Incident at Vichy

“Taken into custody.”  It is a line that has been so often heard in the World War II stories about people who have disappeared into unknown places.  Incident at Vichy is a look at this event from the other side.  Our viewpoint is from the nondescript government building that has been appropriated as a makeshift holding pen.  Our unrelated cast of characters is grouped with no common bonds, or so they would like to believe.  More importantly, perhaps, they would like us to believe. 

Over 90 minutes, this beautifully nuanced story by Arthur Miller develops before us to reveal what all of these players actually do have in common.  They are on the wrong side of a great evil force.  Each character, whether good or evil, reveals himself to be something different than we expect. 

Within the confines of the small room, all the elements of the irrational process that became the Holocaust are unveiled.  At times, the Holocaust can be demonstrated in the massiveness of the Nazi machine.  At other times, it is equally as powerfully demonstrated in the story of just a few individuals.  The play unfolds in real time and during this very short period, the enormity and horror of one of history’s darkest periods is starkly displayed.  It is haunting yet eloquent and never pornographic in its metaphoric presentation of the Holocaust in its entirety.

This is one of the plays in an Arthur Miller trilogy celebrating this 100th birthday.  Incident at Vichy is rarely produced but, in our opinion, one of his finest works.

Review by JMG