It is early May in on a street in New Orleans in the poor part of town. The piano music of entertainers fills the air, and between the railroad and the river rests an old, white flat. Two women, a landlord named Eunice and an unnamed “Negro Woman,” sit on the steps of the building taking in the evening. 

Stanley Kowalski and Harold Mitchell (nicknamed Mitch) walk up to the flat, stopping on the steps. Stanley gives a shout to his wife, Stella Kowalski, a 25-year-old, who then descends the stairs. He playfully throws a package of meat at her, which she catches, and the two men head off to go bowling. Stella follows along minutes later.

Eunice and the Negro Woman are still on the steps when Blanche walks up. Dressed in delicate white clothing that “suggests a moth” (5), she looks up and down from a slip of paper in her hand, appearing confused. After questioning Eunice, she learns she has, indeed, arrived at the proper address. She is Stella’s older sister, visiting from Mississippi. Eunice offers to let Blanche into the apartment, and the Negro Woman walks off to get Stella.