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Eugene O'Neill, Tennessee Williams, and Arthur Miller formed the great triumvirate of the 20th Century American Theatre, The Death of a Salesman which explored the angst of post-war conformity was one of the catalysts for the Beat movement which, of course, spurred on the Sixties. The Crucible, another powerful piece, was also provided my mother with one of her favorite roles, Titiba. :) I believe those two plays will endure. He will be missed:
>Playwright Arthur Miller Dies at 89
21 minutes ago
By MICHAEL KUCHWARA, AP Drama Writer
NEW YORK - Arthur Miller, whose dramas of fierce moral and personal responsibility such as "Death of a Salesman" and "The Crucible" made him one of the 20th century's greatest playwrights, has died at the age of 89.
AP Photo
Reuters
Slideshow: Playwright Arthur Miller Dies at 89
Playwright Arthur Miller Dies at 89
(AP Video)
Miller, died Thursday night of congestive heart failure at his home in Roxbury, Conn., surrounded by his family, his assistant, Julia Bolus, said Friday.
For decades, the playwright, along with Eugene O'Neill and Tennessee Williams, dominated not only American stages, but theaters throughout the world. Broadway marquees were to dim their lights Friday night at curtain time.
"It is the loss of a giant," said Robert Falls, director of the 1999 Broadway revival of "Death of Salesman" that starred Brian Dennehy (news) as the iconic title character Willy Loman. "He made tremendous art."
Playwright Edward Albee, recalling how Miller once paid him a compliment by saying that Albee's plays were "necessary," said, "I will go one step further and say that Arthur's plays were `essential.'"
It was Loman and "Death of a Salesman," which took Miller only six weeks to write, that cemented his reputation when it opened on Broadway in 1949, starring Lee J. Cobb and directed by Elia Kazan. Loman was a man destroyed by his own stubborn belief in the glory of American capitalism and its spell of success.
"I couldn't have predicted that a work like `Death of a Salesman' would take on the proportions it has," Miller said in an interview in 1988. "Originally, it was a literal play about a literal salesman, but it has become a bit of a myth, not only here but in many other parts of the world."
Yet Miller had other powerful plays as well. "The Crucible," a 1953 drama inspired by the repressions of McCarthyism, told the story of the mass hysteria during the Salem witch trials. And there was "All My Sons" (1947), his earliest Broadway success, about a corrupt businessman who commits suicide after it is revealed he sold defective airplane parts.
Miller's marriage to film star Marilyn Monroe in 1956, following his divorce from his first wife, Mary Slattery, gave the playwright a celebrity he tried to avoid.
In a 1992 interview with a French newspaper, he called her "highly self-destructive" and said that during their marriage, "all my energy and attention were devoted to trying to help her solve her problems. Unfortunately, I didn't have much success."
The marriage, which ended in divorce, did provide material for two of his plays: "After the Fall" (1964), the story of a tempestuous singer not unlike Monroe; and his last major work, "Finishing the Picture," produced last year at the Goodman Theatre in Chicago. A rueful, yet generous play, it dealt with the misbehavior of a film star on a movie set, similar to "The Misfits," which Miller wrote and which starred Monroe.
In 1962, he married his third wife, photographer Inge Morath. That same year, Monroe committed suicide.
Miller's success, so overwhelming in the 1940s and 1950s, seemed to wane during the next two decades, despite a well-received Broadway revival of "Death of a Salesman" starring Dustin Hoffman, in 1984. But enthusiasm for Miller's work remained particularly strong in England, which marked his 75th birthday in 1990 with four major productions of his plays.
Nicholas Hytner, director of Britain's National Theatre, called Miller "the last of the great titans of the American stage" and said British audiences had embraced his work.
"We have felt more comfortable with the uncompromising morality of his world view than his compatriots," said Hytner, who directed the 1996 film adaptation of "The Crucible."
"America felt rebuked by him. Over here, we relish the ferocity of his arguments with the way things are."
Undaunted, Miller continued to write, even as he became increasingly disillusioned with Broadway. In 1991, he premiered a new play, "The Ride Down Mt. Morgan," in London — the first time he had opened a play outside of the United States.
"It is what I do," he said in a 1996 interview with The Associated Press. "It is my art. I am better at it than I ever was. And I will do it as long as I can. When you reach a certain age, you can slough off what is unnecessary and concentrate on what is. And why not?"
