Miller's 'Salesman' lives on at the Wells Theatre

With his horn-rimmed spectacles partially hiding the dark rings beneath his eyes, playwright Arthur Miller looked up and bemoaned the fact that "Death of a Salesman," his masterpiece, came so early in his life.

"It was followed," he said in a 1985 interview, "by the years that everyone expected me to produce - everyone but myself. You cannot write on a schedule."

"Death of a Salesman," regarded by some as the greatest American drama, chronicles the life of an aging traveling salesman, Willy Loman, who is losing his dignity in a world in which only money matters.

The Virginia Stage Company, in its 33rd season, is staging its first-ever production of the play. Director Chris Hanna, without changing the dialogue, has moved the setting forward to the 1960s and the start of an advertising age that would have been a threat to a common-man salesman like Loman.

In the production, there remains that moment when Linda Loman, Willy's faithful and long-suffering wife, steps to stage center and bravely defends what appears to be the nothingness of her husband's life:

"I don't say he's a great man," she proclaims. "Willy Loman never made a lot of money. His name was never in the paper. He's not the finest character that ever lived. But he's a human being, and a terrible thing is happening to him. So attention must be paid."

More than 60 years after it was first produced, the play continues to command attention and seems especially timely in an America beset by economic troubles.

When Miller talked with The Pilot more than two decades ago in an interview in New York City, he summed up his most famous character this way: "Willy Loman is a man who is writing his name in ice on a hot day when he wants to be writing it in stone."

The same could be said about Miller, who died seven years ago at age 89. "Salesman" made him a celebrity at age 33, and he struggled the rest of his life to match its success.

First, however, he had to get "Salesman" produced, and that wasn't easy.

"It was," he recalled, "a time when I'd had only one play even produced on Broadway. I was in no position to bargain, but somehow 'Death of a Salesman' got on the stage as written."

In the play, scenes often feature Willy alone on stage. Then he is joined by other characters from different times and places in his life - characters only he can see and hear.

Miller faced a backlash from producers before the first curtain went up.

"They wanted me to change the title," he said, speaking in the fast clip of a native New Yorker. "They claimed no one would go to see a show with that title. Then they wanted me to change all the flashbacks and time switches. The urge was to have the play unfold in chronological sequence."

The 1949 production was a hit, and Miller won both a Pulitzer Prize and a Tony Award for it.

"It was considered quite a daring play then," he said, "but it wasn't but a few years before the critics started calling me old-fashioned."

The playwright was born in Harlem to Polish-Jewish immigrants, and he described his father as a "mostly illiterate but moderately wealthy businessman." During the Depression, his father lost nearly everything - a factor that would affect most of Miller's plays as well as his view of society.

Following the success of "Salesman," Miller ran into problems, he said, because of his predilection for liberal causes.

During the McCarthy era of the 1950s, he was called before the House Un-American Activities Committee, where he refused to name people he had seen at a Communist party meeting some 10 years before. He claimed his interest was social, not political. His passport was denied in 1954, and he was cited with a contempt-of-Congress charge.

More publicity came after he left his first wife and married actress Marilyn Monroe in 1956. The press labeled the union as "the brain marries the beauty" or "the egghead weds The hourglass."

The current movie "My Week With Marilyn," nominated for two Academy Awards, chronicles a brief period in Monroe's life in 1956, when she was newly married to Miller and was filming "The Prince and the Showgirl." In the new film, Miller is portrayed by Dougray Scott, opposite Michelle Williams' Oscar-nominated performance as Monroe.

Miller and Monroe divorced after five years together.

Over his career, Miller found success with other plays, most notably "The Crucible," "A View From the Bridge" and "All My Sons," but he also frequently tasted bitter failures.

He drew criticism in 1964 with "After the Fall." The mild Broadway hit featured a leading lady who was a dumb, naive, blonde movie star. The play was thought to be his lightly veiled look at his former wife. He denied the character was based on Monroe, claiming she was a composite.

The all-important decision in any new "Salesman" production is finding the right Willy Loman.

The role was originated on Broadway by Lee J. Cobb. Others who would play the part on the Great White Way included George C. Scott, Dustin Hoffman (who repeated the role for a television version) and Brian Dennehy. In the original 1951 movie version, the role was handled by Fredric March.

Hanna didn't have to resort to auditions to find his Loman. He went to Tracy Griswold, who had portrayed former Norfolk mayor Fred Duckworth in the world premiere of Hanna's own play "Line in the Sand," produced by Virginia Stage Company.

Griswold, coincidentally, had appeared on Broadway in a revival of Miller's "All My Sons."

"It is important," Hanna observed, "that this actor not be a star or a star presence. It is important that Willy be one of the people."

For the role of Loman's wife, Hanna tapped Julie Fishell, whom he had directed in "The Rainmaker."

Hanna worked with scenic designer Narelle Sissons and costume designer Jeni Schaefer to update the play's look to the 1960s.

"It was a time when advertising really took over Madison Avenue," Hanna said. "The show is very much in the vogue of TV's 'Mad Men' in style. It was a time of Frank Sinatra and the beehive and a world that was becoming obsessed with numbers."

Hanna says the biggest challenge in reviving "Death of a Salesman" is getting beyond any intimidation that it is a classic.

"We have to approach it as a great play, but, after all, just a play. We want to approach it as if it is a new play because, of course, it is new for every playgoer."

Miller himself had this fix on his script: "I think the play - in fact, all my plays - are about how many men make the outside world a home. Or try to make the outside world a home. I think we know a great deal about everything today except how to live with each other."

Once again, Willy Loman commands attention.

Mal Vincent, 757-446-2347,

mal.vincent@pilotonline.com