Laurie Brooks’ Afflicted: Daughters Of Salem (2014) set before the infamous Salem Witch Trials begin, deals with a lot of the same characters, focusing on Tituba and the girls. New production in 2019 by Laurel Mill Playhouse, 508 Main Street, Laurel, MD. Directed by Daniel Johnston, with Ashanti Cooper, Jim Berard, Malissa Cruz Romero, Julie Rogers, Megan Safko, Emily Groves, and Sarah Luckadoo. Set design by Ann Hull. Call 301-617-9906 or check the website for more information.
3-20 October 2019, Obie winner Evan Yionoulis will direct the world premiere of All My Fathers by Paul Young at La MaMa, 66 East 4th Street, NY, NY. When the playwright’s elderly mother discloses that she is the bastard child of the family pediatrician, her former employer (now dead), he is plunged into a real-life Arthur Miller drama. The new play includes text collage from a host of family plays, including Hamlet, All My Sons, Oedipus, and Well. Call 212-352-3101 or check the website for more information.
Vero Beach Theatre Guild, 2020 San Juan Avenue, Vero Beach, FL is offering a tribute to Miller with a series of staged readings of his best known plays. The Crucible 4-6 Oct. 2019; A View from the Bridge 31 Jan-2 Feb.2020; and Death of a Salesman 3-5 April 2020. Call 772-562-8300 or check the website for more information.
A ballet version of The Crucible performed by Scottish Ballet, choreographed by Helen Pickett, with music by Peter Salem, after opening at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival 3-5 Aug., plays other Scottish venues including Glasgow’s Theatre Royal (25-28 September 2019), Aberdeen’s His Majesty’s Theatre (3-5 October 2019) and Inverness’ Eden Court (9-10 October 2019) before going to the Kennedy Center, Washington D.C. for 13-17 May 2020). Check their website for more detail. Also watch the promotional video on YouTube. Originally shown in 2014, as part of a double-bill, it started life as a shorter, more succinct piece of 40 minutes that had its work cut out capturing all of Arthur Miller’s characters and content in one act. The new version will run for two hours.
Witch Cakes: A New Musical by Soma Theatre Collective, Wenham, MA. Performed in Wenham and at Providence Fringe Festival, July 2019. A lighthearted take on The Crucible, with John Proctor as an egotistical lothario against whom his wife, mistress and servant gang-up to prove him the witch to get rid of him, with the aid of a local witch baker!
On August 4th, 2019, the new play reading series, A Place at the Table, held its first reading featuring an all womxn cast of Incident at Vichy. A Place at the Table, conceived by Olivia Daniels, Sarah Hogewood, and Ellie Handel, was created to take classic plays and reimagine them through a contemporary lens, offering womxn artists the chance to perform in roles that were not originally written with their voices in mind.
The 2019 revival of All My Sons on Broadway by Roundabout Theatre received Tony nominations for Best Revival of a Play, Best Actress for Annette Bening (Kate), and Best featured Actor for Benjamin Walker (Chris); sadly, none were winners this time round.
Miller scholar Ramón Espejo will be having a conversation on 6 June with Esther Bendahan, the director of Spain’s Sefarad Center (Jewish-Spanish Center), Calle Mayor, 69, Madrid, Spain on the relationship between Arthur Miller and Spain.The event is free, and check this website for more information.
Hello 22 May-I June by Theatre Terrific, Vancouver, Canada. Written and directed by Susanna Uchatius. Recreating the story of Miller and Morath’s son, Daniel Miller, as seen through Daniel’s eyes. “Singing, dancing, family feuds, friends, food, and moving furniture are woven together with moments of astounding truth paired with equally astounding denial.” Daniel is played by director’s own daughter, Alex Edwards, who was born with brain damage that affected her cognitive, speech and some motor skills. Also appearing are Monique Bourgeois, Keara Barnes, Tamara McCarthy, Francis Winter, Mary Jane Paquette. Technical Director/Mask Design Bill Beauregarde. Tickets can be purchased by phone 604.689.0926 or online: https://bit.ly/2vgVUtw
The 2019 revival of The Price at London’s Wyndham’s Theatre received three nominations in the Olivier Awards (took place in April): nominated for Best Revival, Best Actor in a Supporting Role (Adrian Lukis) and Best Actor (David Suchet). Sadly none were winners.
Highlights from the newly acquired archive of playwright Arthur Miller on exhibit 7 March through to 18 August 2019 at the Harry Ransom Center, University of Texas (archive expected to be fully cataloged by 13 November, 2019). Contact Cline Curator of Theatre and Performing Arts Eric Joseph Colleary <ecolleary@utexas.edu> for more information. Research Fellowships are available, application usually in August for the following year: https://www.hrc.utexas.edu/fellowships/
Friday 22nd of February 2019, Jennifer Juan released her new single “A View From The Bridge,” available on all digital music streaming platforms and digital music stores, including Apple Music, Spotify, Tidal, iTunes and Amazon worldwide. Discussing the upcoming single, Juan said “Originally, it was part of my upcoming EP, Subliminals, but I decided to release it as a single, because I felt it was so different to everything else on the record. I was inspired, in a way, by the Arthur Miller play,” Juan said, talking about the inspiration behind the new single “A View From The Bridge” and what inspired the lyrics. “The first time I read it, as a child, was during a time when I was experiencing love and heartbreak for the first time, so I have a lot of nostalgia and sadness for the play, and it really inspired this song.”
15-23 Feb. 2019 Rollins College’s Annie Russell Theatre, 1000 Holt Ave, Winter Park, FL, are producing, John Proctor is the Villain, by Kimberly Belflower. Another new play that takes on The Crucible, and takes the side, here, of the young women. It takes place in a small town in Appalachian Georgia where a high school English class dives into Miller’s play and find the “girls” to be better role models than the men in the play. Developed by Brooklyn’s Farm Theatre. Directed by David Charles with Allison Stewart, Fiona Campbell, Alison Furlong, Josh Scott, and Faith Artis. Staging by Meredith Egan. Call 407-646-2145 or check the website for more details.
2019: A few Fertile Ground festival shows get a jump on the official starting date, including Witch Hunt (listed in the festival program as Crucible:Very Loosely Adapted from Arthur Miller’s The Crucible) in which Philip Cuomo and the CoHo Clown Cohort work their magic on Arthur Miller’s The Crucible in the same way that they did last year with Philip’s Glass Menagerie, which used the comic physicality of clowning in a radical re-imagining of a Tennessee Williams classic. Taking place on 17-20 Jan. (pre-festival) and 24-27 Jan. (during festival), at CoHo Productions, 2257 NW Raleigh Street, Portland, OR. Directed by Philip Cuomo, with Sascha Blocker, Jeff Desautels, Amica Hunter, Emily Newton and Maureen Porter. Call 503 220 2646 or check their website for more details, or the festival website.
2019: New Ghosts Theatre Company presents a one night only fundraising performance of Paper Doll at Sydney’s the Old Fitz Theatre, 129 Dowling St, Woolloomooloo NSW, Australia on Monday 4th February to help
support their upcoming Perth tour of Paper Doll, as part of The Blue Room Theatre’s illustrious Summer Nights Program at Fringe World Festival; these dates will be 12-16 Feb. at The Blue Room Theatre, 53 James Street, Northbridge, WA. Written by Katy Warner in response A View from the Bridge, it features Hayley Pearl and Martin Ashley Jones. Check the website for tickets to both events.
10 Jan.-3 Feb. 2019 sees The Burn by Philip Dawkins and More Weight: A Derivative New Work inspired by Arthur Miller’s ‘The Crucible’ by director Logan Serabian. At the Wilbury Theatre Group 40 Sonoma Court, Providence RI. Tickets are $15-$38. For the complete performance schedule call 401.400.7100 or visit The Wilbury Group online at thewilburygroup.org/the-burn or thewilburygroup.org/more-weight. Both will be directed by Logan Serabian, with Jeff Hodge, Shannon Hartman, Brien Lang, Sarah Leach, and Daraja Hinds. Set Design by Keri King. Originally commissioned by Chicago’s Steppenwolf Theatre for the 2017/18 season, The Burn is a blend of Arthur Miller’s The Crucible and the online world that serves as modern telling of the way social media blurs the lines of truth and fiction and paves the way for a new kind of witch hunt in today’s world. Written and conceived by Logan Serabian, More Weight is a minimalistic work inspired by Arthur Miller’s original text that at a breakneck pace re-tells the entire original Salem witch trials with just five actors. “Our goal with this project was to look at persecution through a modern lens,” said Wilbury Artistic Director Josh Short. “The Burn is a thrilling new play that puts The Crucible into a modern high school classroom fraught with cyberbullying and a ‘mean girls’ mentality. As a counter-point to Philip’s very modern telling, Logan and the cast of The Burn have developed More Weight as a second piece that boils the original tale of the Salem Witch Trials into a fast-paced ride through Salem, Massachusetts 1962. Together these pieces complement each other beautifully and engage audiences in a conversation about Witch Hunts, past and present.”
Special Events/Releases 2018
In its 50th year, the 2018 Joseph Jefferson Awards ceremony, were staged 10/22 at the Drury Lane Theatre in Oakbrook Terrace, Chicago. Although technically a Goodman Theatre production, A View From the Bridge also was a restaging of director Ivo van Hove’s hit Broadway production of the same title. Still, van Hove won the Jeff Award for best director, and his conceptual, breathtaking production won for best play in a large theater.
Alec Baldwin to host the Inaugural Arthur Miller Foundation Honors on 22 Oct. 2018, and Tony Kushner will be one of its first honorees. Co-chairs include Rebecca Miller, Steven Spielberg and Kate Capshaw, Sandi Farkas, and Janine and Michael Smith, and will feature appearances by stage alums Nathan Lane, Edie Falco, Tituss Burgess, Anthony Ramos, Denée Benton, Katrina Lenk, Ari’el Stachel, Solea Pfeiffer, Sherie Rene Scott, and Brandon Victor Dixon.
Nathan Muha, a music student at Wabash College, Crawfordsville, IN, has written an opera based on A Memory of Two Mondays. It was first performed in Salter Hall on Friday, April 27, 2018 at the college. He updates it a little, turning the Irish immigrant Kenneth into Alano, a Mexican immigrant.
Fall 18 May-16 June, 2018 by Bernard Weintraub at Huntington Theatre Company, in the South/End Calderwood Pavilion, 527 Tremont Street, Boston. Directed by Peter DuBois, with Josh Stamberg (as Miller), Joanne Kelly (as Morath), Nolan James Tierce (as Daniel), Joanna Glushak (as Dr. Wise), and John Hickok (as Robert Whitehead). An exploration of the lesser known story of Miller and his third wife, photographer Inge Morath, and the divide between their public personas and private lives, regarding their son Daniel. Call 617 266 0800 or check the website. [See Arthur Miller Journal volume 13 number 2 2018, pp. 129-47 for a critique of this production by Joshua Polster].
Marilyn! The New Musical, an original musical based on the life of Marilyn Monroe, will open on June 1st 2018 at Paris Las Vegas with preview performances beginning May 23. Written, directed and produced by Tegan Summer, the new musical will feature Ruby Lewis as the resident Marilyn Monroe and Matthew Tyler as Arthur Miller. Tickets can be purchased online at Ticketmaster.com/Marilyn.
Exit Stage Left: The Snagglepuss Chronicles is a DC comic book series. In this issue #3 Snagglepuss awaits his next testimony before HUAC and goes about his life in Hollywood. He comes into contact with quite a few famous faces, including Arthur Miller (who calls on Snagglepuss to help him out of an awkward situation), Marilyn Monroe (who is the awkward situation), and Joe DiMaggio (who’s the other half of the awkward situation for Mr. Miller). And while this Hollywood love triangle is famous, this issue actually finds some surprisingly new ground to plumb in these historical domain characters.
