Blanche DuBois (Vivien Leigh) goes to visit her sister, Stella Kowalski (Kim Hunter) in New Orleans. Blanche is a faded southern belle and an alcoholic who puts on a front of being a demure, self-controlled lady. Stella is happy to see her sister, but she’s also worried about how her husband, Stanley (Marlon Brando), will take to having her staying with them. Blanche has arrived carrying the baggage of her past of being fired from her school-teaching job for having an affair with a young student as well as a failed marriage to a homosexual who eventually committed suicide. Stella herself doesn’t have the happiest marriage in the world. Although she tells herself she loves Stanley and that he’s good to her, in reality he is crude and abusive. When Stella defends her sister against Stanley which is totally out of character for her, she sets off fireworks in the household. Stanley learns about the things in Blanche’s past she has been running away to hide from. He flings them in her face and then rapes her which pushes Blanche over the edge.