? To whom are we meant to relate in this play? Each character seems to show us both his/her goodness and his/her ugly underbelly (with the exception of the annoyingness that is the Gooper clan). Cat was widely criticized for having no clear protagonist, no clear team or cause to support.

Cat on a Hot Tin Roof by Tennessee Williams