Rachel Stern has begun to deploy the literary canon in her photography practice—basing her exhibition More Weight on The Crucible. This is the first time she really thought about a specific piece of literature as the foundation for a body of photographs. More Weight is a line taken from the play and the show will be at Brandeis University 9 July-26 Oct 2018: “Weaving the “real” and “unreal,” with the pageantry of kitsch and the deliberation of vanitas still lifes, “More Weight” presses us to examine how a bizarre enactment of the Law, generations removed, can reveal itself as deeply flawed and driven by greed, fear and hysteria, but also how the re-telling of histories might be intentionally distorted.” stern told a reporter: There is a legend in my family. I guess it’s not really a legend so much as the truth — that Arthur Miller is a distant cousin. I know it’s the truth because I remember going to celebrate holidays at my Great Aunt Sandy’s house and seeing Arthur’s sister Joan Copeland. She would always be reminiscing about visiting Alexander Calder’s studio or hanging out at The Factory and I remember her asserting that Arthur was the famous one but Kermit (the other brother) was “the one who was really worth a damn.” In my adolescent mind, I went straight past Miller to Monroe! Baby punk rock Rachel got such a thrill from insisting that strangers see a resemblance between myself and Marilyn even though we were only related by (a brief) marriage.
2018: British band, Warsaw Radio, released their new single “Ms. Monroe.” Apparently, the song and video take inspiration from the relationship between Arthur Miller and Marilyn Monroe. The narrative imagines Monroe giving advice on relationships after the break down of her relationship with Miller when they were filming what would be Monroe’s last film (The Misfits) in Reno, Nevada. Check it out on YouTube.
One episode in Sky Arts’ new 2018 series of Urban Myths will be a retelling of the Hollywood star’s rumored struggle on the set of Some Like It Hot. The episode – titled “Marilyn Monroe and Billy Wilder”–features Gemma Arterton as Monroe and Scottish actor Dougray Scott as Arthur Miller.
Greenwich Village Portraits 25 Feb. 2018 at the Portsmouth Music and Arts Center, 973 Islington St, Portsmouth, NH, as part of an afternoon dubbed, “Music and Nostalgia.” The piece musically chronicles David Amram’s collaborations and friendships with writers Arthur Miller and Frank McCourt, and the blues singer Odetta. Each movement of the work is named after a different street in New York City’s Greenwich Village. The first movement is dedicated to Arthur Miller, the second to blues singer Odetta, and the third to writer Frank McCourt, all of whom were collaborators of Amram’s. While the piece was originally composed in 2014 for saxophone and piano, the Feb. 25th performance will be the world premiere of the version for saxophone and strings. Russ Grazier (on saxophone) will be joined by members of the PMAC string faculty along with additional special guests. The group will be conducted by Ismael Sandoval. Call (603) 431-4278 for more information.
The Miller Archives at the Harry Ransom Research Center at the University of Texas in Austin are now officially established. At the start of 2018, the New York Times reported a closing sale to the University of $2.7 million and the intent of the Center to finally move forward on cataloging the extensive holdings. Miller’s journals, that span 70 years and over 80,000 pages, will be part of the collection, but not accessible until after the publication of selected extracts have been published by Viking Press. The University of Texas suggests cataloging will take around two years (expected completion for Nov. 2019), but the archive is accessible to scholars and they will also be continuing to acquire Miller materials when available. The Center also offers fellowships for scholars wishing to work with the archive.
29 May-17 June, 2018: Bay Street Theater in Sag Harbor will offer the world premiere of Fellow Travelers, a new play by Jack Canfora set during the McCarthy era, when Hollywood actors and writers were being blacklisted for real or perceived communist sympathies. The play examines the relationship between theater artists Arthur Miller and Elia Kazan, and their romantic connections to Marilyn Monroe. Directed by Michael Wilson with Wayne Allen Wilcox as Miller, Vince Nappo as Kazan, and Rachel Spencer Hewitt as Monroe. Set design by Jeff Cowie. For more information, call 631-725-9500, email boxoffice@baystreet.org or visit baystreet.org.
Special Events/Releases 2017
Dick Cavett, whose interviews in the 1960s, ’70 and ’80s made for some of the most fascinating moments in television history, has donated 2,500 of his talk show programs to the Library of Congress. His erudite collection totals nearly 2,000 hours of programming — about 78 days’ worth of viewing — and features more than 5,000 guests being interviewed, many of whom were usually shy about appearing on talk shows. They include Muhammad Ali, Woody Allen, Louis Armstrong, Fred Astaire, Lauren Bacall, James Baldwin, Marlon Brando, Ingrid Bergman, Mel Brooks, Truman Capote, Noel Coward, Duke Ellington, Helen Hayes, Jim Henson, Katharine Hepburn, Alfred Hitchcock, Myrna Loy, Norman Mailer, Mickey Mantle, Groucho Marx, Arthur Miller, Toni Morrison, Paul Newman, Laurence Olivier, Anthony Perkins, Ronald Reagan, Jackie Robinson, Mort Sahl, Charles M. Schulz, Steven Spielberg, Gloria Swanson, Gore Vidal, Orson Welles, Tennessee Williams and Joanne Woodward. In his interview with Miller, Miller describes being blacklisted because of his protests against McCarthyism and the writing of The Crucible.
Arthur Miller Birthday Commemoration took place on Saturday, October 21, 2017, at St. Francis College in Brooklyn Heights, sponsored by the Arthur Miller Society. The program began at 3 p.m. with remarks by Arthur Miller Society President David Palmer and a keynote by Susan C.W. Abbotson, Professor of Dramatic Literature at Rhode Island College. Jessica Hecht was interviewed by Janet Balakian of Kean University and Stephen Marino, the editor of The Arthur Miller Journal. Here are links to the recording on St. Francis College’s website, and on YouTube, also the interview with Hecht will be published in an upcoming edition of the Arthur Miller Journal.
Arthur Miller takes sixth place in American Theatre magazine’s list of the most-produced playwrights of 2017-18 (last year he was in third place).
10-12 Nov. 2017 EIGHT ABIGAILS: A Dance Piece by Kaitlin McCarthy at Velocity Dance Center, 1621 12th Ave, Seattle, WA. An abstract dance performance loosely based on Arthur Miller’s The Crucible that “investigates and reimagines the teenage villain, Abigail Williams, a young woman teetering on the edge of sanity, survival, and insurgency.” Call 206-325-8773 or check the website.
Erin Sullivan’s one-woman cabaret show about the iconic screen actress, “With Love, Marilyn,” plays at Thalian Hall, Wilmington, NC. on Oct. 13, 2017. Parts about her romances with Joe DiMaggio and Arthur Miller are squeezed in alongside the show’s 11 songs. Call (910) 632-2285 for tickets.
The Essential Marilyn Monroe, Milton H. Greene: 50 Sessions, published by ACC editions, is a new collection of 400 images, many never before published, that includes some of Monroe with Miller.
For season 2 of American Masters, Thirteen/WNET’s bi-weekly podcast series, the second episode aired on 29 August 2017 will feature previously unreleased interviews with Arthur Miller, as they explore The Crucible‘s themes and the fear of being blacklisted when McCarthyism struck Hollywood. Actresses Madeleine Sherwood and Lee Grant also feature.
BBC Radio 4 will be re-airing the 4 part show on Miller’s life written by Mike Walker, “The Life and Times of Arthur Miller” produced in collaboration with LA Theatre Works. It was first aired back in 2015. The first episode, “Beginnings” will air on July 26th 2017 at 2.15pm, each episode is 45 minutes, and it will be available to stream for a time after that on their website. Narrated by Ed Harris, with Ben Feldman as Arthur Miller, and the voices of Gregory Itzin, Kate Burton, Matthew Wolf, Andre Sogliuzzo, Devon Sorvari, Michael Kirby, Anna Lyse Erikson, Jane Kaczmarek. Directed by Kate McAll.
9 July 2017 at 7pm, an evening of Williams and Miller as part of Savoy Bookshop & Café’s “Savoy After Hours” series, 10 Canal St., Westerly, RI. Extracts from Salesman and Streetcar directed by Elissa Englund, with Mary Sue Frishman, and Patrick Cozzolino. Following the event, the actors and the director will answer questions from the audience and give background information about the process of staging the scenes.
2 July, 2017, Reader’s Theatre at to the Miners Foundry Cultural Center, 325 Spring Street, Nevada City. CA, featuring “stories by master storytellers Edwidge Danticat, Jill McCorkle, Carolyn Cooke and Arthur Miller.” Directed by Tim O’Connor, with Gaylie Bell-Stewart, Bruce Kelly, Dave Irons and Carolyn Winters. Call (530) 265-5040 or check the website.
OCTA-Fest 2017: Every year on the fourth weekend of June, Cincinnati’s Association of Community Theatres — they call themselves “ACT” — brings together numerous volunteer theaters to present excerpts from their past seasons. Performances can be up to 30 minutes; three will be presented tonight, and six more starting at 9 a.m. Saturday. It’s a perfect chance to see samples of the depth and breadth of theater work put onstage by hard-working and talented people, perhaps some of your neighbors. They’re vying to move on to a statewide competition for honors from the Ohio Community Theatre Association (OCTA). Excerpts include selections from musicals including American Idiot, Side Show and Always, Patsy Cline and plays such as Arthur Miller’s All My Sons and Richard Greenberg’s Take Me Out. The event is held at Miami University-Hamilton’s Parrish Auditorium (1601 University Blvd., Hamilton). Info: actcincinnati.org
Soulpepper Theater’s production of Incident at Vichy picked up the award at the Canadian Dora Mavor Moore Awards (2016-17 season) for outstanding ensemble, an award that many view as meaning “second-best production.”
Blame (2017) a new movie written, directed, edited, and starring 22-year-old Quinn Shephard is doing the film competition circuit. Its plot, following a burgeoning affair between a teacher and student has connections to The Crucible, deliberately inferred by the teacher assigning the play to the class for them to create their own adaptations.
Danny DeVito was nominated for both Tony and Drama Desk awards for his role as Gregory Solomon in the 2017 Broadway revival of The Price. He won the Drama Desk award!
Hello: I’m Arthur Miller’s Unknown Child is the final installment in Vancouver-playwright Susanna Uchatius’ theatrical trilogy that follows her idea of the story of Miller’s son Daniel (based on her reading of the Vanity Fair article). Runs May 5th to 13th 2017 at Vancouver’s KW Studios. The playwright’s daughter, Alex Edwards (who suffers from brain damage), plays Daniel. The first installment, The Secret Son, tried to tell the story from the author’s point of view (as a Greek tragedy dealing with a buried secret), the second, Egni’s Eye, from the mother’s point of view, coming to grips with the situation, and this third focuses on Daniel’s point of view.
#60 Brooklyn Boy Made Good, 25-26 April 2017 created by Marc Limpach for Luxembourg’s Grand Théâtre, 1 Rond-point Schuman, L-2525 Luxembourg-Limpertsberg. Directed by Thierry Mousset, with Isaac Bush, Elisabet Johannesdottir, and Leila Schaus. Includes excerpts from Miller’s autobiography, essays, open letters and interviews accompanied by live music and completes the month-long focus on Miller by the venue. Check the website for more information.
Manila, Philippines–One of Manila’s premier arts festival, Fringe Manila, Theater House of Black (#14 Leandro Road), and Antipara Collective team up to bring to the stage three theater shorts “Si Edgar, Si Allan at Si Art,” adapted from work by Poe, Miller, Sartre and William Golding. Episode I: Kuba-O: Ang Kwento ng Sinaunang Bruha (is based on The Crucible). The proceeds of the production will go to the Stage Dreams Foundation, a non-profit organization that teaches theater and other art forms to children in rural areas in the country. The show runs 22-23 Feb. 22, 2017, at Cultural Center of the Philippines’ (CCP) Tanghalang Huseng Batute. For ticket inquiries, call TicketWorld (632) 891 9999 or (63921) 3011260 or (632) 9894599.
