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| Noel Desiato and Thomas Ovitt |
Ghosts
take many forms. There are those bed-sheeted wraiths who wander the streets on
Halloween seeking candy, and there are those who supposedly haunt castles or
ancient houses where evil deeds have been done. But the ghosts that most of us
confront are those that lurk in our minds, memories of misdeeds, dishonorable
actions that, though repressed, never spoken of, denied, rattle their chains
and cannot be exorcised. Such hauntings are the subject of Arthur Miller’s “All
My Sons,” which recently opened at TheatreWorks New Milford in a mostly
gripping production under the balletic, sure-handed direction of Jane Farnol.
Miller,
one of the great American playwrights of the twentieth century, was initially
unsuccessful. His first play, “The Man Who Had All the Luck,” ran for a grand
total of four days on Broadway. However, his second play, “All My Sons,” which
opened in 1947, was a success, earning him a Tony. Although dealing with
topical issues, this play, as well as many of his other successful plays – “Death
of a Salesman,” “The Crucible,” “The Price” – never loses sight of the fact
that it is in the family that “great issues” reverberate, that it is,
inevitably, not concepts or philosophies that rise or fall, that suffer, it is
people.
Set in
1947 in a middle-class American town, “All My Sons” introduces the audience to
the Keller family and its neighbors and friends. There’s Joe Keller (Mark
Feltch), the pater familias, a
businessman who must gently deal with his wife, Kate (Noel Desiato), who is
high-strung and clinging to the belief that their son, Larry, a pilot
ostensibly lost in World War II, will somehow reappear. Their other son, Chris
(Tommy Ovitt), actually made it through the war and now works with his father
and has invited Ann Deever (Paige Gray) to visit them.
Ann’s
arrival comes with a tangled web of associations. The Deevers once lived next
door to the Kellers and Ann’s father, Steve, was once Joe’s business partner
but was sent to prison for selling defective airplane parts – Joe was exonerated.
Then there’s the fact that Ann was once Larry’s “girl” and they were expected
to marry after the war.
Other
neighbors often drop by – there’s Dr. Jim Bayliss (Jonathan Ross) and his
somewhat disgruntled wife, Sue (Stacy-Lee Frome), and Frank Lubey (Rufus de
Rham), an astrology enthusiast, and his wife Lydia (Meg Jones), who once was
romantically inclined towards Ann’s brother, George (Deron Bayer), now a
returned veteran who has become a lawyer.
It
would appear to be a typical, post-war suburban semi-paradise, captured by the
trim rear of the Keeler house and back yard, compliments of set designer Jim
Hipp. But, of course, there are ghosts in this American garden of Eden, and the
play consists of the gradual calling forth of these ghosts, a dramatic séance
of sorts that will lead to more than mere eerie knocks on the wall and
tentative table shakings.
I
described Farnol’s directions as “balletic,” and that needs to be explained (I
guess). A graduate of The Royal Academy
of Dramatic Arts, Farnol appears to be extremely sensitive to the “pictures”
she creates in her blocking, none of which are static. If there’s more than one
actor on the stage, if he or she makes a cross (a movement), many of the other
actors will adjust their positions to create a new “scene,” a new balance that
supports the dialogue that is about to be delivered and the tensions inherent.
There are moments when there seems to be emotional distance between the
characters and this is reflected in the blocking, and then there are moments
when the distance is assaulted or destroyed and, again, the blocking supports
and enhances what is occurring on stage. This subtle, chess-piece movement
doesn’t call attention to itself and thus it is all the more effective.
If
there’s one somewhat distracting note to the production, it’s the casting of
Ovitt as Chris. It’s not that Ovitt doesn’t deliver – he’s especially effective
in the play’s final moments – it’s just, well, Chris is supposed to be 32 years
old, a former Army company commander, a seasoned veteran, and Ovitt simply
doesn’t look the part. A recent graduate of Western Connecticut State
University, he is fresh-faced and, like it or not, exudes a visual innocence
that belies his character’s history.
However,
there’s no miscasting involved in giving Desiato the nod to play the somewhat
bedeviled Kate. In fact, although the play’s main focus is on the truth about
the sale of the faulty airplane parts and how that bears on Joe Keller, it’s Desiato
as Kate who draws the eye whenever she’s on stage. Her interpretation of Kate
often suggests that her character just might explode into a million pieces at
any moment. You believe that she
believes that her dead son just might return, such is the strength of her
performance. Desiato manages to convey mania as well as subtle moments of deep
perception about human nature, no more so than in the final reveal that
explains, amongst other things, why she has clung to her belief that her son
will…must…return. It’s a mesmerizing performance.
Although
set in the early post-war years, what the play deals with still seems topical,
for beyond the specifics of the sale of faulty airplane parts it, like “The
Death of a Salesman” and “The Crucible,” focuses on the “deals’ we make with
ourselves to survive in a world that often demands we cut corners, embrace lies
or succumb to the mob-psychology that blinds us to reality. These “deals”
inevitably turn into the ghosts that haunt us and, more often than not,
eventually force us to look into the mirror and acknowledge the phantom looking
over our shoulder.
Written
six decades ago, “All My Sons” still has the power to move and engage an
audience, and TheatreWorks’ production by and large does that. The play’s title
says it all, though its true meaning isn’t revealed until the final moments.
That meaning continues to have relevance, for as John Donne famously wrote, “No
man is an island”…what we do, the sins we commit, the falsehoods we embrace, take
spectral form that haunt the lives of others.
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