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Just before the film was about to be released, Arthur Miller threatened to sue Columbia Studios over the short that was to appear before Death of a Salesman. This short film, Career of a Salesman, showed what the producers believed was a more typical American salesman, and was an attempt to defuse possible accusations that Death of a Salesman was an anti-American film. Eventually, Columbia agreed to remove the 10-minute short from the film's theatrical run.
Though the film won over many film critics and received nominations for many awards, it was a box-office failure. The subject matter, the failure of the American dream, did not appeal to many of the film noir and golden age era's moviegoers. Miller hated the adaptation of his play. He also claimed that, although he wrote the play cinematically, Benedek managed to "chop off almost every climax of the play as though with a lawnmower" and portray Loman as a lunatic rather than a victim.
Miller saw Career of a Salesman as an attack upon his work, and he said this: "Why the hell did you make the picture if you're so ashamed of it? Why should anybody not get up and walk out of the theater if Death of a Salesman is so outmoded and pointless?" He argued against the portrayal of the salesman profession as "a wonderful profession, that people thrived on it, and there were no problems at all."
Eventually, the very attitude that led Columbia to commission the intro film led to the failure of Death of a Salesman: Businessmen and other people in the political climate of the 1950s tried to distance themselves from a film depicting American failure.
Arthur Miller's play Death of a Salesman invites numerous analyses, all of which grapple with the myth of the American dream and its impact on family, work, and self-worth. The play’s exploration of these themes has inspired a wide array of scholarly works. For those interested in feminist interpretations, June Schlueter’s Feminist Rereadings of Modern American Drama includes Gayle Austin’s feminist analysis of the play, offering insights into male hierarchical structures.
Many studies on Death of a Salesman focus on the family dynamics and societal changes reflected in the play. Notable works include Bert N. Adams’s The American Family: A Sociological Interpretation and Michele Barrett and Mary McIntosh’s The Anti-social Family, which provide sociological perspectives on the family unit. Daniel Bell’s The Coming of Post-industrial Society: A Venture in Social Forecasting and Murray Bowen’s Family Therapy in Clinical Practice offer broader societal and psychological contexts, respectively.
Louis Broussard’s American Drama: Contemporary Allegory from Eugene O’Neill to Tennessee Williams and Harold Clurman’s The Fervent Years: The Story of the Group Theater and the Thirties situate Miller’s work within the broader landscape of American drama. Peter Conn’s Literature in America: An Illustrated History provides a comprehensive overview of American literary history, including Miller’s contributions.
Jacques Donzelot’s The Policing of Families and John Kenneth Galbraith’s The New Industrial State discuss the socio-economic forces shaping family dynamics, while Joseph Golden’s The Death of Tinker Bell: The American Theatre in the Twentieth Century and Thomas Allen Greenfield’s Work and the Work Ethic in American Drama, 1920-1970 explore the evolving work ethic and its portrayal in American theater.
Delores Hayden’s Redesigning the American Dream: The Future of Housing, Work, and Family Life and Christopher Lasch’s Haven in a Heartless World: The Family Besieged and The Culture of Narcissism delve into the shifting ideals of home and family. Peggy Noonan’s What I Saw at the Revolution: A Political Life in the Reagan Era provides a political context for understanding the play’s themes.
Thomas E. Porter’s Myth and Modern American Drama, Tom Scanlan’s Family, Drama, and American Dreams, and Edward Shorter’s The Making of the Modern Family offer additional insights into the mythological and familial themes in Miller’s work. Monica McGoldrick and Randy Gerson’s Genograms in Family Assessment is useful for understanding the Loman family’s history, while Tony Manocchio and William Petitt’s Families under Stress: A Psychological Interpretation presents a detailed case study of the Lomans.
These scholarly works collectively provide a multifaceted understanding of Death of a Salesman, its reflection on the American dream, and its enduring relevance in discussions about family, work, and identity.
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| Kevin McCarthy in Death of a Salesman (1951) |
Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman is frequently regarded as the quintessential modern American play. This designation serves as a useful starting point for examining the play’s themes and structure, as well as for exploring the concept of American essentialism. In my upper-division American drama class at the University of Pittsburgh, which is open to all students, we delve into various issues through weekly papers.
