by Arthur Miller
seen at Wyndhams Theatre on 6 March 2019
Jonathan Church directs Brendan Coyle and Adrian Lukis as two brothers, Vincent and Walter, with Sarah Stewart as Vincent's wife Esther and David Suchet as Gregory Solomon, an elderly second-hand furniture dealer, in a fiftieth anniversary production of Arthur Miller's play about the costs and misunderstandings of filial loyalty played out as the brothers meet after sixteen years to dispose of their father's property.
In an astonishing set designed by Simon Higlett to represent a lifetime's clutter, with chairs, desks and other bric-a-brac climbing surrealistically angled walls almost to hang from the ceiling, Vincent, a policeman nearing his retirement, has returned to his father's apartment many years after the latter's death to dispose of all the moveables since the building is about to be demolished. This being an Arthur Miller play, the event is fraught with complex memories and resentments, revealed partly through the tense discussion with his wife when she arrives, when it becomes clear that Walter, the successful doctor brother, has been estranged from Vincent for many years and has not answered calls to help deal with this current crisis.
