Miller foundation work lacks power

ALL MY SONS

Paul Genty

Royal Exchange, Manchester

ARTHUR Miller’s play went out of fashion and lay unregarded for some years following its post-war premiere.

But after revivals in the Eighties we began to recognise it for what it was: not as a creakily-plotted work of youthful intensity but the foundation for great works such as “Death of a Salesman” and “A View from the Bridge”. Miller’s themes are guilt, denial and shame; the breakdown of the American Dream.

Joe Keller has a secret: this endearing family man allowed hastily-repaired, cracked aeroplane engine blocks out of his factory during the war and 21 pilots died. He then allowed his partner and next-door neighbour to take the blame, and was exonerated while the other man went to jail.

Today, Joe has bigger personal problems: his wife is pining, after more then three years, for the pilot-son they lost in the war.

His other son, Chris, wants to marry his (assumed late) brother’s girl, Ann — daughter of the jailed partner, much to the consternation of his mother, the distracted Kate.

It is all highly involved, not forgetting a sort of Greek chorus of neighbours who chime in as necessary.

But this production is something of a curiosity, and not simply in having an all-black cast (courtesy of this being a co-production with Talawa Theatre).

Michael Buffong returns to the theatre in which he previously directed hits “Six Degrees of Separation” and more recently the award-winning “A Raisin in the Sun” — but in softening (deliberately or accidentally) the emotion a little, he has lost some of the drama’s power.

Don Warrington as Joe is friendly and conciliatory throughout, and blows up too suddenly as his world comes crashing in; we get little sense of the man gradually falling apart before this.

Opposite him, Dona Croll as Kate is more intense and concentrated throughout. The two young lovers, Chris (Chike Okonkwo) and Ann (Kemi-Bo Jacobs) also manage to convey the difficulty of their relationship and situation, though Simon Coombs as Ann’s brother George is less successful; he looks not angry and frustrated but a little drunk.

The evening generally appears a little ponderous throughout: with Miller you expect depth and intense emotion; here you look hard to find them.