As part of the Short+Sweet Theatre festival 11 Jan-19 March 2017 at the Depot Theatre, 142 Addison Rd, Marrickville, Sydney, NSW, Australia, Jasper Lee-Lindsay’s short play, Arthur and Marilyn will run in the fourth week 1-5 Feb. and recreates the possibilities of the first meeting of Miller with Marilyn Monroe at a Hollywood party in 1951. Directed by Danen Young and featuring Alec Ebert and Meg Hyeronimus. Check the website for more information.
Special Events/Releases 2016
Susan Johann’s 2016 book of photographs, Focus on Playwrights (University of South Carolina Press) contains a portrait of Miller (also on its cover) taken in 1996; while she did interview many of the artists within, Miller declined the invitation. When the request was made he replied, “No, I’ve given that up.” And when Johann asked if she could quote him on that point, he replied, “Yes. Perhaps it will discourage others from asking.”
20 Nov. 2016 Arthur Miller at 100 on Sunday, Nov. 20, at 3 p.m. at Temple Emanuel, 150 Hicks Lane, Great Neck, NY. The program has been created and will be performed by actress Shirley Romaine, and includes background on Miller, his plays, a live performance, and selections from his films. Call the co-sponsor, Great Neck Library at (516) 466-8055 for more information.
17 Oct. 2016 at 11.30 am Historic Landmarks Preservation Center will hold a cultural medallion ceremony to honor Miller at his former residence 62 Montague Street, Brooklyn. In attendance are the Chair of the New York State Council on the Arts, Barbaralee Diamonstein-Spielvogel, the author Ron Chernow, scholars Stephen Marino, Enoch Brater, director Gregory Mosher and Suzanne Nossel, Executive Director of PEN America. All are welcome to attend.
17 Oct. 2016 Launch of the new Arthur Miller Society website.
16 Sept. 2016 at 8pm (Friday) Brian Dennehy will discuss O’Neill, Miller, and Beckett at the Sheen Center for Thought and Culture, 18 Bleecher Street, NYC. An evening of performance and conversation moderated by Anne Cattaneo. For tickets call (212) 925-2812 or check their website.
Temple Anshe Amunim, Pittsfield, MA will host a four-part Play Analysis series on Tuesdays in July, beginning July 5, 2016 from 10 to 11:30 a.m. The topic is “The Corrupting Influence of Materialism in Plays by Arthur Miller and David Mamet.” This course will be taught by Dr. Barbara Waldinger of Hofstra University, Marymount Manhattan College, and Queens College. The cost for the four-session course is $40 for Temple members and $45 for non-members; or $15 for any individual session. For more information, contact the Temple Anshe Amunim office at 413-442-5910 or visit their website.
The Persian version The Price has recently been released by Afraz Publications in Tehran (2016), translated by Jafar Mirzai and Maryam Hosseini. Death of a Salesman, The Crucible and All My Sons are also available in Persian.
2016: 9 Tony nominations for Ivo Van Hove’s 2 Miller revivals: View from the Bridge: Best Revival of a Play (WON); Ivo Van Hove Best director (WON); Mark Strong best actor; Jan Versweyveld best scenic design; Jan Versweyveld best lighting design. The Crucible: Best Revival of a Play; Sophie Okonedo best actress; Bill Camp best actor in a featured role; Jan Versweyveld best lighting design.
Death of a Streetcar Named Virginia Woolf: A Parody, 27 April-31 July 2016 created by Second City veterans Tim Ryder and Tim Sniffen, and written by Sniffen for Writers Theatre, at the Gillian Theatre, 325 Tudor Court, Glencoe, IL. Play combines Death of a Salesman, A Streetcar Named Desire, Glass Menagerie, Our Town, and Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? Directed by Stuart Carden and Michael Halberstam, with Marc Grapey (Willy Loman), Jennifer Engstrom, John Hoogenakker, Michael Perez, Sean Fortunato and Karen Janes Woditsch. Set design by Linda Buchanan. Call (847) 242-6000 or check the website.
Idaho band a.k.a. Belle and wild horse group Wild Love Preserve (2016) have collaborated on a very special project to benefit the preservation of Idaho’s wild horses with the band’s new single, Mustangs, apparently inspired by The Misfits.
Kingdom City 4-14 Feb. 2016 by Sheri Wilner by University of Illinois Theatre Department, in Krannert Center’s Studio Theatre, 500 S. Goodwin Ave., Urbana, IL. Directed by J.W. Morrissette, with Ford Bowers, Jessica Kadish, and Jordan Gleaves. Built around an attempted production of Miller’s The Crucible, Wilner gives an articulate voice to both sides of a controversy that surrounds the staging of the play in an ultra-conservative high school in the Midwest. Call 333-6280 or check the website.
New York Times article on “Arthur Miller’s Brooklyn” by Helene Stapinskijan from 22 January, 2016.
Joan Copeland in a rare reading of her brother’s short story “The Performance.” The private industry reading will take place at Manhattan Theatre Club’s Creative Center on Monday, February 1 at 7PM, 2016. “The Performance” is part of a collection of short works from Miller’s Presence: Stories (2008).
The Arthur Miller Foundation will be celebrating Arthur Miller’s 100th Birthday with a star-studded, one-night-only performance of Miller’s seminal works directed by Gregory Mosher. Originally scheduled for 16 Nov. 2015, this event will now take place on 25 Jan. 2016. It will take place on the stage of Broadway’s Lyceum Theatre, where Miller’s drama A View From the Bridge is currently being revived. Emmy winner and Tony nominee Alec Baldwin will join Pulitzer-winning playwrights Sam Shepard and Tony Kushner, and performers Bradley Cooper, Laurence Fishburne, LaTanya Richardson Jackson, Ellen Barkin, Ayad Akhtar, McKinley Belcher, Ray Fisher, Greta Gerwig, Jake Gyllenhaal, Katori Hall, Peter Sarsgaard and John Turturro for a special evening of Arthur Miller readings Jan. 25, 2016, to mark the latter playwright’s centennial, according to Variety. The celebrities are scheduled to read excerpts from Miller’s autobiography Timebends, along with speeches from his plays Death of a Salesman and All My Sons, as well as unpublished works. Proceeds will go to the Arthur Miller Foundation for Theater and Film Education, “which aims to provide mentorship, training and support for new theater teachers and increase the number of New York City public schools that have access to theater education.”
Special Events/Releases 2015 (Centennial Year)
Bolton, UK: A full day of lectures, film, theatre and discussion will take place at Bolton Library and Museum on Friday, October 30 and will include Thacker’s inaugural lecture on Arthur Miller’s Broken Glass, his first lecture as Professor of Theatre at the university. On 31st Oct .,Thacker will host “An Investigation into Arthur Miller” accompanied by novelist and Professor of American Studies, Christopher Bigsby, who wrote the internationally celebrated two-volume biography Arthur Miller. Tickets are free but ticketed in three separate sessions and booking is essential on 01204 520 661; for more information visit the Octagon Theatre’s website.
The Jewish Channel on Cable will continue its second season of its popular theater-oriented monthly TV show, ROW J, which will include during October, an in-depth interview with award-winning actor Richard Thomas, who is appearing in the Signature Theatre Company’s production of Arthur Miller’s Incident at Vichy.
17 Oct. 2015 NPR Weekend Edition piece on Arthur Miller in honor of his centennial. Includes comments from Tony Kushner, Miller, and sound clips from various productions.
The Colin McEnroe Show for WNPR Connecticut (10/21/2015) was all about Miller and featured director Mark Lamos, and Miller scholar Dr. Susan Abbotson. Check out the podcast.
The week leading up to Miller’s Birthday (17 Oct.) displayed a cornucopia of programming from the BBC radio to celebrate America’s leading playwright! Radio 4 devoted four of its afternoon slots to new dramas based on events in Miller’s life. Radio 3 had a Sunday documentary about Miller’s life in his native city, New York, plus a new production of Death of a Salesman plus, in The Essay across the week, five valuable reflections on working with Miller. Radio 4 Extra carried a swift repeat of the documentary, Playing the Salesman. On Saturday afternoon, Radio 4 put on a long-hidden Miller screenplay, The Hook, and Archive on 4 gave us Attention Must Be Paid, a documentary by Miller’s biographer, Christopher Bigsby. On Sunday, Radio 3’s play was Miller’s A View from the Bridge, another new production, this time made in the US with an American cast, directed by Martin Jarvis.
17 Oct. at Lucknow University in India a celebration of Miller’s Centennial. Students of Lucknow University’s department of English and Modern European languages are curating an exhibition featuring the writer. Handmade paintings, rare photographs and articles, archival posters from a Broadway production on Miller, including his highly regarded play, Death of a Salesman, have been put on display till October 19.
Colin Towns Mask Orchestra has produced a recording Drama (Provocateur Records PVC 1044), which is a series of jazz pieces that Colin Towns has composed based on famous plays by Shakespeare, Chekhov, Ibsen, O’Neill etc. and it includes a 20 minute piece based on Miller’s The Crucible.
Gloucester Stage proudly presents The Arthur Miller Centennial, a celebration of playwright Arthur Miller and his work in honor of his 100th birthday, on Saturday, October 17 at 7:30pm at Gloucester Stage, 267 East Main Street, Gloucester, MA. This will be a multimedia performance featuring recorded interviews with Miller himself as well as scenes from some of his best-known works including The Crucible, Death of a Salesmen, and After the Fall. The cast features Kate Paulson and Sheridan Thomas. The audience is invited to enjoy birthday cake during a post-show reception with the cast and crew. Tickets are $15 for the event. Tickets are $1 for ages 25 years and under for the event (only on the door). For more information and to purchase tickets, call the Gloucester Stage Box Office at 978-281-4433 or visit the website.
Radio 3 broadcast on 11 Oct. 2015. Featuring Ben Brantley, and a variety of others, including scholars Stephen Marino, Enoch Brater, Miller’s sister, Joan Copeland, and playwrights such as A. R. Gurney. Includes audio from Miller himself, and clips from various productions.
A feature written by Nora Sobich on Arthur Miller in honor of his Centennial will be broadcasted on Germany’s RBB Kulturradio on the 17th of October: 7-7.30pm as part of their KULTURTERMIN: LITERATURradio show. A week after the broadcast the feature will be available on the writer’s personal website.
Check out the links at Arthurmiller.org, including those to a variety of Centennial events.
As part of BBC celebrations to mark the centenary year of Miller’s birth, a new production of Death of a Salesman will be broadcast on BBC Radio 3. Directed by Howard Davies, with David Suchet and Zoe Wanamaker (who previously appeared together in a recent production of All My Sons).
“The Individual & American Society: Celebrating Arthur Miller at One Hundred” will explore Miller’s life and the multi-faceted themes of his works. Programming will include speakers, discussions, workshops, films, family events, and a month-long lobby exhibit, as well as events off-campus. The enrichment programs are designed to deepen the audience’s experience of the play. Check Westport Playhouse website for more details with a complete calendar of community engagement events with dates, times, and locations, or a special brochure may be requested by calling the Playhouse box office at 203-227-4177. Event highlights include speaking engagements by Arthur Miller scholars Susan Abbotson, author of Critical Companion to Arthur Miller and Student CompaniontoArthur Miller, and Stephen Marino, founding editor of the Arthur Miller Journal, on Sunday October 11, following the 3 p.m. performance of Broken Glass; Rita B. Gabis, author of A Guest at the Shooter’s Banquet, on Tuesday, October 13, noon, at Westport Library; World War II child survivor Aleena Rieger, author of I Didn’t Tell Them Anything, on Wednesday, October 14, 6:30 p.m., in WCP’s Sheffer Studio; and J.J. Goldberg, editor-at-large of The Forward, on Sunday, October 18, following the 3 p.m. performance. In addition, there will be an Artistic Directors Forum, sharing personal insights into Miller’s work, with WCP’s Mark Lamos, Yale Repertory Theatre’s James Bundy, and O’Neill National Playwrights Conference’s Wendy Goldberg, on Monday, October 19, 7 p.m., in the Playhouse’s Jason Robards Theatre. Film screenings of Miller’s works, followed by talkbacks, will include Focus, starring William H. Macy and Laura Dern, on Saturday, October 3, at 7:30 p.m., at Unitarian Church in Westport; and The Crucible, starring Daniel Day-Lewis, Joan Allen, and Paul Scofield, on Monday, October 5, 7 p.m., in WCP’s Sheffer Studio. Arthur Miller’s 100th birthday on Saturday, October 17 will be celebrated with refreshments in the WCP lobby prior to the 3 p.m. performance of Broken Glass. The Norwalk Library will host a book discussion group around Miller’s 1945 novel Focus, on Thursday, September 24, at noon; and Norwalk Community College will present a student/faculty forum celebrating Miller on Thursday, October 1, at 2:30 p.m.(see below). This year’s community partners for “The Individual & American Society: Celebrating Arthur Miller at One Hundred” are The Arthur Miller Society, Barnes & Noble of Westport, Carver Center of Norwalk, Federation for Jewish Philanthropy of Upper Fairfield County, Housatonic Community College, Norwalk Community College, Norwalk Public Library, Team Westport, Unitarian Church in Westport, Westport Cinema Initiative, and Westport Library. Sponsors of the initiative are Connecticut Humanities, GE Capital, Graham Foundation of Connecticut, NEA Arts Work, and National Endowment for the Arts.
