Mildred Dunnock: On DEATH OF A SALESMAN
"What was also bearing down on me—on Linda—was time. What would it do to all of us?"
Carrie Nye set up a series of phone interviews between me and Mildred Dunnock. Nye and Dunnock had cemented a friendship after working together in Michael Cacoyannis’ The Trojan Women, produced off-Broadway at the Circle-in-the-Square, in 1963. This first telephone conversation was in 1989, and the last in 1990. These comments are from two separate interviews.
JG: Carrie Nye wanted me to ask you about Elia Kazan and his direction of Death of a Salesman.
MILDRED DUNNOCK: Well, that’s a big subject. I know Carrie Nye and I talked about him a lot. Well, let’s see…
Arthur Miller wrote this extraordinary play—this searing play—and I held it in my hands. Words on a page. Page after page. It affected me deeply. I felt, I could see, as I rarely do, what it would look like on a stage; how it would make people feel. I was numb. I wanted very much to play Linda, but I felt no ambition. I felt nothing at all. I was overcome. Elia and Kermit [Bloomgarden, the play’s producer] called around. They wanted me. What was I thinking? What was I going to do? I was frightened.
I think being frightened is the sign that I’m working on something of value. Something important and bigger than me.
I expressed this to Elia. He understood. He told me to always look for him and reach out to him. He let me know he was always available for me. He admitted that he was afraid of Arthur’s play just as I was. It’s a big play. It’s devastating. I think we can all see ourselves—or imagine ourselves—in its characters. Elia used to say that all of us, all the time, are on the line, on the job, hustling, justifying our lives to others. Asking for the permission to live. Elia had seen this in Blanche [in Tennessee Williams’ A Streetcar Named Desire]. Elia believed them both to be great plays, and great plays pose these dangerous questions. Why are we here? Do we belong? Do we matter? How are we seen? Are we loved?
I showed up to rehearsal, and I was walking oddly. I didn’t really know this, but Elia pointed it out. I think my fear was manifesting in my bones and my muscles. I was walking beneath the weight of Linda, of all she was carrying and trying to keep going. All that she was denying, shifting. Elia told me to use that. Linda creeps about that house all the time, afraid of what her sons will know or do; afraid of the inevitable outbursts of her husband; certain of his eventual suicide. She tiptoes around the many land mines in that house, in that marriage. I kept the fear in my muscles and my bones, but I stood up straight, because that is what Linda does. She makes the beds and the meals and she tells stories she hopes will keep the family together. She acts. She lies. Honorably, she lies.
Sometimes it would get to be too much, but Elia was always there for me. He was there for all of us. He held us up and together. Arthur was there, too, but he really surrendered his play to Elia. He knew that those words on those pages were being transformed into theatre, into performed literature, in Elia’s hands.
When lives are shattering all about you, reality and perception are both altered. You lose your balance. This is what Elia wanted us to always remember, and that is why we had that marvelous set, which was off-balance, a motley series of things and images and shapes: it was all the memories and dreams of all the people in that house, and it was all about to come undone. And then Arthur [Miller] told us that this was Willy's life and it was all our lives--the coming undone. How do we keep it together? Paying attention; loving; creating the memories that might hold it all together. It was a wonderful, draining, fascinating experience."
Time alters things. Time is a gift and curse. Arthur told me that Linda speaking of seeing her boys shaving together was a testament to success: She and Willy had gotten these boys to manhood. Through all the struggles, they were now young men. But time curses, and the boys are angry with their father; disappointed in their mother. What was also bearing down on me—on Linda—was time. What would it do to all of us?
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I did the play—for television—many years later, and time had changed us all. What did Tennessee say? What did he call it? A time knot? It is so true. You have the gift of so much time, but it constricts and it circles you and it eats up your air.
And Elia told me that he couldn’t do anything for Linda. What was coming for Linda had been decided by Arthur. But Elia said he could give me—Millie—air and time and faith to bring Linda forward. To share Linda with audiences. Elia gave me air.