THE MILLER PLAYS
by T.E. Klunzinger
Arthur Miller’s double bill of one-act plays, “A Memory of Two Mondays” and “A View from the Bridge,” now playing at MSU’s Pasant Theatre through October 21, was not successful when it premiered in New York in 1955 and it’s easy to see why: both plays are not very much fun and are unrelentingly grim.
“Mondays” comes first and presents many people toiling away at dead-end jobs in a 1930’s New York warehouse. Nobody has much to look forward to except young Bert, who’s only working until he can save enough to go off to college, which he does. Which is about all that really happens. It’s presented as a memory play which adds an element of distance so you’re not fully feeling the pain.
“Bridge” is also a memory play, but because it focuses on a relatively few characters, it feels more immediate and intimate. It also has a much stronger and more tragic story so it works vastly better as a play. Yet even despite the eloquent narration and heightened reality of the action, it’s still very much of the kitchen-sink realism school of playwriting that was in vogue in the decade following World War II and apparently still is today, with multiple New York and London revivals that have tended to attract multiple awards.
Director Rob Roznowski masters the action of both plays, instilling workaday choreography to the warehouse routine, then setting up the more-confrontational family tragedy. His work is complemented by the double-duty faux-Brooklyn Bridge set by Lex van Blommestein/Brandon Barker featuring some very versatile crates, as well as the lighting design by guest artist Dana White, up from Purple Rose.
Brandon Drap and Cameron Michael Chase are winning as the two main characters in “Mondays,” while the dozen-odd other actors master a wide range of working-class accents. In general, though, “age has its own authority,” so it becomes problematic when you have relative youngsters playing characters who are supposed to be 50 years older. But there it is.
Kevin Craig is belligerently effective as the tragic protagonist Eddie in “Bridge” – as written, he’s creepily obsessed with his young niece Catherine and not very likable, but the actor makes us sort of care for him, or at least understand him. Anna Ryzenga and Alek Doerr beautifully portray the young lovers, while Claire Wilcher and Raied Jawhari give solid support as family members thrown together in their search for the American dream.
While the overarching theme of both plays would seem to be that of immigrants, illegal or otherwise, trying to make it in mid-20th-Century New York, what may resonate most with today’s audiences is Eddie’s almost-demented obsession with Catherine and the shocking lengths to which he will go to keep her at hand.
The Miller Plays continue this afternoon and then Tuesday through Sunday at MSU’s Pasant Theatre, playing on a mildly complex schedule – check website for exact times. (And remember, Wharton Center Parking is now $10.)
http://www.theatre.msu.edu