Judith Ivey-Amanda Wingfield — a well-prepared role

The last time Judith Ivey played a Tennessee Williams role was opposite Karl Malden. That workshop created a hunger to perform in a Williams play that has gnawed at Ivey ever since and is now yielding what may be the performance of her career as Amanda Wingfield in “The Glass Menagerie.” Directed by Gordon Edelstein, who has stripped the play of its sentimentality and coaxed his cast members to a piercing understanding of their characters, the production began life at Long Wharf Theater in New Haven in 2009. “I had wanted to play Amanda since high school when I first started acting,” Ivey said over a salad in the green room of the Laura Pels Theater during the New York run.