‘Glass Menagerie’ lures Field back to Broadway

NEW YORK — Sally Field had a chance to cross “The Glass Menagerie” off her bucket list 13 years ago, but she wasn’t finished with the play.

The award-winning actress is again portraying Amanda Wingfield, the fearsome Southern belle at the heart of the Tennessee Williams masterpiece. She took on the role in 2004 at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., and is now playing Belle on Broadway.

“It is really right up at the top — the finest American play ever written,” she said.

Field, 70, is among several celebrated actors to have landed on Broadway in recent years to tackle a role they had previously tried. Among the others: Glenn Close in “Sunset Boulevard,” Jessica Lange in “Long Day’s Journey Into Night” and Jeff Daniels in “Blackbird.”

For Field, the decision was simple: “There are very few really interesting characters for older women in theater or in film or even, honestly, in literature. I mean, there are some, but you have to look for them.”

“The Glass Menagerie” centers on an aging, overpowering mother who hopes her unhappy son can fulfill her dreams of finding the perfect “gentleman caller” for her shy, damaged daughter. The Broadway revival in 2013 starred Cherry Jones and Zachary Quinto.

The current revival, directed by Sam Gold, co-stars actor/director Joe Mantello as Field’s son.

Field acknowledged that she has a “creative crush” on Gold, the much-admired director of the musical “Fun Home,” who last year had explored “The Glass Menagerie” in Amsterdam. The addition of Mantello, she said, was icing on the cake.

“Under these circumstances, it was better than good.”

Said Gold of Field: “I don’t know what I did to deserve this. She was like, ‘I just want to get back onstage.’ ... It just worked out to be the easiest decision ever.”

This version of “The Glass Menagerie,” at the Belasco Theatre, is more bare-bones than previous productions, Field said.

“It isn’t your mother’s ‘Glass Menagerie.’ It is a harder look at it.”

Field won the Oscar for best actress for “Norma Rae” and “Places in the Heart.” She also spent five seasons in the ABC series “Brothers and Sisters,” winning an Emmy in its first season.

Field — who had appeared on Broadway only as a replacement in 2002 in Edward Albee’s “The Goat, or Who Is Sylvia?” — is a big fan of theater.

“It’s all worth seeing,” she said. “I think, right now, American theater is really exciting.”