It would not be unfair for a member of my immediate family to describe their husband or father as preoccupied with the great American play, "Death of a Salesman," currently on fine display in a revival starring Philip J. Hoffman and Linda Edmond. While many would argue it is the greatest drama ever produced for the American theater, it is certainly one of the very finest, along with Tennessee Williams's "A Streetcar Named Desire," and Eugene O'Neill's "Long Days Journey into Night." It is, perhaps, no mistake that each of these magnificent plays involves both madness and families in disarray. "Salesman," however, is a "political" play, in a territory where neither Williams nor O'Neill's dramas ever ventured. As a sympathetic member of the (non-communist) left, Arthur Miller's "Salesman" is a thinly veiled indictment of capitalism, and the victims left in its wake. Fortunately, his good sense of drama and (mostly) successful avoidance of cliche, rescued the play from descending into agitprop. Indeed, as I later suggest, Willy is more the victim of his own demons than those caused by the economic system in which he works, however indifferent it may be to his plight.
Although I was too young to see the original production when in opened in early 1949, I do remember my mother describing the stunned silence of the audience as the curtain closed, only to be followed by thunderous applause. This description left an indelible impression upon me. My older sister saw the play as well, and was similarly moved. Shortly thereafter, I began going to the theater in earnest, a habit that continues to this day. My mother's younger brother was my uncle, Sam Norkin, whose wonderful theatrical caricatures graced the pages of the old Herald Tribune and, later, the New York Daily News. Sam would often take me with him on the second nights of shows, when he would do the drawings that later became the wonderful works of brush and ink that people would see in their Sunday papers. By the time I'd finished college, I'd seen many plays, but waited in earnest for a revival of "Salesman." I'd read the play a number of times, and had seen the very good film version sometime in the mid-50's (with Frederick March playing Willy). I even still have the LP of the play, with Thomas Mitchell substituting for Lee J. Cobb. When I got married in 1965, my requested wedding present from Uncle Sam was the original of his theatrical painting of "Salesman," which appeared in the Herald Tribune in February, 1949. I see it every night as I ascend the staircase in our Brooklyn home, probably not far from the enclave in which Willy lived out his woebegone life. In Sam's caricature, Biff (Arthur Kennedy) has discovered his father (Lee J.Cobb) in his Boston hotel room with another woman (Winnifred Cushing), while Willy's long-suffering wife, Linda (the incomparable Mildred Dunnock) stands off on stage left holding a laundry basket. Willy is trying to console his disconsolate son, flanked by the two women posed in artistic counterpoint to the sorrowful scene unfolding on center stage. It is a masterful work of brush and ink, and perfectly captures the play's most dramatic scene. I did not see Cobb play the role until he and Mildred Dunnock reprised their roles in a 1966 televised version of the drama with George Segal (Biff) and James Farrentino (Happy) playing his wayward sons. In 1966, I was younger than both Biff and Happy, and Willy and my father were exactly the same age, a fact not lost on me. But yes, from that day forward, Lee J. Cobb defined the role for me.
It should come as no surprise to devotees of "Salesman" that many of the lines are not only lodged in my memory, but have formed part of our family's vocabulary. I remember my younger son, jokingly echoing Willy's cries of "spite!" When we would watch Seinfeld with my older son, he was arguably among the few who understood Jerry's occasional references to George as "Biff." Other lines which have always stayed with me include "he's liked, but not well-liked;" "I'm feeling Kind of temporary;" "The woods are burning;"and "I'm a dime a dozen, Pop, and so are you;" and, of course, "attention must be paid to such a person." I suspect many of us have, on occasion, felt "temporary." Ironically, back in Willy's day, most people spent their lives at one job. Now, just about everyone feels temporary.
And, from Charlie's informal eulogy at the play's conclusion, he talks of the salesman, "...way out on the blue, riding on a smile and a shoeshine...A salesman has got to dream, boy. It comes with the territory. One dast not bame such a man." There's something about the use of the archaic "dast," that reminds us that the play itself opened 63 years ago (once again, Willy's age), and people spoke differently then. The formality of much of the locution is, in itself, deeply moving. When Linda implores the boys not to say things to their father that would make him "blue,"I think of it as a word my dear, late mother would use, and it moves me deeply. And, of course, the phrase, "it comes with the territory," has entered the lexicon.
