Poster by Peter Shank
By Tennessee Williams
August 7-17th, 2025 (Thursday to Saturday at 7:30pm and Sunday at 3pm)
The Grandel Theater
Friday, August 8th at 5:30pm
Courtyard at The Grandel
Always a huge and humorous event, Festival goers will shout Stella’s name. The loudest and most compelling is voted by a jury of random and less than expert volunteers who will declare the winner.
Curated by Tom Mitchell
Saturday, August 9th
The Grandel Theater
9:00am Tennessee in St. Louis/Tennessee in New Orleans: Between 1938 and 1940 Tennessee Williams made a transition from St. Louis to New Orleans. Experts discuss the influence of New Orleans on the work of Tennessee Williams, especially A Streetcar Named Desire.
10:00am Ten Years of Tennessee: A Conversation with Carrie Houk, Tom Mitchell, and Mark Charney: Initiated as an act of love for St. Louis’s great playwright, the Tennessee Williams Festival St. Louis has a decade of accomplishments. Founder and Executive Artistic Director, Carrie Houk, talks about the festival’s beginnings, challenges, and accomplishments.
11:00am Streetcar Adapted for Opera, Film, and Stage: Tennessee Williams’s great play has inspired adaptations in film, onstage, and in the opera. We will learn about Andre Previn’s operatic adaptation, Novid Parsi’s dramatic retelling within an Iranian immigrant family, and the influence of Streetcar in Pedro Aldomovar’s film, “All About My Mother.”
Saturday, August 9th at 2pm
The Grandel Theater
A conversation with the award-winning actor and director whose work has included productions of Tennessee Williams plays. Austin Pendleton's long career has been distinguished by performances on stage, film and television in roles that are distinctive and committed. As a director, Pendleton has staged productions on and off Broadway and at major theatres around the country and abroad. He is also an influential acting coach. Among other plays, Austin Pendleton has worked on Tennessee Williams’s Vieux Carre, Night of the Iguana, Camino Real, The Glass Menagerie, and Small Craft Warnings. Carrie Houk, Executive Artistic Director of Tennessee Williams Festival St. Louis will host the conversation.
Led by Tom Mitchell
Sunday, August 10th at 9am
The Link Auditorium
The Williams family first settled in the Central West End and the neighborhood became important to Tennessee’s work. Beginning and ending at The Link Auditorium, this walking tour will visit neighborhood sites that relate to his life and writing. Along the way, we will hear Williams’s own words describing familiar locations. The tour will end with a READING of “God in the Free Ward,” a newly published story written in 1934 about Anna Wilkins, hospitalized with a puzzling illness, that reveals Tennessee Williams’s feelings for his sister Rose before her confinement in a mental hospital.
Sunday, August 10th at 7pm
The Grandel Theater
A special evening of readings, song, dance and music celebrating the work of Tennessee Williams.
2025 Season Preview
July 14, 2025 at St. Louis County Library
Fourth Annual TWSTL Pool Party
July 20, 2025
Missouri History Museum Thursday Night Event
July 31, 2025
Playwriting Initiative Finalists Staged Readings
Fall 2025
And more...