100 Years of Arthur Miller 8 Oct. at 6pm Dr. Jim Schlatter, Professor at the University of Pennsylvania, discusses the work of playwright Arthur Miller. Stockton Performing Arts Center, 101 Vera King Farris Drive, Absecon, NJ.
NORWALK CT— NCC President David L. Levinson, Ph.D. is pleased to present a symposium panel celebrating the life and career of the late Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Arthur Miller. The event will take place on Thursday, October 1, 2:30 p.m. in NCC’s PepsiCo Theater, located on the East Campus at 188 Richards Ave. The public is invited to attend and admission is free.
POD CAST on Miller’s Centennial broadcast on BBC Radio 5 from the Janice Forsyth Show (18 minutes); talking to the Rapture Theatre Director Michael Emans, about their two touring Miller productions this year, All My Sons and The Last Yankee. Includes a clip of Miller talking about All My Sons, and ends with a new interview with leading Miller scholar, Chris Bigsby.
Pequot Library, 720 Pequot Avenue Southport, CT hosts Arthur Miller books exhibition in their Rare Book Case in the Library’s Reading Room. The exhibition runs through Oct. 8, and is free and open to the public during normal library hours.
Guardian critic, Michael Billington, includes The Crucible in his book of the 101 Greatest Plays ever Written.
This September New Repertory Theatre in Watertown, MA, will be hosting a panel discussion focusing Arthur Millers’ work and his identity as a writer as part of our Spotlight Symposium Series. Titled “Examining Arthur Miller: How Life Influences Art.” The series is intended to engage our audience on deeper themes and meanings of the productions. This symposium session will take place on Sunday, September 20th at 4:30pm, following the matinee performance of Broken Glass. Dr. Sue Abbotson, Dr. Josh Polster and David Palmer will be on the panel–a film of the event will be available shortly on YouTube.
All My Sons 9-18 Oct. by Department of Theatre and Drama at University of Michigan, in their Arthur Miller Theater, Ann Arbor, MI, as part of the university’s celebration of Miller’s Centenary. A special gala performance will be given on 9 Oct. see website for more information about the play and other events.
Death of a Salesman early Oct. in Yiddish, with English supertitles by the New Yiddish Repertory at Theater Castillo Theater, 543 West 42nd Street, Clinton, NY. For 40 performances only, call (212) 941-1234, or check their website. Though drawing on the 1951 Joseph Buloff translation–Toyt fun a Salesman–this is a new, more expansive translation.
There is an American electropop duo who have named themselves “Twenty One Pilots” (Tyler Joseph and Josh Dun) in homage to All My Sons, where a man must decide what is best for his son after causing the death of twenty-one pilots. The duo tackle moral dilemmas through their poetic lyrics mixed over synthetic beats.
A new two part four hour biopic, The Secret Life of Marilyn Monroe will be first broadcast on Lifetime on May 30 and 31 at 8pm. Based on the New York Times best selling book by J. Randy Taraborrelli. Kelli Garner is cast as Marilyn, with Susan Sarandon as her mother. Stephen Bogaert will be playing Arthur Miller.
In 2005, Miller’s estate donated 55 acres along Tophet Road, to the Roxbury Land Trust, which became the Arthur Miller and Inge Morath Miller Preserve. Now, ten years later, their daughter, Rebecca has donated nearly 100 acres more along the Woodbury-Roxbury border. The land connects other preserved parcels to create a greenbelt that now stretches from Painter Hill Road in Roxbury to the Good Hill Farm Preserve on Route 317 in Woodbury. That preserve, which is contiguous to the newly donated land, connects to four other nature preserves that total nearly 720 acres of open space. The land trust has preserved 3,630 acres of farmland, woodlands, wildlife habitat, watercourses, wetlands and open space in Roxbury and neighboring communities since it was established in 1970.
Abigail/1702 29 April-24 May, “sequel” to The Crucible by Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa at Long Beach’s International City Theatre. Call 562-436-4610 or check the website.
Marilyn Forever (by Gavin Bryars ) 21-29 March, American premier by Long Beach Opera, Warner Grand Theatre, 478 West Sixth Street, San Pedro, CA. Directed by Andreas Mitisek. The opera (with jazz interludes) focuses on Monroe’s relationships and marriages, particularly with Arthur Miller, and her death. Call 562 432-5934 or check the website.
2015 Olivier Awards: Ivo Van Hove’s production of A View from the Bridge carries off prizes for best actor (Mark Strong), best revival and best director.
Cité des Arts is partnering with the Lauren-Reilly Eliot Company, Acting Unlimited (AUI), Wanderlust Theatre Co., the Cane Fire Film Series and others to produce the Arthur Miller Festival Series. The Lauren-Reilly Eliot Company opens the Festival at Cite Des Arts with their production of Death of a Salesman from January 17, 2015 to February 1, 2015. In May, Cité des Arts, will produce A View from the Bridge (from May 8, 2015 to May 17, 2015 at Cite Des Arts), and Acting Unlimited will contribute The Crucible (at Theatre 810 from May 22, 2015 to May 30, 2015). In June, American history professor, Dr. Nina McCune will conduct a seminar on HUAC and the Hollywood Blacklist at Cité; and in July, the Cane Fire Film Series will screen Miller’s The Misfits. Wanderlust Theatre Co. closes the year long collaboration and celebration in December with All My Sons at Cité des Arts. The Festival continues to reach out to area theatre companies and other producing entities for participation, so watch for future announcements regarding further productions and programs throughout the year.
Arthur Miller – A Life April 16-19 2015. An L.A. Theatre Works Original Docudrama celebrating Miller’s 2015 centennial, this world premiere docudrama reveals the events in Arthur Miller’s life that shaped some of the most iconic plays in modern history. Get a glimpse into Miller’s Depression-era adolescence (with Edward Asner as Miller’s father); journey into the McCarthy era and Miller’s complicated relationships with director Elia Kazan (Hector Elizondo) and Marilyn Monroe; and, later, his marriage to Inge Morath (Jane Kaczmarek). Arthur Miller – A Life sheds rich and lasting light on the life and art of this profound man. Directed by renowned BBC radio drama producer Kate McAll.
Special Events/Releases 2014
Reno by Roy Smiles 16-20 Dec. by A Pretty Villain, at Rialto, Dyke Road, Brighton, UK. with Robert Cohen and Lauren Varnfield. Play set during the filming of The Misfits, that explores the couple’s dying relationship during the shoot. Call 01273 725230 or check the website.
The first comprehensive archive of theater materials related to the Holocaust has been established at the University of Miami, allowing researchers and students worldwide access to such plays as Arthur Miller’s Broken Glass. The digital Holocaust Theater Archive includes more than 550 titles and will continue to grow, including details like synopses, country of origin, casts and rights holders. Study guides and educational programs will be built around the archive. The archive is the work of the Sue and Leonard Miller Center for Contemporary Judaic Studies and the George Feldenkreis Program in Judaic Studies — both at the University of Miami — and the National Jewish Theater Foundation. The site organizes the works by title and authors, as well as categories, including such common subjects as the ghettos, the extermination camps and Holocaust deniers.
Death of a Salesman: The Sitcom 17-28 Sept. the theater group Speakeasy recreated Death of a Salesman into a 1980s style TV comedy taking place in a live television studio with audiences witnessing an episode of laugh-packed The Loman Empire and the off-set antics that take place during breaks. The show was written by comedian Danny McGinlay who also starred alongside Russell Fletcher, Lana Schwarcz and Jimmy James Eaton under the direction of Damian Callinan. Part of the Melbourne Fringe program at Northcote Town Hall, Melbourne, Australia. The show was closed early due to a complaint from the Miller Estate.
The Crucible 5-6 April by Civic Ballet of San Luis Obispo at Cal Poly’s Spanos Theatre, San Luis Obispo, CA. Loosely based on Miller’s play, this is a new creation, that combines classical, modern, and contemporary movement styles set to music ranging from mid-century pop, to Philip Glass. Director Drew Silvaggio with Jenna Lee. Call 805 756-4849. Or check the website.
The Crucible 16 Aug. by Maltz Jupiter Theatre, 1001 East Indiantown Road, Jupiter, Florida. This will be an all-teen production (including every aspect front and back stage), for which they are currently seeking applications. 7 April is submission deadline: see details on the website. Call (561) 575-2223 for more information.
Scottish Ballet is to premiere a ballet version of Arthur Miller’s The Crucible by Canadian choreographer Helen Picket. The Crucible will be paired with the UK premiere of Christopher Bruce’s Ten Poems, set to a recording of 10 Dylan Thomas poems read by Welsh actor Richard Burton. The pairing will tour Scotland in September and October 2014.
“In The Line King’s Library: Al Hirschfeld” at The New York Public Library, The Library for the Performing Arts presents the largest exhibition of Al Hirschfeld’s artwork and archival material from its collection, including cartoons of Arthur Miller and characters from his plays. On display through January 4, 2014, in the Library for the Performing Art’s Oenslager Gallery, the free, multimedia exhibition celebrates the Al Hirschfeld Foundation’s latest gift of Hirschfeld papers and objects to the Library, and commemorates the 110th anniversary of his birth.
If you would like to watch the recent interview between the Arthur Miller Journal’s editor Steve Marino, and playwright, David Henry Hwang (in which, among other things, Hwang discusses his views on Miller), go to the St. Francis College website, where there is a link to the video on the Journal’s homepage.
Special Events/Releases 2013
27 Dec. 2013 by Garage Theatre Group at The Becton Theatre on the campus of Fairleigh Dickinson in Teaneck, NJ, a first reading of a new play by Thom Molyneaux: Artie, Gadge, Marilyn and HUAC. About the friendship and connections between Arthur Miller, Elia Kazan, Marilyn Monroe and how HUAC impacted their lives.
Timebends is available on CD (2 vols) or MP3 as part of the Chivers Audiogold series, Bath, England AudioGO, 2013. Read by William Roberts.
Episode of the South Bank Show, filmed by London Weekend Television in 1980, released on DVD, 2013. Melvyn Bragg interviews Miller about his life, his ideas, the craft of writing, money, success, failure and the American dream. Included are extracts from Death of a Salesman, The Crucible and The American Clock.
July 2013, at Contemporary American Theater Festival in Shepherdstown, W.Va., Liz Duffy Adams’s A Discourse on the Wonders of the Invisible World premiered, featuring Abigail Williams and Mercy Lewis ten years on from The Crucible.
This Great Country 10-13 July, a new theatrical reimagining of Death of a Salesman, trimmed to 100 minutes, rewritten and set in the present by Brooklyn-based 600 Highwaymen, in what used to be an Express clothing store in the Pier 17 shopping mall at the South Street Seaport. Presented by Abigail Browde and Michael Silverstone; six actors, including Stacey J. Dotson, Derek Kolluri, and Lana Dieterich share the role of Willy Loman (Dieterich also plays Linda Loman), and a 7-year-old plays Willy’s boss, Howard. The play premiered last spring at an arts festival in Austin, Texas, and is now part of the River to River NYC festival. To reserve a free tickets, go to: rivertorivernyc.com.