There are certain scenes that continue to bring tears to my eyes. When Willy sees his long-suffering wife, Linda, darning her torn nylon stockings, he tears them from her hand. As a man who used gifts of nylons to bed his Boston chippie (how's that for an archaic word?), the shame is too much for him--a flawed, but not evil, man. Another such scene is the one in which Willy goes to Charley's office to (a) inform him that he has been fired, (b) hit him up for yet another cash infusion that he thinks Linda is unaware of, and (c) refuse yet another offer of work from Charley. While waiting for Charley to arrive, he meets Bernard, once the object of his, and his sons' mockery. Bernard is now a successful attorney, en route to Washington to argue a case. He is armed with both a valise and a tennis racquet clamped in its wooden press, and has come to say good-bye to his father before heading for the train. Willy is obviously impressed that Bernard will be staying at a home that has a private tennis court. Tennis, back then, was still an elite sport, and the thought of someone having their own court was (and still is) most unusual. When Bernard confronts Willy about why Biff disappeared right after the math test, and never went to summer school, he is striking Willy on what is still his deepest wound. Before taking his leave, Bernard and Charley hug, not once, but twice. While Willy says nothing about this open show of affection, it is doubtless not lost on him, and will be recalled in a marvelous twist near the drama's end, when Willy receives his own hug from his prodigal son, Biff. When Charley tells him Bernard will be arguing a case before the U.S. Supreme Court, Willy is nonplussed. "And he didn't even mention it," he tells Charley. Charley's response says it all: "He don't have to--he's gonna do it." This stands out in sharp contrast to Willy's empty boasts. Most sadly, at the end of this telling scene, Willy admits to Charley that he is his "only friend," an irony lost on neither of them.
The other "hugging"scene to which I refer is near the end of the play, when Biff collapses in Willy's arm in tears. It is the first embrace we have seen between father and son. Willy doesn't quite know what to make of it. "Isn't it remarkable. Biff, he loves me." It is this realization that impels Willy to take his own life. After all, with the final installment on the insurance made (thanks to Charley), Willy realizes, in his final "discussion" with brother Ben, how "magnificent that boy will be with $20,000" behind him. Perhaps Biff and Happy will make good on their promise to join forces on a traveling sporting goods venture in which they will play before adoring crowds. In the wake of Bill Oliver's refusal to bankroll Biff on this project, Willy comes through as backer in the only way he can. (I guess that's why they call these kinds of plays "tragedies.")
Biff's recounting of his abortive meeting with Bill Oliver, who kept him waiting all day only to cast him aside with barely a glance. is painful to listen to. Willy had high hopes for this meeting, even saying in uncharacteristic false modesty, "He may remember me." Fat chance. Biff had left Oliver's employ years before, following a theft of some basketballs, and Willy is (rightly) concerned about Biff's behavior in the upcoming meeting with Oliver. True to both form and fate, Biff is in Oliver's office just long enough to steal a fountain pen and dash down the many flights of stairs until, at last, he feels free in the open air, free of the stifling confines of the business world that Miller held in such disfavor.
In an inadvertent example of life imitating art, while an officer trainee in the Air Force, I found myself asked by a Southern upperclassman (with a weakness for drink) if I had seen his fountain pen, which he had conveniently left in the room I shared with a fellow trainee. Both my room-mate and I (respectively one of the very few black men, and--in my case--the lone Jew in our Squadron) denied having seen it. When I discovered the pen in our room immediately after the upperclassman's visit and ran down the hall after him , he warned "I'm not accusing you of anything, but I'll be keeping my eyes on you." When I later had the chance, just before graduation, of reviewing my official record, the "accused of lying and stealing" entry became something I never forgot. And so, each time I see the play, I keep hoping against hope that Biff won't take that damn pen. Although I've seen the show countless times, he just keeps on stealing it. Jesus, Biff, would you leave it alone for once!
