Set in New Orleans' wealthy district at the home of a widow Violet Venable, who once traveled the world with her son Sabastian, a poet. She now wants to clense his memory from the niece of her late husband, Catherine, a poor girl who accompanied Sabastian on his final trip and witnessed his violent murder. Between these two women is a young doctor who has been offered a generous research grant from Mrs Venable in return for his services, which are to give Catherine a lobotomy to keep her from tellng the truth about Sabastian and his sexual preferences. Catherine has been put in one institution after another by her aunt Violet, given insulin and shock treatments. She is now at her aunts to be evaluated for a lobotomy. Her mother, Mrs Holly and her brother George try to convince her to change her story about Sabastian because of a hundred thousand dollars they are suppose to get when Violet dies. The best part of this story is the end. Catherine knows what she saw, and under a "truth serum" injection she begins to tell the story of the horrible death of Sabastian. How he fed his fantasy with young boys on a European beach but suprisingly they end up feeding on him. Literally. An act that recalls the Dionysian ritual, sparagmos and omophagia, in which a living animal or sometimes even a human would be sacrificed by being dismembered, by tearing apart of limbs from the body and eating the raw flesh. As in many of Williams plays, this one incorporates elements from his own life and of his idol, poet Hart Crane. Williams' sister Rose was compelled to undergo a lobotomy at the instigation of their controling mother. Read the play, it's short, or check out the 1959 movie version with Katharine Hepburn and Liz Taylor. This screenplay was written by Gore Vidal! A must see!
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