Link to an piece about a the original draft of the Life article, “My Wife Marilyn,” that Miller wrote about Monroe back in 1958.
This year marks the sixtieth anniversary of The Crucible.
Robert Ward, whose best-known work, an operatic setting of The Crucible, won the 1962 Pulitzer Prize for music, died on Wednesday 3 April 2013 at his home in Durham, N.C. He was 95.
Special Events/Releases 2012
Abigail/1702, a new work by Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa, premiered 27 June- 8 July during Powerhouse Theater’s summer season, at the Hallie Flanagan-Davis Powerhouse Theater in Poughkeepsie, NY (with Vassar college and New York Stage and Film). Ten years after the events of The Crucible, Abigail Williams is living under a new identity in Boston and haunted by her past. When a mysterious figure appears, she confronts Salem’s dark history head on and must atone for her role in it. Directed by David Esbjornson. Call (845) 437-5907 or check the website. Check here to see a video explaining the concept.
2012 Broadway revival of Death of a Salesman was nominated for seven Tony awards, including Best Revival of a Play, Best Actor in a Leading Role in a Play (Philip Seymour Hoffman) and Best Actor in a Featured Role in a Play (Andrew Garfield), Best Actress in a Featured Role in a Play (Linda Emond), Best Direction of a Play (Mike Nichols), Best Sound Design of a Play (Scott Lehrer), and Best Lighting of a Play (Brian MacDevitt). It won the Best Revival and Best Direction, but was beaten out in the other categories! Meanwhile, the production also garnered three Drama Desk awards for outstanding play revival, director and lighting design.
All My Sons by University of Kansas Theater. The play is one of the programs of the ACT festival at Shanghai Dramatic Arts Center, 288 Anfu Road Shanghai. where 18 contemporary theatrical projects from different parts of the world are presented from Nov 5 to Dec 9. This year, the festival is themed “Creative Diversity.” Call 021-6473-0123.
Actor Dougray Scott played Arthur Miller in the 2012 movie My Week with Marilyn.
Alex North’s original score for Death of a Salesman has been released as an MP3 “album” that can be downloaded from Amazon, iTunes and other Web-based music dealers. The score was recorded by the four musicians who played it on Broadway in 1949.
The Ride Down Mt. Morgan now available as part of “The Arthur Miller Collection” published by L.A. Theatre Works. Performed by: Brian Cox, Jenny O’Hara, Amy Pietz, Kirsten Potter, Gregory Itzin and Saidah Arrika Ekulona.
Adler, Stella. Stella Adler on America’s Master Playwrights: Eugene O’Neill, Thornton Wilder, Clifford Odets, William Saroyan, Tennessee Williams, William Inge, Arthur Miller, Edward Albee, et al. Knopf. Aug. 2012. ed. by Barry Paris. Based on transcripts of classes she conducted in the 1970s and early 1980s. After an overview of each playwright’s work, several individual works are discussed in great detail. Tennessee Williams, Clifford Odets, Eugene O’Neill, Arthur Miller, and Edward Albee all have multiple plays covered, along with one work apiece by Thornton Wilder, William Saroyan, and William Inge. Each discussion emphasizes interpretation, imagination, and subtext.
Elegy for a Lady 23 May (reading), followed by conversation with Oskar Eustis, Rinne Groff, Stephen Adly Guirgis, Richard Nelson and Tony Kushner for “On Arthur Miller: A Playwrights’ Conversation,” to be held at The 92nd Street Y in Kaufmann Concert Hall, Lexington Avenue at 92nd S. May 23, at 8pm. The evening opens with a reading of Miller’s one-act play Elegy for a Lady by Marin Ireland and Jay O. Sanders. Check the website for tickets.
April 28th, the first movie that Robert Redford will be introducing on his new Robert Redford Presents…. series on Sundance Channel, will be Nicholas Hytner’s 1996 version of The Crucible.
The long awaited second volume of Miller’s collected Plays from the Library of America, Arthur Miller: Collected Plays 1964-1982, edited by Tony Kushner has arrived. Covering what they are calling, Miller’s middle period, the collection includes: After the Fall (1964), Incident at Vichy (1964), The Price (1968), The Archbishop’s Ceiling, and the teleplay Playing for Time (1980). In addition, several of Miller’s one-act plays and sketches—such as Fame (1970), I Think About You a Great Deal (1982), Some Kind of Love Story (1982) and, published for the first time, The Reason Why (1970).
Actor, Frank Langella, just penned his first memoir, Dropped Names, which includes stories (among others) about Elizabeth Taylor, Laurence Olivier, William Styron, Marilyn Monroe, and Arthur Miller.
1 March 2012, New York Times kicks off an online series of discussions, interviews, video presentations and perhaps the occasional heated argument about Death of a Salesman, which opens on Broadway on March 15 in a new production starring Philip Seymour Hoffman. Join in a conversation between two writers for Times, the theater critic Charles Isherwood and the columnist Joe Nocera, about the play’s relevance in a time of economic upheaval. Share recollections of your favorite Willy, the most moving Linda, the most boffo Biff you ever saw—whether it was on Broadway or in your high school auditorium. They’ll be talking to Mike Nichols, and hearing from contemporary playwrights discussing Miller’s importance to their work and to the American theater. They hope the series will inspire everyone to engage with this classic text with fresh eyes. If you want to dig up that dusty copy from the shelf, or download a new one, please do. The conversations begin on March 1 on ArtsBeat: nytimes.com/artsbeat.
The 2012 issue of the Arthur Miller Journal will be a special double edition to commemorate the upcoming 60th anniversary of the Broadway premier of The Crucible. Due out in the Fall.
“WHY I BROKE DOWN WHEN ARTHUR MILLER DIED” is a monlogue by playwright Frank Gagliano, exploring his reaction to news of Miller’s death. This was first presented at the Last Frontier Theatre Conference, in Alaska, 2005, and in August that same year at the Beijing Institute of World Theatre and Film. It was presented again on the first anniversary of Miller’s death at Open Stage Theatre in Pittsburgh. Go to the website for more details and to download a pdf of the script.
Special Events/Releases 2010-2011
Missed Apollo Theatre’s 2010 acclaimed All My Sons with David Suchet and Zoe Wanamaker? The production was released on Thursday 14 April 2011 at 10am from Digital Theatre as a downloadable production (or to stream) for £6.99 at their website, and is available now as a preorder.
Joan Copeland will offer two performances of “Joan’s Show” at the Acorn Theatre, 410 West 42nd St. New York, on August 15 at 7pm and August 18 at 2pm. Joel Vig has directed the production, which features musical direction by Dennis Buck. The piece features the award-winning actress sharing songs and stories about her career as well as anecdotes about her family, including brother Arthur Miller and sister-in-law Marilyn Monroe. Call 212.714.2442 or check the Theater Row website for more information.
Miller’s adaptation of Henrik Ibsen’s An Enemy of the People is rendered into Persian by Fatemeh Khosravi and Gholam-hossein Dolatabadi. 1100 copies and will be released in Iran in 2011 by Afraz Publications.
Arthur Miller Journal presented a Spring Colloquy Celebrating the Sixtieth Anniversary of the Broadway Premier of Arthur Miller’s version of Ibsen’s An Enemy of the People, on Thursday, March 30, 2011 at 5pm at The Mahoney Forum for Arts and Culture, Saint Francis College, Brooklyn Heights, NY. Keynote address by Enoch Brater. Staged reading of An Enemy of the People, directed by Timothy Dugan. Event coincided with the publication of the Spring ’11 issue of Arthur Miller Journal, featuring “A Conversation with Christopher Bigsby” after the publication of the much awaited Vol. 2 of his biography of Arthur Miller.
Digital Theatre: 2010 Apollo Theatre’s West End production All My Sons was released on Thursday 14 April 2011 as a downloadable production (or to stream) for £6.99 at the Digital Theatre website. Directed by Howard Davies and designed by William Dudley, with David Suchet as Joe Keller, Zoe Wanamaker as Kate Keller, Stephen Campbell Moore as Chris, and Jemima Rooper as Ann Deever.
Several events are planned to introduce Sarasota’s March production of the operatic version of The Crucible:
Audiences can get a better sense of how Ward adapted the play into an opera in the Jan. 24 program “Spoken and Sung.” It features Studio Artists from Sarasota Opera with third-year students at the FSU/Asolo Conservatoy. Actors will present some monologues and scenes from the play, followed by Studio Artists singing the corresponding arias and ensemble numbers. The program is at 4 p.m. in Felding Hall at the Sarasota Opera House, also includes a discussion. Admission is free, but space is limited.
At 1 p.m. March 5, the day of the opening performance, the composer will take part in a conversation with Artistic Director Victor DeRenzi in the Opera House main theater.
The final event is a panel discussion on “Miller and McCarthyism,” at 3 p.m. April 17 in the Opera House in conjunction with the Sarasota Film Festival. Among the panelists scheduled is Alex Ross, music critic for New Yorker magazine. Admission is free for those with a ticket to the opera.
The first four new teaching editions of Miller’s plays commissioned by Methuen were released in April, 2010: All My Sons, The Crucible, Death of a Salesman and A View from the Bridge. The follow-up editions for After the Fall, The Last Yankee, The Price, and A Memory of Two Mondays came out January 2011, Broken Glass is due March 2011. Series editor is Enoch Brater. Go to the A&C Black website for more information.
Special Events/Releases 2009
AUCTION: Bloomsbury Auctions in New York is offering the “Burt Britton Collection of Self-Portraits” on September 24, 2009. This collection includes a cartoon-like, pen and ink self-portrait by Arthur Miller. You can view the lot here–estimated price $2000-$3000.
Chicago’s Eclipse Theatre Company has chosen Arthur Miller for its “One Playwright, One Season” 2010 Season, and will be producing After the Fall, Resurrection Blues and A Memory of Two Mondays. Call 773-404-7336 or check their website for more information.
May 30, L.A. Theatre Works will air its production of The Crucible by Arthur Miller, starring Richard Dreyfuss and Stacy Keach. The broadcast can be heard locally in Southern California on Saturday from 10pm to midnight on KPCC 89.3 FM, and can also be streamed on demand at www.latw.org. L.A. Theatre Works’ radio theater series can also be heard on the following stations (check local listings for broadcast times): 89.7 WGBH in Boston; 91.5 FM WBEZ in Chicago; 94.9 KUOW in Seattle; 93.5 FM KRTS “Marfa Public Radio” in Texas; 90.5 FM KUT in Austin; 88.9 FM KUNM in Albuquerque; 91.5 FM, Interlochen Public Radio in Northern Michigan; 90.1 FM KKFI in Kansas City, MO; 90.7 FM KVNO in Omaha; 94.1 KPFA in Northern California; 91.1 FM KRCB in Sonoma County; and 89.1 KUOR in Redlands.
Series of talkbacks offered alongside TACT’s current production of Incident at Vichy, all free and immediately follow the respective performance of the play.
Baruch Performing Arts Center, New York City. The Great Works Reading Series will be presented in the Engelman Recital Hall on Thursday, March 12 at 12:45 p.m. and Monday, March 16 at 1:30 p.m. and 6 p.m. This season’s selection includes the one-act Arthur Miller play “I Can’t Remember Anything”, as well as two additional one-acts by Harold Pinter. Acclaimed actors Graeme Malcolm and Mary Beth Peil (of Dawson’s Creek fame) will be featured in the readings.