The first time I actually saw the play "live" in was in 1975, at the Circle in the Square production starring (and directed by) George C. Scott, by then widely considered one of very greatest actors. He was (to use one of Willy's words) "magnificent." If anything, the strength of Scott lent a fury to the anger that fueled Willy's insecurities. By now, I was a contemporary of the sons, and could appreciate the frustrations that struggling men can feel at an age when they are already supposed to be "established," and prospering in their fields. One casting experiment was having Willy's neighbors, Charley and son Bernard played by two African-Americans (Arthur French and Chuck Patterson). While the two were certainly accomplished actors, it required (for me) too great a suspension of disbelief. While the question "Is Willy Jewish?" continues to be debated (see the May 20, 2012 edition of the New York Times), Willy's identity as either a Christian just struggling to get by as he ages in an indifferent culture, or a Jew so desperately seeking assimilation in the America he yearns to be a part of, is not essential to his "everyman" role. While Willy may or may not have been based on Arthur Miller's Uncle Manny (himself a salesman), it doesn't much matter. Religion simply doesn't play a role in this play. Strictly speaking, neither does race, but, in the years in which the play takes place (1932-1949), casting black actors as Charley and Bernard (and as highly successful in their chosen fields) creates a cultural dissonance too hard to ignore, especially in the heavily segregated Brooklyn of those days. Although there is a place for color-blind casting, I'm not sure it makes sense in such a deeply class-conscious play as this.
Interestingly, the late James Farrentino (who died earlier this year) who played Happy in the 1966 television version, had "matured" into the role of Biff in 1975. By the time the next revival came in 1984, I took my parents, my wife and two sons to see Dustin Hoffman in the title role. At the time, there was considerable discussion as to whether the role of Willy could be successfully played by someone of Hoffman's height. I had always imagined Willy as a big, overweight man, and found it a bit of a physical disconnect, almost as strong as Bernard and Charley being black. That said, Dustin Hoffman did a fine job as Willy, but just didn't come across as someone who would have been the kind of presence that towered over his sons (both literally and figuratively) in their formative years. In fairness, Dustin won the Tony for his role as Willy, so my reaction should be taken in context. By then, my once powerful father was in his early 80's, and he found the excursion a physically exhausting one. Although he was to live another eleven years, I think it was the last play he saw. My kids, by then, were well aware of my "Salesman" fixation and familiar with the show. I don't think it was lost on them that Willy, like me, was the father of two sons. Like Willy, my father was frequently "on the road," (albeit as an international lawyer), but my mother, like Linda, payed a price for his absences, and I do think of mom whenever I see the play. But, once again, like Willy and, I suppose, any father, I wanted my sons to think well of me. Whatever my father's and my shortcomings may have been as parents, I'm thankful that none of us viewed our respective fathers as hypocrites, perhaps the saddest of poor Willy's failings.
In 1989, suffering from five years of Salesman-related-withdrawal Syndrome ("SRWS"), I took my wife and younger son to see a tragi-comic fantasy called "The Loman Family Picnic," in which a thirteen year-old boy, studying "Death of a Salesman" in school, sees the similarities between his own family and the star-crossed Lomans, and even envisions what a Loman family picnic would have been like. Hint: it was no picnic!
By the time of the 1999 revival, Brian Dennehey (a prolific, but rarely distinguished television and movie actor), was cast in the role of Willy, and did an excellent job, well deserving of his "Tony." His combination of power, strut, and impotence were perfectly balanced. Dennehey, as mentioned above was the only Willy to be roughly the same age as his character. I found myself in the strange position of, at long last, being just a few years shy of 60 myself. For the first time, I was able to identify with Willy as a contemporary. Although I hadn't yet faced the prospect of forced retirement at the hands of a forty-ish boss, that most unpleasant of experiences lay not too far ahead. While I managed, ultimately, to hang on until a time of my own choosing, I did realize that Willy was more of an everyman than I cared to believe. Winning a Tony for his role in "Salesman," was hardly a fluke. Dennehey also won the best actor Tony for "Long Day's Journey into Night." For all his television and film work, he has never had the recognition properly granted him on Broadway.
Some months ago, it was announced that a new production of Salesman was being mounted by the superb director, Mike Nichols, and starring that most versatile of actors, Philip Seymour Hoffman. As is obvious to most, he will be the second Hoffman to play Willy. But for those interested in "Salesman" trivia, Andrew Garfield--as Biff--will be the second Garfield to perform in the play. Julie Gardield--no relation--played one of the young women Happy picks up in Frank's Tavern in the 1975 production of the play. But when I received the discount flyer to the Nichols' production, I vowed not to see the play. Enough, after all, was enough.
