A recurring criticism of the surprisingly infrequent productions of Tennessee Williams’s influential early success A Streetcar Named Desire at the Oxford Playhouse has been of the actors speaking too quietly — at least on the opening night. The Oxford Times’s critic complained of it when Jonathan Kent directed the play for the resident company in 1978. I said the same five years ago of a student production by Tom Littler, and I say the same now of this week's polished and powerful revival by another undergraduate company, Indigo Productions.

Perhaps it is concern to get right the difficult accent of America’s Southern states that leads performers to hold back on the volume. If so, then this cast really has nothing to worry about on that score. Ruby Thomas, the worst ‘offender’ in the early scenes on Wednesday night, later went on to give a confident and convincing portrait — no mean feat for an actor so young — of Blanche Dubois, the fading Mississippi belle at the centre of the drama.

Chucked out of her teaching job for moral turpitude (as we eventually learn), she has moved south to New Orleans to stay with sister Stella (Hannah Roberts) and her husband Stanley Kowalski (James Corrigan), an uncouth toughnut of Polish background.

What follows is a clash of cultures, grippingly explored here under director Anna Hextall. Confined to the Kowalskis' seedy two-room apartment, Blanche absurdly tries to cling to the life she had been used to in the days of the family’s prosperity, and is angry that her sister chooses not to do the same. Stanley is the representative of a rougher, thrusting America, and resents being lectured by a dipsomaniac sister-in-law whose lax morals — not to say nymphomania — he has suspected from the start.

Eventually, as they must, Blanche’s lies unravel, ending a blossoming relationship with Stanley’s good-sort pal Mitch (Henry Faber) with whom are shared some of the most affecting scenes in the drama.

Excellent work by all members of the cast is matched by high standards on the technical side, with an especially evocative set by designer Anna Lewis. This is another example of high-quality student drama.

There are further performances tonight and tomorrow afternoon and evening. Box office 01865 305305 (www.oxfordplayhouse.com).