Arthur Miller is being honored at Manitoba Theatre Centre’s (MTC) ninth annual Master Playwright Festival, Winnipeg. Recognizing his influential career the MillerFest will take place from January 22 – February 8, 2009. Professional theatre companies, university theatre programs, cultural and community theatre groups and a local independent cinema will present several full productions, including The Price, All My Sons, Miller’s version of An Enemy of the People, Clara, Some Kind of Love Story, and Playing for Time as a staged radio play. There will also be readings of The Ride Down Mt. Morgan, Resurrection Blues, and The Man Who Had All the Luck, and screenings, including The Misfits, Focus, and The Crucible. MillerFest will also provide a broader context of the playwright’s life and work through the MillerUnbound free events series that will include a lecture, a directors’ panel and a screening of a documentary. For more information on the history of the company and details of the festival please visit their website. Details of individual productions are given above.
The Crucible 24-25 Jan. as part of Brave New World Repertory Theatre’s sixth annual “Play Reading Salon Series.” Directed by Claire Beckman at The Old Stone House in Park Slope, NY.
Special Events/Releases 2008
Two more recent books on Miller–Eric Sterling has published a new collection of essays on Death of a Salesman and Silima Nanda’s Faces of Miller Women, was published in New Delhi, India: Mittal Publications, 2007 (try D. K. Agencies to get a copy: www.dkagencies.com).
Penn Cinema in Lancaster, PA is showing The Crucible (1996) for one week, starting on Miller’s birthday, Oct. 17 through Oct. 23. One-half of ticket sales will benefit the American Cancer Society in memory of Steve Centola. Check the website for more information.
Theatre in the Woods will host the first in a series of free discussions in conjunction with its production of Arthur Miller’s The Crucible next week. Associate Professor of Literature Dr. Nancy Chick of University of Wisconsin-Barron County will present “Toil and Trouble: A Literary Witch Hunt” on Oct. 8, at 7 p.m. “Crises of Conscience: Crucibles in America” will feature UW faculty members speaking on different aspects of The Crucible and the playwright Arthur Miller on October 15 at 7 p.m. UWEC Associate Professor of History Dr. Selika Ducksworth-Lawton will speak on McCarthy, HUAC, and Arthur Miller on October 19 at 2 p.m., UW Stout Professor of Philosophy Timothy Shiell will discuss freedom of speech. November 6 at 7 p.m. Michael Epstein’s documentary film None Without Sin: Miller, Kazan, and the Blacklist will be screened. The series will conclude on Sunday, November 9, with a 2 p.m. screening of Elia Kazan’s Academy Award-winning film On the Waterfront. All programs in the series will take place at the Erika Quam Memorial Theatre, Shell Lake, WI and are free and open to the public.
Cast members of the current Broadway production of All My Sons, alongside Miller expert, Stephen Marino will be discussing the production and play at 5.30pm on Thurs. Oct 2nd at Borders, Columbus Circle (in the Time Warner Center).
Brenda Murphy, distinguished professor of English at the University of Connecticut at Torrington campus will be discussing Arthur Miller’s play All My Sons, as part of The Litchfield County Writers Project fall series on Wednesday, Sept. 3, from 6:30 p.m. to 9 p.m. The event is free and open to the public.
Seattle Repertory Theatre artistic director David Esbjornson was planning a communitywide, fall 2009 festival of works by Miller, but this is now even more speculative given his leaving the Rep six months earlier than expected. Whether the board will respect his intent is on hold until they announce a new artistic director. His vision for the prospective Arthur Miller festival, would have many local arts groups join the Rep in presenting the late author’s plays, works of fiction, film scripts and other works. Esbjornson met Miller when he directed the New York debut of The Ride Down Mt. Morgan.
Through June 28 at La Motta Fine Art, 11 Whitney St. Hartford, CT, a show of sculptures in wood and bronze by the expressionist sculptor Tom Doyle are on display with patterned textiles by his wife, Jane (neé Miller), Miller’s eldest daughter. For more information, call 860-680-3596.
April 9, at 7pm, Christopher Bigsby will be lecturing on “How Jewish is He? Arthur Miller and the Holocaust,” at Brown University, RI, as the Fourth Annual Don Wilmeth Endowed Lectureship in American Theatre. Reception to follow. John Hay Library, Brown University, 20 Prospect Street, Providence, RI.
Methuen Drama has struck an agreement with the estate of Arthur Miller to publish a new series of scholarly editions of the playwright’s key works, which Rebecca Miller has described as “the definitive editions for students and scholars for many years to come.” The publisher will also reissue the complete set of Miller’s plays in six volumes in early 2009, saying that while at present there are annotated editions suitable for schools, there are no modern editions of the plays with critical commentary aimed at a higher level. It looks like the five volume series they had out covering Miller’s plays is currently out of print until then.
It looks like Christopher Bigsby’s Arthur Miller: The Definitive Biography, set for a January 2009 release in the US, may have stalled–but it came out in the UK in November to very positive feedback. Here are links to two of its reviews: Times, Guardian.
This year’s “Arthur Miller Freedom to Write Lecture” at the PEN World Voices Festival of International Literature (April 29 through May 4), will be delivered by Umberto Eco. The full schedule is available at pen.org.
March-April: “The Arthur Miller Celebration” at the Theater J, 1529 16th St. NW, Washington, DC. As well as hosting the Cape May Stage production of The Price with the Prosky family, Theater J is also offering a bunch of discussion groups and play readings related to this production at the Theater. Among the Artistic Director’s Roundtable discussions are: March 9: Miller’s Evolving Politics: What’s He Saying in The Price?; March 16: The Price in the Pantheon: Arthur Miller, August Wilson – Comparing Their Greatest Works; March 30: Judging an Artist’s Work in the Wake of Stunning Revelations; and April 13: 5×5–Playwrights Responding to the Work of Arthur Miller and The Price. Also there will be a series of Pay-What-You-Can Miller Readings (including The American Clock on March 18; The Crucible on March 25 and Playing for Time on April 8. For more information on these and other events check the website.
March 13 Jeopardy! featured a special group of categories: THE MISFITS, ALL MY SONS, THE CRUCIBLE, “DEATH” , OF A SALESMAN, and ARTHUR MILLER. Only the last one contained questions on the playwright and his work and they ran: $200: ARTHUR MILLER’S MARRIAGE TO HER WAS MIRRORED IN HIS PLAY “AFTER THE FALL” (Marilyn Monroe) $400: MILLER’S PLAY “A VIEW FROM THE BRIDGE” CONCERNS A VIEW FROM THIS NEW YORK BRIDGE (The Brooklyn Bridge) $600: IN JUNE 1999 ARTHUR MILLER RECEIVED A LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT ONE OF THESE AWARDS AT RADIO CITY MUSIC HALL (Tony Award — none of the three contestants got this right) $800: ARTHUR MILLER WROTE THE SCREENPLAY FOR THE 1961 FILM “THE MISFITS”, THIS MALE SUPERSTAR’S LAST FILM (Clark Gable) $1000: MILLER’S PLAY “DEATH OF A SALESMAN” WAS HIS TRAGIC TALE OF THIS TITLE CHARACTER (Willy Loman)
March-May: “Arthur Miller Festival” at Arena Stage, 1101 Sixth Street, SW, Washington, DC 20024 D.C. The season’s final two Fichandler productions will be A View from the Bridge and Death of a Salesman. The festival will also feature Monday evening readings, screenings and lectures exploring Miller’s other work.
Check the link to read a recent interesting article on Jewish-Irish collaborations on Broadway in the Jewish Forward, which makes some mention of Miller in this light.
“Inge Morath and Arthur Miller: China” Jan. 12-March 23 at UMMA Off/Site, 1301 South University (at South Forest), Ann Arbor. Photographs and text covering the couple’s trips to The People’s Republic of China in the 1970s and 1980s. Hours are Tue., Fri., Sat. and Sun. 11 a.m. to 6 p.m.; and Wed. and Thu, 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Admission is free. For information, call 734-763-UMMA.
9 January 2008 staged reading of “I Can’t Remember Anything” at the National Arts Council. Stephen Marino will be introducing the play and moderating a Q&A to follow. Joan Copeland is reading Leonora.
Special Events/Releases 2007
20 Dec. Brian Dennehy at Chicago Art Institute will be discussing what has made the plays of Eugene O’Neill and Arthur Miller so powerful and essential to our lives as well as the state of contemporary theater. 6-7 p.m. in Fullerton Hall. Members and Students with ID: $10, Public: $15. Reservations: Suggested. Event Code: EAIJ1220.
The Crucible is Mayor Richard Daley’s selection for Chicago’s “One Book, One Chicago” program during the 2007-2008 academic year.
For those interested in the Monroe angle—a portrait of Miller features in the play, “Here I Am Mother,” the Real Story of Marilyn Monroe, penned by Monroe’s self-announced daughter, Nancy Miracle/Nancy Maniscalco. There have been some readings of this piece thus far, and there may be a production soon in Bulgaria. Copies are available through Nancy’s website.
Inner Workings: Literary Essays 2000-2005, by J. M. Coetzee. Random House, Australia, 2007. ISBN 9781 74166 8353. RRP $39.95, contains an essay on the screenplay for the film, The Misfits.
Sept. 4 to Dec. 30, 2007. Exhibition at University of Texas at Austin: “Rehearsing the American Dream: Arthur Miller’s Critical Theater” can be seen in the Ransom Center Galleries on Tuesdays through Fridays from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., with extended Thursday hours to 7 p.m. On Saturdays and Sundays the galleries are open from noon to 5 p.m. The galleries are closed on Mondays. Curated by Charlotte Canning. The exhibition uses Miller’s plays to explore conscience in its theatrical expression: as an intertwined and interdependent political and emotional life. Check the Harry Ransom Center’s website for more details. Harry Ransom Center Contacts: Jennifer Tisdale; e-mail: jentisdale@mail.utexas.edu; phone: 512-471-8949 or Alicia Dietrich; e-mail: aliciadietrich@mail.utexas.edu; phone: 512-232-3667. Or by regular mail: Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, P.O. Drawer 7219, Austin, Texas 78713-7219. For more information phone: 512-471-8944; or fax: 512-471-9646.
More events related to the above exhibit for which seating is free, but limited (there is also a local production by City Theatre of Death of a Salesman)Harry Ransom Center THURSDAY, OCTOBER 25, 7 p.m. Charlotte Canning and Lucien Douglas from the Department of Theatre and Dance at The University of Texas at Austin weave together critical commentary and scenes from the plays of Arthur Miller in “Up Against the American Dream.” This 90-minute presentation includes performances of scenes
from Miller’s works, including All My Sons, The Crucible, View from the Bridge, After the Fall, The Archbishop’s Ceiling, and American Clock. The event features visual and audio resources to address themes that run throughout Miller’s work: history, tragedy, family, nation, politics, and philosophy.Up Against the American Dream FRIDAY, OCTOBER 26, 2 p.m. David Savran, Distinguished Professor of Theatre at the CUNY Graduate Center, presents “Arthur Miller and the Broadway Canon.” Despite the money and celebrity that has surrounded Broadway for the last 100 years, the commercial New York theater has served as a forum for what is now deemed serious drama for less than half of that period. Indeed, the group of great playwrights who had their work routinely performed on Broadway is a small one, beginning with Eugene O’Neill in 1920 and ending with Tennessee Williams and Arthur Miller in the early 1960s. This talk addresses the construction of the canonical, Pulitzer Prize-winning Broadway play with a focus on Arthur Miller’s work in an attempt to discern Miller’s unique position in the history of the commercial theater.
Susan Abbotson’s Critical Companion to Arthur Miller, an encyclopedic guide to the man and his work came out on June 30th, 2007 from Facts on File. Get more detail from their website, (search on Abbotson).
New collection of essays on Miller edited by Paula Langteau now available from University Press of America, and at a mere $25 well within most people’s book budget. It is titled Miller and Middle America: Essays on Arthur Miller and the American Experience. Go to the UP of America website and type in Langteau under author for more details (this includes brief reviews of the book).
Arthur Miller died on Feb. 10, 2005 — the same day (56 years earlier) that Death of a Salesman opened on Broadway. Playwright and professor Frank Gagliano has presented his tribute, “Why I Broke Down When Arthur Miller Died,” three times. Now the complete tribute is at the “articles and essays” link on Gagliano’s new Web site, www.gaglianoriff.com, “the personal chronicle of a life in American Theatre: from the glory days of the Off-Broadway movement, to theatre’s present decline and towards its uncertain future.”
