The structure of the play is remarkable, but the play is less compelling than other Miller plays that are less about him, in my opinion. Miller uses Quentin's most recent love affair, with Holga, set in the present, to examine his past. The controversial center of the play is the self-destruction of a show business idol, Maggie, to whom he is married. The play is a kind of memory play, where Quentin sits on an almost bare stage and returns to various memories of women in his life-his marriages, affairs, his mother-touching on the Holocaust, the McCarthy Trials, the Stock Market Crash, and other incidents. I listened to an LA Theaterworks production over the last couple days, starring Anthony Paglia, who plays a lawyer stand-in for Miller, Quentin, reflecting on his loves and losses. I'd never read this play or seen it, after heard it was interesting, but somehow self-serving, focused as it is in part on his relationship to Marilyn Monroe, with whom he had divorced two years previous to the first production of the play. I have decided to re-read or listen to productions of Arthur Miller's plays, many of which I have taught or seen produced many times.
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