On Broadway in New York, he was at one point a forgotten corner after the over-inflated commercial drama. Without Dustin Hoffman, who would be willing to "sell" a "valuable but tedious" "Death of a Salesman"? Since the 1980s, New Yorkers' enthusiasm for pop elements, commercial theater and star investment has led the dying Arthur Miller to lament that "theater has always been a business, and it was once an art."
However, is the "verbose", "tedious" and "spoiler" Arthur Miller really outdated and without a market? The Shanghai Dramatic Arts Center recently staged 14 consecutive plays "Death of a Salesman" and sold out on the spot. Yesterday's last successful curtain call, and many scenes in the past few days are unforgettable: on the morning of the sale of public welfare tickets, the audience stood in line at the entrance of the theater at five o'clock in the heavy rain; after watching the four-hour", "The Death of the Salesman" could not catch up with the last subway, but almost no one left the scene early; the warm applause at the end of the curtain every night and the high score of the 9.2 online review, all telling the contemporary value of this realistic work.
Shanghai was the first stop of Arthur Miller on the Chinese stage
The heated discussion caused by "Death of a Salesman" is not a single phenomenon. Shanghai was the first stop of Arthur Miller on the Chinese stage. In 1981, the Shanghai People's Art Theater staged Miller's 1953 play "Salem's Witch", which was performed 52 times in a row at the Yangtze River Theater, and the venue was full, and the ticket buyers lined up from The Yellow River Road to Nanjing Road. Two years later, Beijing Renyi rehearsed "The Death of a Salesman", starring Ying Ruocheng and Zhu Lin, and its images were also made into VCD distribution. Many Chinese audiences of the previous generation started with "Death of a Salesman" and came into contact with "American dramas", knowing Arthur Miller, Eugene O'Neal, Tennessee Williams...
"It was a bit difficult for the audience to watch the show at that time. On the one hand, we don't know much about the 'American Dream', and on the other hand, we don't know much about the professions of salesmen and insurance. Yu Rongjun, artistic director of the Shanghai Dramatic Arts Center, said, but "Death of a Salesman" is still hugely influential.
More than 30 years later, today's "Death of a Salesman" expresses a more full connotation, in the view of Rong Guangrun, a professor at the Shanghai Theater Academy, willy's frustrated life in the play is both the illusion of indulging in the difficult to achieve "American Dream", but also the disappointment of his career family and interpersonal relationships due to his excessive pursuit of perfection. From social problems to personality weaknesses, human nature, emotions and social development space, in the face of the topic of "failure", this version of "Death of a Salesman" of Shanghai Dramatic Arts Center opens up more space for discussion. "Arthur Miller's approach to composition is spoiler-filled, too voluminous and seemingly uninteresting, but it also shows the determination of his work in contemporary theater trends – the viewer can always maintain his own wisdom and judgment." Guo Chenzi, a professor of drama and literature at the Shanghai Theater Academy, said.
Today, Miller's plays are arousing the enthusiasm of a new generation of audiences, and young post-90s and post-00s have written reviews on the platforms they are familiar with, sharing their enthusiasm for classics. "Everyone is getting better, except for themselves. Willie always can't understand why he is no longer the hero of the family, and the traps constructed by consumerism and hedonism have made him fall into a deep depression and lose his own value judgment. ”
Through the disillusionment illusion of the "American Dream", read the sympathy of the playwright for ordinary people
The wonderful character development also made the last version of "Death of a Salesman". On stage, Willie Lohmann, a salesman in a suit and top hat, walked slowly into the stage carrying two large boxes, his dignified appearance and anxious tone getting closer and closer to the audience as he paced. Lu Liang, a powerful actor, fully demonstrates the charm of realistic performance, and richly portrays the image of a frustrated person: the spirit of hard supporting a blow with self-deceptive fantasies, the remaining self-esteem covered up with hypocrisy, cunning and nameless anger, as well as the guilt of family, the collapse of self-confidence... All kinds of emotions eventually overwhelmed him and he went to the end of the road.
In 1949, Arthur Miller was only 33 years old when he became a star writer with the Broadway debut of The Death of a Salesman. The Frenchman Frederick Martel, in The Decline of Drama in America, commented on Arthur Miller and Tennessee Williams: "Both native American playwrights attacked the American society in which they lived, which they saw as a rich, materialistic, and depraved society, and questioned the falsity of the 'American Dream,' an unprecedented situation that opened a new chapter on Broadway. In the 1980s and 1990s, classic American drama gradually disappeared from Broadway and "pop" appeared. Arthur Miller moved off to Off Broadway like any other drama writer.
"'The Death of a Salesman' looks 'mournful,' but in the tragedies of these ordinary people, there is a noble moral force that embodies the conscience of a true playwright toward society." Rong Guangrun said.
Author: Tong Weijing
Editor: Xu Yang
Image source: Stills