Special Events/Releases 2006
Hungarian Journal of English and American Studies has a special Arthur Miller Edition: Volume 11, Number 2 (2005): ISSN: 12 18-7364. It contains several new essays on Miller’s work. This journal is published twice a year by the Institute of English and American Studies, University of Debrecen, Hungary. HJEAS is available through subscription. A year’s subscription (2 issues) is $40 or €30 postpaid. Individual issues are $25 or €17 postpaid. To subscribe send a personal check made payable to “University of Debrecen,” mail to HJEAS, Institute of English and American Studies, University of Debrecen, 4010 Debrecen Pf. 73, Hungary.
“Great Literature of All Times” — Oro Valley Public Library, Tucson, AZ in the library meeting room at 1305 W. Naranja Drive. Bill Fry will discuss Arthur Miller’s play The Crucible. 10 a.m.-noon Nov. 16. Free. 229-5300.
The American Association of University Women will read The Crucible by Arthur Miller on Thursday, Sept. 21, 2006 at 1:30 p.m. in the Flett Room of the Belmont Public Library. The Read Aloud will be led by Janet Khattab and Dolores Murphy, both from Belmont. AAUW members and guests are invited to read parts of the play or just listen and enjoy. No preparation is required. The public is welcome. The event is free of charge. The next
monthly reading will be on Tuesday, Oct. 31 at the Burlington Library. The selected reading will be Death of a Salesman. For more information, contact Liz Blumenthal at 781-641-5159.
Through September 15, 2006, the Museum of the City of New York presents the exhibit New York Creative: Portraits by Everett Raymond Kinstler, which focuses on his interpretations of celebrated figures from the world of arts & letters in New York. Fifty oil paintings, watercolors, pastels, and charcoal sketches of such cultural luminaries as artists Will Barnet and Jacob Lawrence, writers Tom Wolfe and Arthur Miller, and performers Tony Bennett and Paul Newman will be on view.
Westport Country Playhouse Sunday Symposium discussed “Arthur Miller: Artists’ Struggle in the Face of Repressive Government Censorship” on Sunday, Aug. 27, 2006, following the 3 p.m. performance. The symposium is free and open to the public. Guest speakers will be Brenda Murphy, professor of English at the University of Connecticut, and Roya Hakakian, author and filmmaker.
All My Sons 30 July, 2006, a reading in honor of Israel Horovitz performed by Peter Boyle, Lucy Boyle, Alice Duffy, Joe Pacheco, Melinda Lopez, and Richard McElvain (Boyle was sick and his role was taken by Klein on the day of performance).
7 June, 2006, Prague. The 16th Prague Writers’ Festival was dedicated to Miller whose quotation “There Is No Life Without Ideals” was adopted for this year’s festival motto.
Awake & Singing: New Edition, edited and annotated by Ellen Schiff and published by Applause Theatre and Cinema Books, 2004 has added Broken Glass to its playlist. The plays in the collection have been chosen, as Schiff explains, because “they bring to life before our eyes many of the seminal events that shaped the American Jewish experience through the last century: immigration, family life and generational conflicts, the Great Depression, “making it” in America, encounters with anti-Semitism, the Triangle Fire, assimilation, two world wars, the Holocaust and Israel nationhood.”
“Birth of a Playwright: Arthur Miller at Michigan.” The project revolves around Miller, how and why he chose University of Michigan and the development of his craft while at the University. Produced by Chris Cook for U-M TV2. WFUM-TV: http://www.wfum.org U-M TV2: http://www.michiganchannel.org
Turkish writer Orhan Pamuk will deliver the inaugural “Arthur Miller Freedom to Write Lecture” at the PEN World Voices Festival on its opening night, Tuesday, April 25, 2006.
“The Arthur Miller Project” April 6-9 2006 in The Old Science Hall Lab Theatre at Oklahoma University, Norman, OK. This is an original script written by Oklahoma University graduate student Jason Gerace to honor the playwright. It is made up entirely of the playwright’s works, including his essays, speeches and his autobiography, as well as scenes from his plays. Gerace emphasizes the playwright’s thoughts on the nature of tragedy, organized by four themes: fear, man in society, name and death — all of which are used to connect the piece in its entirety. Performed by Rachel Kerbs, Matthew Altobelli, Travis McElroy, Matt Carpenter, and Meghan Caves. Performances at 8 p.m. Thurs- Saturday and 3 p.m. Sunday. Tickets are $8 for adults, faculty, staff and senior adults and $6 for students.
17 March, 2006: “The Works of Arthur Miller.” Tony Kushner in conversation with Michael Krasny. 6:30 p.m. at Berkeley Repertory Theater, 2025 Addison St., Berkeley. Tickets are free with the purchase of Arthur Miller: Selected Plays, 1944-1961 at Cody’s Books, 2454 Telegraph Ave., Berkeley, or $15 at the door if any tickets still available. (510) 845-7852.
15th March, 2006: Tony Kushner and Robert Brustein in a multimedia celebration of the publication of Arthur Miller: Collected Plays 1944-1961 (Library of America). In addition to discussing Miller’s plays, the evening will feature a screening of The Misfits. Wednesday, at 6 p.m., at the Brattle Theatre, Cambridge. Tickets are $10 and can be purchased at Harvard Book Store. Or get two free tickets when you buy the book for $35, with all proceeds benefiting the embattled Brattle. Call 617-661-1515.
February 2006, Films Media Group releases The Drama of Creation, Writers on Writing, a 46 minute documentary on playwrights which includes new interviews with Miller alongside other dramatists including August Wilson, Arthur Miller, Wendy Wasserstein, Tina Howe, Terrance McNally, Neil Simon and Edward Albee who talk about their writing techniques and inspirations. Their press releases talks about Miller’s disclosure about how he wrote the concept for Death of a Salesman during his college days in Brooklyn and had forgotten about the manuscript until years later. We can assume they are talking about the short story “In Memoriam.” Content for the documentary is the culmination of two decades of interviews with featured playwrights, compiled by the Media Resources Center of Wichita State University under the leadership of executive director Michael Wood. FMG currently has 2,000 titles available digitally through its FMG On Demand service launched in September. With 200 new titles being added each month, this collection includes many exclusive offerings from leading producers and broadcasters including PBS, BBC and ABC News as well as original content produced by FMG. The Drama of Creation, Writers on Writing is a product of FMG’s Films for the Humanities & Sciences brand, tailored specifically for advanced level high school and college students. For reviewers, if you would like to receive a complimentary DVD or VHS review copy of The Drama of Writers, Writers on Writing or speak to the FMG producers responsible for its creation, please contact John Hartnett at (609) 671-5716. A transcript is also available on request. For a preview of the film or for information, visit website. To watch the entire movie online: then type the word “review” in the playlist code box and select “Go.” Click the “Play” button in the lower left-hand corner underneath the black screen. This free, full-length feature is for private use only, not for broadcast, and will expire at midnight on March 17, 2006. They welcome your review of this film.
Christopher Bigsby will be participating in a panel discussion on the works of Miller at the Theatre Museum, London, on March 5th 2006, as part of events surrounding the Scott Davison production of Two Way Mirror.
“Tribute to Miller”: Feb. 10th 2006. Actors Eli Wallach, Marian Seldes and Frances Sternhagen will be among the readers next week at a tribute to Arthur Miller, whose collected works are being published by the Library of America. The readings are to take place Friday, Feb. 10th 2006, the first anniversary of Miller’s death, at St. Bartholomew’s Church in midtown Manhattan. The event, for which admission is free, is sponsored by TIPA (Toward International Peace Through the Arts), a nonprofit organization. Miller’s sister, Joan Copeland, will also appear at the reading.
From January to March 2006, the multi-award-winning Octagon Theatre, Bolton (UK), presents Miller at the Octagon, a short series of two plays celebrating the work of one of the twentieth century’s great playwrights, Arthur Miller – A View From The Bridge (26 Jan – 25 Feb 06) and Broken Glass (2 – 25 Mar 06).
A voluminous collection of essays has just been published in India under the title, Arthur Miller: Twentieth Century Legend. Several society members contributed essays and it has been published by Surabhi Publications. Edited by Dr. M. A. Syed, it totals 408 pages and costs the equivalent of $18 in India. Write to Mr. Suresh, Surabhi Publications, Rasta Sanghiji, S M S Highway, Jaipur- 302 003, Rajasthan, for more information.
Westport Arts Center’s “Play With Your Food”, a lunch hour (and a half) theater/lunch/socializing series. Toquet Hall, Westport, CT has scheduled an exciting series of new plays, including plays by Arthur Miller. But these are lesser-known works, according to Schweid, including some “hidden jewels” of Miller’s that no one knows he wrote. Uncertain when—sometime in 2006.
Feb. 4th, 2006: Delaware Theatre Company (Wilmington, DE) has started a new series of audience enrichment events called “Connections.” These are free forums that they offer periodically throughout ourseason that take a look at issues raised in the plays and try to connect them to a broader realm of experiences. In “connection” with their production of The Price (25 Jan. -12 Feb.) and in commemoration of Miller’s passing, they will present a retrospective of Miller’s life as dramatist, novelist, political figure, and celebrity. Guests, including director Gerald Freeman and theater scholar Steve Centola, will place Miller’s works in their appropriate historic and literary contexts. Actors will illuminate the scholarly discourse by reading selections from Miller’s works. This event will be held on Saturday, February 4, 2006. This event is free and will begin around 4.30 pm., and is partly funded by Delaware Humanities Forum. Box office (302) 594-1100 and check website for more details.
BERKELEY’S Aurora Theatre Company in CA dedicates its new season to the memory of playwright Arthur Miller. The season opens in September 2005 with a production of The Price.
Special Events/Miller’s Last Appearances 2000-2005
The inaugural Anne Frank Human Writes Award for 2005 has been posthumously awarded to Arthur Miller.
Old BBC Radio four interview with Jonathan Miller in which Miller discusses his detachment from a religious belief. It will be re-aired on Mon 28th February 2005 7.30 US time (Tues Mar.1st 12.30-1 am UK time). Check link for details.
Bob Balaban, Joan Copeland, Bob Dishy, Anne Jackson, Laila Robins, Marian Seldes, and Eli Wallach will participate in “The Writings of Arthur Miller: A 90th Birthday Celebration” on Monday, October 17 2005 at 12:30pm. The event, which is part of the Food for Thought series, will take place at the Players Club (16 Gramercy Park South). In addition to readings from the late playwright’s works, Copeland will share stories about her brother and read a letter that Miller sent to the House Un-American Activities Committee. Wallach will introduce a short film written by Miller and shot at his home in Connecticut (The Reason Why). Tickets to the event are $55 for subscribers and $65 for non-subscribers; it includes lunch, the reading, a Q&A session, and a reception with wine and cake. For reservations, call 212-362-2560 or 646-366-9340.
The naming ceremony for the Charles R. Walgreen Jr. Drama Center and Arthur Miller Theatre at the University of Michigan is scheduled for Friday October 14th 2005 at 10 am in Rackham Auditorium.
Sense of Urgency Theatre presents scenes from the plays of Arthur Miller in “It’s Miller Time.” At 7 p.m. this Tuesday 23rd Aug. and Sept. 6; 2 p.m. Sept. 10 2005 at the Oak Park Library, 834 Lake, Oak Park, Chicago. Admission is free. Call (708) 267-9845.
John Drew Theater at Guild Hall in East Hampton, NY will be holding a tribute to Arthur Miller with Joan Copeland, Paul Hecht, Hal Robinson, and Martin Gottfried on Sept. 4 2005.
The Jung Center of Houston is offering a seven-week companion course to Alley Theater’s 2005 Miller productions entitled, “The Jung Center Goes to the Alley: Two Plays by Arthur Miller.” Scheduled for every Thursday between January 27 through March 10, classes include background lectures, group attendance, and post-show discussions led by Alley Teaching Artist Jere Pfister. The cost is $135 or $120 for Jung Center members. For more information, contact the Jung Center at 713/524-8253 or visit www.cgjunghouston.org.