These issues include the dominance of the white male experience in the American dramatic canon, the marginalization of women and racial and ethnic minorities, the influence of the American dream on culture and drama, the search for individual identity within the American landscape, and the dramaturgical strategies used by modern playwrights to engage audiences and explore these topics.
Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman is often noted for its innovative use of expressionism, but Miller clarifies that he did not employ these elements to create a detached or highly stylized play that conveys a social thesis, as was common in German expressionism. Instead, he used expressionism to present a subjective truth, making the play feel as though it naturally "happened" rather than being deliberately crafted (Roudane, Conversations 39). This approach aimed to blend illusionistic and non-illusionistic elements, as reflected in Jo Mielziner's stage setting, making the audience forget they are watching a play while simultaneously being aware of the manipulation of realism.
Notably, for it is notable that Death of a Salesman (1951) should be on a film noir site, notably Death of a Salesman (1951) is treated to a strong mentioning in Borde and Chaumeton, the gosepl and definiton makers of all things film noir. The film is cited as a valuable testimony to the popular them of the everyday life of the lower middle class.
Elia Kazan suggests that as film and television achieve naturalism beyond what the stage can, theater might benefit from decreasing its attempts at realism, potentially increasing its artistic value (364-65). The critical difference between realistic-illusionistic and nonrealistic-nonillusionistic drama lies in the maintenance of the "fourth wall"—the imaginary boundary between the stage and the audience. Roman Ingarden describes this as the difference between a closed and an open theater (383-84), where in the former, the audience suspends disbelief, and in the latter, they are reminded they are watching actors who are aware of being observed.
Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman remains an American classic, celebrated since its Broadway debut. Among the various interpretations, Fredric March's portrayal of Willy Loman stands out. At 54, March was the appropriate age for the role, and he masterfully captures the essence of a man whose life has slipped away, leaving him running on fumes. Willy's dream of rising to management through his likability is a poignant representation of his misguided aspirations.
The Loman family, including Willy's wife (played by Mildred Dunnock) and sons (Kevin McCarthy and Cameron Mitchell), support him, though McCarthy's character, once a high school football hero, is estranged from his father. This estrangement and its underlying causes are central to the narrative, making Death of a Salesman a compelling exploration of middle age and purposeless existence.
Miller's work allows for diverse interpretations of Willy Loman. My perspective is that Willy's tragedy lies in his lack of fulfillment beyond his professional aspirations. When young, we all have ambitions and dreams, and our choices shape our destinies, often without us realizing it. Most of us adapt, finding comfort in hobbies, causes, or even sports fandom. For Willy, his fatal flaw wasn't his need to be liked but his lack of personal interests outside his career
In Death of a Salesman, Miller manipulates audience expectations, notably in the way Willy Loman's role blurs the line between actor and character. This complexity makes it hard to define the play's formal structure easily. For instance, Willy's movements between the proscenium stage and the apron forestage challenge the illusionistic conventions without directly addressing the audience. Instead, Willy's soliloquies are internal, confessions to himself, making him his own "narratee" (Prince 18).
Miller's technique differs from traditional narrators like Wilder’s Stage Manager in Our Town or Williams’s Tom Wingfield, who guide the audience through the play's events. In contrast, Willy’s actions are more subjective and self-contained, emphasizing his internal struggles rather than providing an objective narration. This innovative approach in Death of a Salesman highlights Miller's intention to create a deeply personal and subjective theatrical experience.
At the beginning of the course, I ask students to place themselves within the American context by addressing two questions: What is America? What is an American? This exercise encourages students to consider America from multiple perspectives, including geographical, political, and mythic dimensions. They reflect on America as a physical reality, a democratic republic, a land of freedoms and rights, a nation built by immigrants, and the embodiment of the American dream of individualism and material success. This discussion sets the stage for exploring how these themes recur in the plays and essays we read.
The best adapted screenplays of 1951:
- A Streetcar Named Desire
- Detective Story
- A Place in the Sun
- The African Queen
- Strangers on a Train
- Oliver Twist
- La Ronde
- Death of a Salesman
- He Ran All the Way
- Alice in Wonderland
