A View From the Bridge

This is the third Broadway production of A View From the Bridge that I have seen. It is a rave-reviewed, three-time Olivier Award winning (Best Revival, Best Director, Best Actor) London transplant. We decided to ride the wave of Arthur Miller productions to honor the 100th anniversary of this birth.  About mid-way through the show, I wondered if I had ever experienced this before.  This is A View that I have never seen.

So much has been said about the “Hollywood comes to Broadway” formula.  This play reveals what we get when we bring London to Broadway.  It is the stage without glam.  As the play ended, I thought to myself, “this is the essence of theater.”  The staging is minimalist but not blank.  The sound production (something I sometimes wonder why anyone discusses in a play) is as integral a component as any of the characters (sound design by Tim Gibbons).  Mark Strong as Eddie Carbone, and Nicola Walker as his wife Beatrice, unveil the complex and disastrous elements of this American marriage.  I cannot believe that this presentation is anything short of exactly what the playwright had in mind when he wrote it.  No other production I have seen has even come close. 

We saw the show late in its run that has now completed.  The takeaway is that Ivo van Hove is a directing genius.  With great anticipation,  now have tickets for his next Arthur Miller production, The Crucible, which begins previews on February 29.  Also associated with both of these shows is set and lighting designer, Jan Versweyveld.  I am eager to see van Hove’s interpretation of this venerable work.

Review by JMG