Octagon theatre, Bolton
In Holly Race Roughan’s thrilling and dynamic production, Arthur Miller’s classic about a Brooklyn longshoreman and his family roils with primal passions
If Arthur Miller had not got there first, you might call this play a crucible. Certainly that is how it feels in Holly Race Roughan’s thrilling production for Headlong and partners. On Moi Tran’s oily black set, overlooked by a wood-panelled walkway like a prying courthouse corridor, the director creates laboratory conditions for a collision of elemental forces.
In this everyman tragedy about Eddie Carbone, a Brooklyn longshoreman whose inappropriate feelings for his niece lead to a betrayal of his extended family, Miller evoked primal passions. The playwright was thinking of the archetypal inevitability of Greek drama as well as the inviolability of Sicilian codes of honour. Juxtaposed with the niceties of US justice, these ancient forces seem wild and untameable, emotional logic carrying a power greater than the quiet voice of reason.
