BCAllMySons

 When I attended the final showing of The University Theater’s production of Arthur Miller’s classic drama //All My Sons// on November 13, I expected something great. This was the first show I had seen performed in the large theater of the fine arts building and everything I had heard about the play from my professor, my friend involved in the production, and from the research I did into the play itself led me to believe the performance would live up to this grand college theater, and I was not disappointed. //All My Sons//, which has been traditionally thought of as a very realistically natured play in both its performance and concrete design has won many awards with that formula, which makes University Theater’s success in changing that formula all the more heroic. While the performances of the actors and their costumes remained highly realistic, the set design was highly representational and conceptualized. This contrast proved very successful and overall the play came off beautifully.  //All My Sons// is a parable about the nature of greed and shame and their relation to capitalism and the family. The play is set in post WWII suburban America and features the interactions of a family led by Joe Keller who was the co-owner of a firm producing airplane parts for military planes during the war. Keller and his business partner Steve Deever allow a large shipment of flawed airplane parts out of their factory, despite their knowledge of the parts’ insufficiencies, which results in the traumatic deaths of over twenty American pilots. When this scandal is found out Joe Keller throws all of the blame upon his business partner who spends the rest of his life in prison while Joe attempts to hide his secret and live a normal suburban life. Joe’s first-born son, Larry, is MIA throughout the play. While Larry’s mother, Kate, retains a false sense of hope that Larry will return, but Larry’s old girlfriend, Ann Deever, knows the truth: That Larry committed suicide upon finding out that his father was not only a criminal, but also refused to take responsibility for his actions. Meanwhile Larry’s younger brother, Chris, is pursuing a relationship with Ann. As the play progresses the distribution of secret knowledge becomes more equal amongst the characters with Ann revealing the secret of Larry’s suicide and Joe’s secret guilt coming to the surface as well. These revelations cause a gradual increase in intensity throughout the play that culminates with Chris’ shame over his father, and his father’s later suicide.  One word which could be used to describe the set of this play is skeletal. The back of a two story suburban home is represented through two planes of hanging windows, an isolated door, and a hanging beam representing the roof. A porch was elevated by metal framework and a similarly metallic tree of pipes was located in the back yard. This outline of the house of a fine home is a very abstract approach to defining culmination the suburban American dream. Instead of white picket fences to literally transcribe the elements of a house specific characteristics are transported and suspended to create the ghost of a home, representing the illusive and elusive nature of the American dream. A further purpose of the non-literal interpretation served to represent the transparent nature of an individual’s life. Although secrets can be kept hidden temporarily, the lack of privacy and individual strength will have them found out eventually. A third potential for the metaphor is to represent more fully that the moral crises presented in this play are relevant to everyone. As the house façade is only a sketch of a home the audience can fill in the blanks with their own background and life and apply the lessons of this play to that life. This can be kept  Another specific detail of the set that should be relayed is the contrast of the warmth and luxury of the rich wooden parts of the set and the cold metal parts. The metal, especially the chrome tree, represents the cold metallic nature of capitalism and its harsh realities of self-serving individualism. It is juxtaposed with the warmth and love associated with the love and nostalgia for the family home. This juxtaposition is a portrait of the conflicting virtues and the blend of new and old influences found in modern western society. This graded stage and the see through home in which all of the characters remain on stage at all times can also be applied to the action within the play to represent the transparent nature of the characters lies, attempts at self-delusion, and the futility of the pursuit of privacy. The audience and the neighbors can see right through the home and has a superior view of the family, and because the characters remain on stage the whole time it is implied that they cannot escape exposure.  The stage also had a thrust which protruded out into the audience and was graded so as to allow a slightly top down perspective of the proceedings within the play. This experience is meant to be reminiscent of an old operating theater in which a patient would be worked upon by a surgeon in full view of those who wished to see. The operating theater sets the stage so as to allow for a conscious examination and dissection of the characters and their interactions within the play. The focus of this play then becomes on the human psyche under societal and familial pressures and the powers of hidden guilt and shame.  The lighting, sound effects, and music were also artfully done. The back drop of the play was a color gradient which responded very well to different shades of lighting to set the tone of the different scenes. In scenes of confrontation like that between Ann and those of Larry’s family that will not admit to his death, or in that of Chris’ confrontation of his father, Joe, the colors become very intense and deep. This is a surreal way of overtly displaying the emotions of the actors. Another neat lighting effect was that of scenes wherein the lighting was somehow shadowed and moved to represent the flowing shadows of sunlight through trees. Lighting is a factor in a play that cannot be avoided: It can be done very poorly or very well but it can never be ignored. All My Sons addressed this truth with an overall technical yet subtle approach that enhanced the value of the play without being distracting, a principle which the director would also apply to the inclusion of music and sound effects.  Sound bites from old radio shows were inserted at the beginning of each act. Gave the piece a period feel by containing updates on the war and contributed to the feeling of authenticity despite a lack of realism in the set. As radio would have been such an important part of domestic life for a family of that time period it a very helpful contribution to the verisimilitude of the family and the setting. Piano music was also occasionally introduced to the play. This soft and delicate sound track was very dreamlike and a little bit eerie and fit perfectly in with Kate’s monologues. Kate refused to believe that her son could possibly be dead and in her monologues this sense of manic denial is present and contrasted with the sweet tones of the piano producing something of a macabre effect that was wonderfully intense. The dreamlike music was also introduced during the intermission which was a fine undercurrent to the sense that the dreams of capitalism are not always compatible with the dreams of a united and loving family.  The costumes of this play were much more realistic than the set was allowed to be. The men wore finely polished leather shoes and pressed slacks and shirts. Suspenders held together their outfits which were refreshingly accurate. The women wore dresses that seemed to me to be straight out of the home-front scenes of the movie //Saving Private Ryan.// Their jewelry and accessories were very detailed which really helped the authenticity of their characters. There was a very subtle but realistic use of props in the play as well. The characters of Joe Keller smokes a wood pipe and, although I do not know what the laws on smoking inside are, for entertainment purposes it was fascinating to see him light a match and to smell that match burning. Another little detail that really pulled the play up just that little bit more was the inclusion of a real apple. When Joe, Chris, and Ann are sharing an apple, they actually eat it. It was so refreshing to see that they took the care to include actual produce. In my mind one of the cheesiest things a play can do also seems to be very common, and that is to use prop food and drink. In the //39 Steps// the whiskey glass is full of glue and when he pretends to drink it the so called fluid remains static in the bottom, the sandwiches in that play are also overtly fake. I believe the inclusion of fake food or drink that is not even close to believable really takes away from any play, and I was happy to see that //All My Sons// made at least a little effort in the direction of real props. // All My Sons // was a fine production. The changes to the stage were drastically different than what is traditionally done for this play, but I believe that that adventurous change paid off very well in the end. Its abstract form meshed perfectly with more realistic acting styles of all the characters and the realism of the costumes, props, some of the lights, and the sounds. I believe that this was the best work of the University Theater as I have seen it, and I was happy to end my theater season on such a high note.