Author Enoch Brater discusses the book Arthur Miller’s America: Theater and Culture in a Time of Change at 4 p.m. Jan. 27 2005 at Shaman Drum Bookshop, 311-315 S. State St. Free. Information: (734) 662-7407. Arthur Miller’s America collects new writings by leading international critics and scholars that consider the dramatic world of icon, activist and playwright Arthur Miller’s theater as it reflects the changing moral equations of his time. Written on the occasion of Miller’s 85th year, the original essays and interviews in Arthur Miller’s America treat the breadth of Miller’s work, including his early political writings for the campus newspaper at the University of Michigan, his famous work with John Huston, Clark Gable and Marilyn Monroe on The Misfits, and his signature plays like Death of a Salesman and All My Sons.
The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston Film Department presents two screenings of films written by Miller including The Misfits, the 1961 film featuring Marilyn Monroe, Clark Gable and Montgomery Clift, at 7 p.m. on Monday, February 7 2005. The 1985 film version of Miller’s play Death of a Salesman featuring Dustin Hoffman will be shown at 7 p.m. Monday, February 21. Both screenings take place in the Museum’s Brown Auditorium and will include a pre-show introduction by Alley Artistic Director Gregory Boyd. The public is invited to attend a reception prior to each screening from 5:30-6 p.m. General admission is $6. MFAH members, senior adults (55+), and students with ID receive a $1 discount. Children five and under are admitted free. For more information, contact the MFAH Film Department at 713/639-7531 or visit www.mfah.org.
The Holocaust Museum Houston hosts a panel of local scholars who will discuss “Trial by Conscience in Arthur Miller’s After the Fall” at 7:30 p.m. Monday, January 10 2005 at the Museum’s location at 5401 Caroline Street. The event is free and open to the public. For more information, call the Holocaust Museum Houston at 713/942-8000 or visit www.hmh.org
Film series at Bank Street Theater to aid Our Towns project. Our Towns for Sar-E-Pol, a non-partisan, humanitarian effort by towns in the Litchfield Hills to raise funds to help the women and children in war-torn Afghanistan, is hosting a film forum series at Bank Street Theater in New Milford. The series, which began Oct. 3, features a variety of films that will be personally introduced by a local resident associated with the making of the film. Residents include Arthur Miller, Milos Forman, Frank McCourt, Tom Cole and Joyce Chopra. The schedule will feature Smooth Talk Jan. 16, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest Feb. 20 and Angela’s Ashes March 20. All movies will be shown Sundays at 3 p.m. The film forum series was conceived by Our Towns for Sar-E-Pol members Ann Nevel and Kathy Van Hemert, co-owners of The Firehouse, Clothing & Home on Bank Street in New Milford. Richard Freedman, owner of the theater, is donating one theater for each viewing. For more information and tickets, call (860) 210-1518.
“Michigan on Broadway: A Tribute to Arthur Miller” on November 15th, 2004 at the Richard Rodgers Theatre on Broadway at 8pm with Hunter Foster, Jennifer Laura Thompson, Gavin Creel and Barrett Foa to celebrate the naming of the world’s only Arthur Miller Theatre which will be built at University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, groundbreaking is set for 2005. Tickets (which are open to the public) are available by calling (734) 763-0529) or through www.music.umich.edu.
Under a Colour Cap, a documentary by Shivaun O’Casey, the daughter of playwright Sean O’Casey, premiered at the Stranger Than Fiction documentary festival 3rd Oct. 2004. Although its focus is her father’s life to illustrate his free-thinking attitude how his views remain relevant to today’s world, it includes interviews with Harold Macmillan and Arthur Miller.
The late actor, director and teacher Stella Adler will be celebrated Nov. 8 in “Stella By Starlight,” a gale fete and awards ceremony in the Pierre Hotel’s Grand Ball Room. Awards will be presented to playwrights Tony Kushner and Arthur Miller and, posthumously, to actor Marlon Brando. Zoe Caldwell will present Miller with The Group Theater Award for “prolific achievement in theatre, film, television arts and for community and social commitment.” “Stella By Starlight” is set to begin with cocktails at 6:30 PM, followed by the “Salute to Musical Theatre.” Dinner is scheduled for 8 PM with the award presentations and special tributes at 9:15 PM. Individual tickets to the one-night-only event are priced at $1,000. Tables of ten range from $5,000-$25,000; call Scott Perrin at (212) 838-2660, ext. 22. **Miller was unable to attend this event due to a bout of pneumonia, but sent his daughter Rebecca to collect the award. **
Mr. Miller was present at the ninth Arthur Miller Society International conference at St. Francis College, Brooklyn, NY on April 23-24, 2004.
As the winner of the Tulsa Library Trust’s 2004 Peggy V. Helmerich Distinguished Author Award, Miller will receive the award at a black-tie dinner in Tulsa City-County Library’s Central Library on Dec. 3. He will give a free public presentation at Central Library on Dec. 4.The award consists of a $25,000 cash prize and an engraved crystal book. The Tulsa Library Trust gives the award annually to an internationally acclaimed author who has written a distinguished body of work and made a major contribution to the field of literature and letters. For more information about the Peggy V. Helmerich Distinguished Author Award, call Larry Bartley, Tulsa Library Trust manager, at (918) 596-7985.
As part of “Waterfront: A Journey Around Manhattan in 18 Films” which runs through March 11 at the Museum of Modern Art at the Gramercy Theater, 127 East 23rd Street, Manhattan, NY; they’re showing the 1962 classic, A View from the Bridge with Raf Vallone, Maureen Stapleton and Carol Lawrence on Tues. March 2nd at 8pm. Call (212) 777-4900. Tickets: $6; free for members and children under 16 accompanied by an adult.
Arthur Miller spoke to the Philomathean Society, a literary society, at Zellerbach Theatre, at University of Pennsylvania on April 7. He read from his essay On Politics and the Art of Acting and answered audience questions following his lecture. Please consult their website for more specifics about this lecture. Philo also hosted a series of events during the week of Miller’s speech, including a lecture, roundtable discussion and dramatic reading of one of his plays. A playwriting workshop took place after Miller’s speech. Complimentary tickets were available to students in an online lottery.
Arthur Miller visited the University of Michigan on April 1 for a rare discussion of his works at the Lydia Mendelssohn Theatre. The discussion, from 10-11:30 a.m., highlighted this year’s “Arthur Miller Symposium,” sponsored by the U-M School of Music (NB This was sold out). The discussion was facilitated by Lamos and Enoch Brater, professor of English. The symposium was held in conjunction with “An Arthur Miller Celebration,” a collection of excerpts from Miller’s plays presented by the Department of Theatre and Drama from April 2-11 at the Trueblood Theatre. Miller attended the show’s final dress rehearsal April 1, which was closed to the public. Tickets for “An Arthur Miller Celebration” were also on sale, priced at $15, or $8 for students, at the league ticket office. The production, directed by Mark Lamos and student directors, pulled scenes from well-known and rarely performed plays in combination with excerpts from Miller’s 1987 autobiography, Timebends.
FYI: Plans are still being developed for the Arthur Miller Theater, to be located on the U-M’s North Campus, possibly next to Pierpont Commons on Murfin Street. The theater was first proposed in 1997, and then approved by the Board of Regents in 2000 for a Central Campus location next to The Power Center. But drastically escalating cost estimates and a sagging economy led U-M officials to rethink the project and consider a new location. The theater now will be part of the Walgreen Drama Center, which will include other student drama facilities.
The audience was sold-out for a public interview between Miller and Mel Gussow on 19 Nov. 2003 (originally scheduled for Sept. 22).
Miller accepted his Jerusalem Prize in Israel on June 24th, 2003 at which he gave a speech.
Miller appeared on June 23rd 2003 at the Martin Beck Theater, since renamed the Al Hirschfeld Theater, to speak in honor of the late artist, Al Hirschfield. The ceremonies began at 7 p.m. and were open to the public.
Desmond-Fish Library honored Miller at a special fundraiser dinner on June 7th 2003 at the Garrison Golf Club, Garrison, NY. Space limited, reservations necessary. Call library for information at 845 424 3020.
On March 7 2003, Miller appeared at CUNY as part of a TimesTalk weekend.
In 2001 the National Book Foundation bestowed its Distinguished Contribution to American Letter’s Medal on Arthur Miller. Mr. Miller accepted the honor in New York City at the 2001 National Book Awards Dinner on November 14th.
In honor of its 25th year at its South Bank location, The National Theatre, London recently held a Poll to determine the most memorable play from each year. The results included three plays by Miller: 1987 A View from the Bridge, 1994 Broken Glass, and 2000 All My Sons. A
series of events were scheduled featuring extracts and discussion with key figures in connection with each play. The platform celebration for 1994s Broken Glass was on Friday, 7 Sept. 2001, at 6pm in the Cottesloe Theatre, featuring director David Thacker and the actors who played the Gellburgs (Henry Goodman and Margot Leicester), and Harriet (Julia Swift), all from the 1994 British premier production of the play. The platform celebration for 2000s All My Sons was on Wednesday, 19 Sept. 2001, at 6pm in the Lyttelton Theatre, featuring director Howard Davies and other members of the original cast. This production was also revived for that current season.
Arthur Miller appeared at The Kennedy Center, Washington, D.C., on Monday, March 26, in an event sponsored by the NEH–the speech he gave was published in June 2001 edition of Harpers as well as extended and printed in book form as Art and the Politics of Acting (2001).
As part of their “Evening Reading Series,” Arthur Miller appeared in a forum with Joyce Carol Oates and others at Queen’s College on October 13, 1999. He appeared again at Queen’s College on October 18th, 2000 with Peter Matthiessen, Frank McCourt, and Grace Paley as part of the same series in a session titled “A Reading in Honor of Arthur Miller on the Occasion of his 85th Birthday.”
The New York Times–“New York is Book Country Literary Brunch.” September 24, 2000, at The Waldorf-Astoria, The Grand Ballroom Park Avenue at 50th Street, New York City. Arthur Miller attended with Cynthia Ozick, Nicholas Sparks, Liz Smith, Candace Bushnell, and master of ceremonies, William H. Honan.
There was a one day birthday celebration gala in Arthur Miller’s honor in England, October 14th, 2000, hosted by Christopher Bigsby at the Sainsbury Center, University of East Anglia. There was an interview with Miller, and a discussion with theatrical practitioners, followed by a gala dinner and reception.
Arthur Miller gave the keynote address at the birthday celebration which the University of Michigan held in honor of his 85th birthday. Titled, “Arthur Miller’s America: Theatre and Culture in a Century of Change,” the event took place 26-28th October 2000. It kicked off a year of theater at U-M, which presented a variety of guests, scholars, commentators, critics, practitioners, and panel participants from around the world, including Buenos Aires, Tel Aviv, and London. Mel Gussow of the New York Times was part of a panel discussing “Miller and the American Theater” on Oct. 28. U-M’s Museum of Art presented a photographic exhibit of work by professional photographer Inge Morath, Miller’s wife. The exhibit, “Arthur Miller at Work,” included material from her years as a “Magnum” photographer with some photos from the set of The Misfits, as well as many shots of Miller over the years. Though this Morath material has been shown in Barcelona and Paris, this was the first showing of her work on this subject in the United States. Among the activities and events scheduled during the celebration was a presentation by U-M composer William Bolcom discussing the problems of transforming Miller’s A View from the Bridge into an opera. U-M’s Hatcher and Bentley libraries mounted exhibits illustrating Miller’s years at U-M and those immediately after his graduation. Miller’s works that have been adapted for film were shown before and after the symposium. U-M’s Theatre and Drama Department staged A View from the Bridge during the symposium at a special performance on Oct. 27. This Miller work was also presented Oct. 5-8 and 12-15 in U-M’s Trueblood Theatre.