Alas, SRWS got the best of me. Last week, I purchased a single ticket (no one in the family cared to join me--after all, who could blame them?). So much for my resolve. The cast was uniformly excellent, as was the production. Sadly, for me, it was (as Yogi is said to have said) it was deja-vu all over again. There were a couple of moments that still moved me, but, mostly, it was an intellectual, rather than an emotional experience. To that degree, I agreed with the Ben Brantley review in the New York Times. On two key points, however, I disagree. I found the 44-year-old Hoffman entirely believable as the 63 year-old Willy, and thought he turned in a strong and powerful performance. While Brantley found Linda Edmond too powerful to play the beaten-down Linda, I thought her performance was spot-on, as was Andrew Garfield as Biff and the rest of the cast. I expect that this production will garner several Tony's--and deservedly so. I'm glad that I went, and happier still that a new generation of theater-goers had this opportunity. There is little to laugh at in the play, even though there are a few incidental attempts at humor. At one point the audience inappropriately laughed when Linda looks at her son, Happy and describes him as "a philandering bum--that's all you are, my baby." It is a line that always moves me--and did so here as well. It is a sad and telling line. To hear something like this invoke laughter makes me wonder just a bit about today's audiences. But that does not take away from the fineness of this production. I recommend it without reservation. Despite the passage of time, its heavy-handed political overtones, and some of its overbroad metaphors, "Death of a Salesman" lives, and deservedly so.
Salesman mystery: We know that Biff never went to summer school and why, but we never know why Willy never even tried to get Birnbaum (the math teacher) to adjust Biff's Regents. Perhaps even he realized such an effort would have been too little too late. The damage had been done, and the injury too deep. My dear late mother was able to convince my own math teacher to give me a second shot at the math Regents which allowed me to graduate "on time," and attend the college to which I'd already been accepted (and no, it was not the University of Virginia). But yes, life--at least mine--does imitate art yet again.
It is interesting that, while Death of a Salesman has won its share of Tony's (and the Pulitzer Prize), the best acting award did not go to Lee J. Cobb (or for that matter, George C. Scott). It did, as mentioned above, go to both Dustin Hoffman (in the 1984 version) and to Brian Dennehy (in 1999). Dennehy, by the way, is the only age-approriate actor to have portrayed Willy, being 60 1/2 when he performed the role.
So where does that leave me after so many years of growing up (and old) with the play? Willy tried hard to succeed, and "no one dast blame such a man" for that. It wasn't his lack of success that makes "Salesman" the tragedy it is, nor can capitalism be blamed, however indifferent it may be for those who do not measure up to its law of averages. I applaud Willy for his outsized dreams. Browning told us that "man's reach should exceed his grasp, or what's a heaven for." Where Willy went astray was not in the bankruptcy of his finances but in the bankruptcy of his values system. Willy excused the "borrowing"of the school football, and knew full well from where Biff and Happy were going to "liberate" the lumber to repair the porch, because cutting corners was the way to go ahead. Brother Ben never fought fair, and imparted that lesson to the teen-aged Biff. If these were lessons Willy took away from capitalism, they were doubtless self-tought. Charley and Bernard were not only the best friends Willy and Biff ever had, but men who succeeded in the same system that stymied Willy. More importantly, they did so (it would appear) through honesty, generosity, and hard work. My father and I both had our share of bumping up against the walls of the system, so I have some idea of how Willy (and those older men and women trying to get along in an economy that manages by downsizing and outsourcing) felt. There is, sadly, a timelessness about "Death of a Salesman," and that is why this very good revival has been so well received.
And so, dear Willy, it is true that your sons deserved a better father, and your wife a better husband but--however imperfect your efforts-- you did try, and that should count for something. if I had been that young whipper-snapper Howard, I would have given Willy the home office job that would have saved his life. All he wanted was fifty bucks a week. One can understand Willy's shame in not wanting to keep taking handouts from Charley, sadly, the only friend of a man who prided himself on being well-liked. And it is also easy to understand his reluctance to go to work for Charley. A man like Willy could rationalize the handouts as loans on which he was "keeping strict account," but being in Charley's employ would be, for him, the real handout. Charley was, as so many people who fell short of Willy's admiration, "liked, but not well-liked," and simply being "liked" was death to a salesman. And yes, attention should be paid to such a person. And wasn't.
As for future revivals of "Death of a Salesman," I'm older than Willy now, and pretty soon, I'll be old enough to play his brother Ben in the Boca Raton Little Theater production. Indeed, I have probably seen enough productions to (you'll pardon the expression) last a lifetime. But then again, come 2030 or so, when Justin Bieber and Adele star as Willy and Linda, who knows? SRWS is a powerful thing
