Brian Dennehy plays Willy superbly as a man who has lived all his life on a level of fantasy. Michael Billington of The Guardian: "This is as fine a rendering of the play as one could hope for: one that realises that the key to the play lies in the word dream… Falls recognises that the whole play is structured with the fluidity of a dream… But the strength of Falls' production also lies in its casting. You leave the theatre in no doubt that you have witnessed a great, possibly THE great, American tragedy."
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Not a performance rings false, not a word seems superfluous to requirements. Yet what a racking, wrenching hold the play still takes upon an audience, thanks to Brian Dennehy's spellbinding take on the title role."Ĭharles Spencer of The Telegraph: "Though the show lasts considerably longer than three hours, there is not a moment when one isn't moved, gripped, and at times appalled by the sheer raging pain on stage. It is too melodramatically loaded and sometimes psychologically trite. Nicholas de Jongh of The Evening Standard: "Robert Falls's ponderously slow, poorly staged production, premiered in Chicago six years ago, fails to convince me Death of a Salesman is quite the classic we all once thought it to be. With our own Claire Higgins and Douglas Henshall giving him support, the result is a testament to the power and to the incisiveness of the play's author, the late Arthur Miller.
It is a memorable performance that builds slowly but achieves extraordinary highs. Here is a sampling of what they had to say:īenedict Nightingale of The London Times: "No wonder Willy Loman, doomed salesman, won him a Tony award in New York. Did London critics love the production, which opened at the Lyric Theatre on May 16, as much as Broadway scribes did years ago? The show is mostly recast with British actors, including Claire Higgins, but still features Broadway cast members Dennehy, Howard Witt who received a Tony nomination for his featured work, Steve Pickering and Allen Hamilton. The Tony-winning 1999 Broadway revival of Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman, starring Brian Dennehy and directed by Robert Falls, has made it to the West End.