Jim’s place in the whole play, despite featuring in only two scenes provides the most entertainment or action. He gives a focus for Amanda, who uses Jim as a way of reliving her past with the gentleman callers. This is despite the fact that it was Amanda’s original intentions to involve her daughter, Laura into the situation more and finally accomplish her task of making Laura find and marry a gentleman caller which she talked about at the end of Scene 1 in her renditions of her trademark ‘blue mountain’ stories.
Williams again delivers another ominous remark before the scene gets properly underway where Tom remarks ‘he was about to discover that I did’ in reply to Jim’s question about Tom ‘having folks!’ This highlights Jim’s embarrassment or discomfort at his family and the environment he lives in and he knows that his mother will no doubt embarrass him with her stories, again. All the time, Williams is leaving comments that show that something isn’t quite right and that danger is lurking somewhere despite describing a somewhat perfect night. ‘It is about five on a Friday evening of late spring’ which conveys a warm and peaceful night which as the next scene shows turns very sour.
Williams then goes into describing the apartment and the changes it has undergone but Williams’ real intention here is to show that the new and ‘seemingly’ attractive apartment is a mask of reality. ‘the new floor lamp with its rose silk shade’ may seem pretty and appealing but it is merely a cover up which hides the truth, exactly what Amanda spends her time doing to Laura instead of facing up to her disability and discussing it. Williams almost spells out his intentions with the stage direction, ‘a colored paper lantern conceals the broken light fixture in the ceiling,’ which emphasizes the concept of concealment and how illusion has the appearance of truth and that truth can also come in the ‘pleasant disguise of illusion’. Tom’s key speech at the beginning of the play can be referred to in so many parts of this play.
It is not only the apartment that has come under concealment but Laura as well as we see Amanda crouching before her dressing her in a colored dress ‘designed by memory’. Here, Williams sheds hope on the situation if only for a moment with the stage directions ‘Laura’s hair is changed; it is softer and more becoming’. But, Williams lets this hope linger for simply a second as he continues with ‘a fragile, unearthly prettiness has come out in Laura: she is like a translucent glass touched by light, given a momentary radiance, not actual, not lasting’ which clearly sets out Laura’s fate. She is set for destruction which the adjective ‘fragile’ conveys and of course the reference to translucent glass which comes into play in the next scene, but, the audience are instantly aware that Williams is showing them that Laura can be concealed as much as is possible but her fragility is ever-present and it will be her downfall. The reference to the light in which she is given only a ‘momentary radiance’ is also bleak because it may seem optimistic for her now and especially in the next scene in her encounter with Jim (up until the end that is) but she will never have a ‘lasting’ radiance. Williams sets this out so very clearly indeed.
Scene 6+7 are very closely linked together as they come immediately after one another in the sense of time and events and it is in these two scenes that Williams allows a moments peace and enjoyment for the 3 protagonists : Tom, Amanda and Laura. It is in scene 6 too that we learn about Tom’s plan of escape with the ‘Union of the Merchant Seamen’ which he describes to Jim. Tom is clearly in his element discussing films and adventure with Jim and this is clear in the exclamation marks Williams uses. ‘I am tired of the movies and am about to move!’ ‘I’m starting to boil inside…. – well I’m boiling!’, both convey Tom in his happiest or buoyant of moods and this is in stark contrast to the moody and irritable Tom we see particularly around his mother!
Amanda too, enjoys the whole of scene 6 and a bit of 7 as she parades round in her ‘girlish frock of yellowed voile with a blue silk sash. She carries a bunch of jonquils – the legend of her youth is nearly revived’. Williams instantly bursts Amanda’s bubble with the word ‘nearly’ which conveys Amanda as a kind of nostalgic woman. Williams like for when he shows Tom in his element, uses exclamation marks for Amanda too, ‘afternoons, long, long rides! Picnics- lovely!’
However, Scene 6 for Laura is quite the opposite to her two family members who seem to slightly enjoy the event of Jim coming round. Instead, Laura is reminded of that fact that Jim O’Connor was a boy she liked back in high school and the thought of Jim coming round sends her into a panic. Williams uses the screen legends to represent this as well as the stage directions in ‘Laura sways slightly and catches hold of a chair’ and the screen legend “Not Jim”. The stage direction again emphasizes Laura’s shy personality and her fragility in that a boy has the effect of making her faint almost. Her shyness and fear is emphasized even more so when Jim and Tom arrive and she almost cannot open the door and even when she does, she turns for her Victrola, her blanket almost, and she continues to ‘wind it frantically’ clearly shaken by the ordeal of opening a door to someone she is madly besotted with. Williams doesn’t exactly convey that Laura loved Jim but that she ‘won’t come to the table’ if it is indeed the same Jim.
The scene finishes on a very dramatic note with Laura collapsing due to her shyness towards Jim ‘she is obviously quite faint, her lips trembling, her eyes wide and staring. She moves unsteadily to the table’ and if that wasn’t enough, Williams adds ‘Terror!” as the screen legend and there is an example pathetic fallacy in ‘a summer storm is coming on abruptly’.
The scene ends with Laura being ‘stretched out on the sofa’ and attempting to ‘hold back a shuddering sob’ whilst the others remain seated at the table to say grace which leaves the audience comparing the reality of human life and the ideals in life – represented by religion and Christianity.