Joe Keller, played by Tristan Hood, represents the American dream. He is a wealthy businessman with a traditional family with a surviving son that is about to marry. Like the ideal American man in the 1940s, his morality is shaped by the traditional family obligations and capitalism.
Yet Arthur Miller’s All My Sons, performed by Exeter College Drama Society does not have a happy ending. It was a tragedy that examines the complex dynamics of a family living in post-war America in the 1940s. Joe Keller who owned a factory that manufactured plane engines for the US military. After being charged with shipping defective plane engines that caused the death of twenty one pilots, Joe was exonerated by shifting the blame onto his business partner who was convicted.
It is an opinionated play that reveals the destructive result caused by an individual morally bankrupted by capitalism and burdened by American traditional family values. Directed by Emily White, the play’s sceptical undertones towards American capitalism and family values are highlighted.
Set in the gardens of Exeter College, the play opens with the audience seemingly eavesdropping on the conversation of Joe Keller’s family. Act I establishes the tensions with the family: between Joe and his wife Kate (Savannah Brooks) on the death of their son Larry, between Joe and his son Chris about whether the latter will stay at home, and between Kate and Chris on his decision to marry Ann Deever (Honor Thompson), the daughter of Joe’s convicted partner.
An inattentive audience may never catch these three relationships and everything else that were buried within the conversations. That does not come as a surprise. The play is designed as such that the audience is seemingly intruding into the midst of a family conversation and the slow unravelling of the entirety of the situation only happens at the end of Act I.
Act II sees the turning point in the play when George Deever (Paul Tomlinson), son of Joe’s convicted partner, arrives at Joe’s house to retrieve Ann. Tomlinson precisely portrayed the emotional instability and distress with a tinge of insanity that seems to be ready to spill over at any moment. The conversation between George and the rest of the characters demonstrates each actor’s strong control and understanding of their role.
It is also in Act II that the audience sees a brilliant portrayal of Kate Keller (Savannah Brooks). Kate Keller is a despicable character; she bears the qualities of a matriarch of a typical American family that is supposed to be loving and act as the powerful counterbalance to the father. Yet she also represents everything that is wrong when those qualities are amplified; being overly caring leads to her refusal to accept the death of Larry, and being overly generous leading to her implicating Joe’s guilt in backstabbing his partner. The fact that Kate is hateable demonstrates Brook’s talent.
Finally, Act III is highlighted by the performance of Joe Keller. Joe’s character is complex; he is a man of explosive temper who struggles between doing what is right versus doing what is best for his family. The grasp on this character’s emotional depth is portrayed perfectly as Hood conveys Joe’s dedication to his business and most importantly the silent sacrifices he made to his family. It is the anguish, pain, and helplessness that the character displayed in the final moments of Act III that defines Joe’s character and is an excellent reflection of the calibre of the actor.
The play and actors make an artful choice with silence. Like in Sidney Lumet’s 12 Angry Men, the play uses silence to build up tension. It is the pauses between the arguments and the changing volume of conversation that kept the arguments realistic and unpredictable. It places the audience in a constant state of anxiety to speculate the direction in which a dispute is going to go.
The one aspect I remained unconvinced by was the depth of love that existed between Chris and Ann. There was not enough revealed, either emotionally or through the substantive writing of the play, to build up the audience’s approval of the relationship between these two. Therefore, when it came to Chris’s decision to leave, the decision did not have the gravitas that it should have had.
Nevertheless, it is because of the excellent performance of each individual actor that the themes of All My Sons were drawn out clearly. Its commentary on capitalism and the family values in post war America remains relevant to this day. This was not a simple play. Yet, it was well executed. To this end, I extend all my compliments to the cast and crew.
