Brian Dennehy and Elizabeth Franz in Death of a Salesman. Photo: Eric Y. Exit
Take Arthur Miller’s iconic Death of a Salesman, for example. In 1998 Robert Falls directed a powerful, physically-emotive revival for Chicago’s Goodman Theatre. This was in recognition of the fiftieth anniversary of the tragedy’s opening. The production transferred to Broadway in 1999 and was subsequently filmed for four 2001 Showtime airings, as brought to the home screen by Kirk Browning.
Now the Goodman, in collaboration with Playbill, is streaming that turn-of-the-century take. This is another example of how theater people are increasingly bringing valuable goods to audiences denied traditional access by the cruel pandemic. The palpable memories of what has been excellent in the past are oases for already convinced theater lovers as well as susceptible newcomers.
The development is indisputably welcome, although the point must be made that the entries aren’t necessarily strict representations of the conventional theater-going experience. They are not always straightforward recordings of productions. Often cameras are not placed only at the back of the auditorium but also move in much farther in for unabashed close-ups. Even superimpositions materialize.
[Read Melissa Rose Bernardo’s ★★★★★ review here.]
That’s the case with this Death of a Salesman, which includes some of the best interpretations of Miller’s great work that have ever evanesced on a stage. The playwright’s scrutiny of the sad, suicidal Willy Loman (Brian Dennehy) story still comes across the screen footlights as most likely timeless. That’s as experienced by wife Linda (Elizabeth Franz), sons Biff (Ron Eldard) and Happy (Ted Koch) as well as next door neighbors Charley (Howard Witt), his son Bernard (Richard Thompson), Willy’s ghostly older brother Ben (Allen Hamilton), and others.
Director Falls, flawless in his instincts, repeatedly gives us definitive Miller. The playwright’s eavesdropping on brothers Biff and Happy in the early bedroom scene and the somewhat later sequence in which Linda chastises her sons over their disdain of Willy—“Attention must be paid,” she memorably exclaims—are only the beginning of Falls’ profound understanding of Miller’s text and subtext.
To a great extent, Falls’ intentions are magnified by Browning’s determined close-ups. Emotions playing across an actor’s face are constantly examined. Chief among them are Franz’s frequently quivering mouth. That she is always honed in on Willy’s planning to take his life is brought out with heart-breaking effect. Eldard’s face as he grapples with his inability to revisit his days as an adored football hero is alive with doubt and recriminations. Yet, Browning’s attention also includes the brief scene in which Willy goes hat-in-hand (Dennehy wears no hat) to Howard, the son of his boss. There, Steve Pickering, on his acting toes, proves there are no small parts. The same goes for Richard Thompson’s Bernard.
Dennehy reigns over it all. He roams a range from invincible confidence to punishing ignominy. He’s fired by an unextinguishable anger. His quiet moments are only distractions from unpredictable outbursts. It can be said, however, that since Dennehy is presumably playing to an auditorium audience, some of Browning’s close-ups are a bit much. (There are even one or two moments when Willy’s blowhard sallies are reminiscent of Ralph Kramden’s outbursts at Alice. This goes to show there is often only the thinnest line between tragedy and comedy.)
Falls’ guidance of Dennehy and company is as close to perfection as could be hoped. As a single instance of his inspirations, there’s a moment—not seemingly provided by a Miller stage direction—when Willy puts his right arm over Biff’s shoulder in paternal camaraderie. Observing a father’s gesture towards a favored son, the chagrined Happy pokes his head under Willy’s left arm to wriggle into a similar embrace. The unspoken moment is so primal that Falls repeats it later with gathering irony. Talk about remarkable stage business.
With a production as convincing as this one on set designer Mark Wendland’s time-and-place-shifting turntable and under Richard S. Philippi’s searching lighting, Miller’s themes explode. Miller was outraged at the misunderstood American dream. (How relevant is that to today’s indignities?) “He had the wrong dream” is said of Willy. Miller remains addled by the tensions between fathers and sons. It’s difficult to miss Willy’s ambivalence toward Biff and vice versa—not to mention the strong Oedipal element in Biff’s constant defense of his mother, whom Willy incessantly derides.
Just as strong, if not stronger, is Miller’s stress on the difficulty American boys have becoming bona fide men. Lines pop like “You’re such a boy,” “You never grew up,” “You gotta grow up.” There’s no dodging the subject. André Malraux once wrote that he had never met a mature man. Miller appears to have the same conviction.
Of Death of a Salesman one abiding question tauntingly remains: What does Willy sell during those endless 700-mile drives back and forth from New York City to Boston, Hartford and points east and north? He has samples with him. Are they for women’s clothes? Stockings? They become an important plot snag, so to speak. Miller stays vague. although his father manufactured women’s clothes. All the same, more than anything in his inventory, Willy—Miller’s low-in-many-senses man—is selling himself. In the last analysis, his gnawing uncertainty about achieving any real success at that is the playwright’s devastating objective. Isn’t it?
Death of a Salesman is streaming free on demand until Oct. 25 at 11:59 p.m. CT at goodmantheatre.org and playbill.com. Click here to donate to the Actors Fund.