Among his later plays were "Broken Glass" (1994), a drama about a dysfunctional family that won respectful reviews on Broadway and a Tony nomination, but no big audiences. In London, it won an Olivier award as best play. "Resurrection Blues" had its world premiere at the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis in 2002. Set in an unnamed banana republic, the satire dealt with the possible televised execution of a revolutionary.
And Miller had a surprise hit with a New York revival of his first Broadway play, "The Man Who Had All the Luck." It lasted only four performances in 1944, but nearly six decades later, in a Roundabout Theatre Company production starring Chris O'Donnell, this family drama received positive notices.
David Richenthal, who produced the last Broadway revival of "Salesman," said recently that he and Miller were working on a London revival. It will go on as planned in May, directed by Falls and starring Dennehy and Clare Higgins.
Dennehy said not having Miller with them in London will put "a pall over it. We wished he would be there with us, although the last few months we knew it probably wouldn't happen.
"It's not just the play, he's been a presence in my life since I was 13. He's one of the great triumvirates of the American theater."
Born Oct. 17, 1915, Miller was one of three children in a middle-class Jewish family. His father, a manufacturer of women's coats, was hard hit by the Depression and could not afford to send Miller to college. A tall, imposing man with a gruff Brooklyn accent, Miller worked as a loader and shipping clerk at a New York warehouse to earn tuition money and eventually attended the University of Michigan, where he earned a bachelor's degree in 1938.
He wrote his first plays in college, where they were awarded numerous prizes. He also published several novels and collections of short stories. Miller also wrote several screenplays. Besides, "The Misfits," there was "Playing for Time," (1981) a controversial television movie about the women's orchestra at Auschwitz.
He also wrote a number of books with Morath, mainly about their travels in Russia and China.
Miller had two children, Jane Ellen and Robert, by Slattery, and he and Morath, who died in 2002, had one daughter, Rebecca, a filmmaker married to actor Daniel Day-Lewis (news).
___
AP National Writer Hillel Italie, and AP writers Ula Ilnytzky and John Christoffersen contributed to this report. <
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It is our loss that O'Niell is no longer of this Earth but it is our good fortune that he verily passed through.
Eugene O'Niell wrote a single play that changed what we once understood to be the American Dream. He didn't erase that dream with his drama, he simply modified and advanced the American Dream for those who have eyes and ears to further understand.
May God bless you (I almost said Whitman), Eugene O'Neill, you were a giant of a man.
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Thank you, WhitmanO', for the quotes and Milo, for reminding us of the gifts many give while 'passing through.'
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Earth calling Milo... earth calling...
It's Arthur Miller that just died. And he was a far more important writer.
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 Dadgumit, Maverick, you are picky, picky, picky. You'd throw a fit at a funeral just because they buried the wrong man. I meant to say Arthur Miller but my meant got all tangle up in all those Whitmans and O'Neills. My apologies to all. But don't let it be thought that I don't know my playwrights. I just can't seem to remember who is alive and who is dead. 
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> You'd throw a fit at a funeral just because they buried the wrong man. lol! Guilcup as charged, m'lud 
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And he was a far more important writer
With all due respects, mav, my good friend and colleague, but in degree of importance and stature O'Neill towers over Miller. Without Eugene O'Neill there would be NO American theatre, he brought stature and respect to the American stage, was known as the "Father of the American Theatre", and to see his work well-produced is a revelation...plays like "The Iceman Cometh," "Long Day's Journey Into Night," "Moon for the Misbegotten," and "Anna Christie", among so many others, including his one-act sea-plays, will live forever as promethean achievements. Oh, and we was also the second US Nobel Laureate and only US playwright to be awarded such.
In a line of importance I would have to say it is O'Neill, Tennessee Williams, and then Arthur Miller...all titans of the stage.
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> O'Neill, Tennessee Williams, and then Arthur Miller
I was pretty sure you'd think that, mate, but.
I think this is one of those xpond variations of perspective. Now if we were talking about theatre expressive of specifically and only the American psyche, I prolly might agree... I still rank Miller as much (choosing my word very carefully) more important than these other titans.
End of the day though ~ it's good that all of them gain credit for helping shape our understanding of the world.
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End of the day though ~ it's good that all of them gain credit for helping shape our understanding of the world.Thank you, mav.
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