Theater review: ‘The Glass Menagerie’

No ifs, ands or buts — “The Glass Menagerie” should break your heart.

The new Broadway revival starring Cherry Jones and Zachary Quinto cracks it wide open. The striking production also opens your eyes to fresh insights in Tennessee Williams’ mid-’40s breakthrough.

It’s a remarkable achievement, considering how familiar we’ve become with the drama of overbearing Amanda Wingfield, her fragile daughter, Laura, and restless son, Tom.

When the play begins, Tom, like his father, has already deserted the women in his life. In this vision, Tom revisits his younger self with a simple, meaningful movement — taking a giant, unsteady step backward into the past.

Tom and his family are on the brink. In this thoughtful staging seen last winter at the American Repertory Theatre in Cambridge, Mass., director John Tiffany (“Once,” “Black Watch”) places the Wingfields on the edge of an abyss. The home floats over blackness.

Cramped rooms rest at odd angles in Bob Crowley’s stylized set. It’s as though the floorboards are warped by dashed hopes. Anxieties are so rampant they’ve even been absorbed by the few sticks of furniture. Williams used that idea in the short story “The Man in the Overstuffed Chair.” Tiffany ingeniously summons that notion in a haunting visual that reminds us how the doomed Laura is always in Tom’s mind.

The other evocative set piece is a tower of fire escapes ascending high into the heavens. Not that the Wingfields ever would notice. They’re caught up in a ritualistic grind, neatly underscored by Steven Hoggett’s choreographed motions. The Wingfields’ gaze, like their psyches, leans constantly downward.

In keeping with the strong, spare scenery, performances are lean and natural. Jones, a stage great who’s won Tonys for “The Heiress” and “Doubt,” endows Amanda with potent vitality. She can lose herself in the sweet-scented memories of jonquils and gentility, but she’s no shrinking violet. She’s fiercely maternal.

Quinto, of the “Star Trek” reboot, streaks Tom, the stand-in for Williams, with exasperation and surliness. His cruel abandonment of his family in the dark is all the more credible.

As the delicate Laura, Celia Keenan-Bolger draws you in with her transparent honesty. A simple line (“Mother, you’ve made me so nervous”) or lifting a typewriter shows how everything is a chore and painful. She has lovely chemistry with Brian J. Smith, who brings easygoing charm as Jim, the gentleman caller.

The fall Broadway season has just begun. This shattering and shimmering “Glass Menagerie” is the first must-see.

jdziemianowicz@nydailynews.com