Inspired, visceral 'View From the Bridge' opens Goodman Theatre's season
The final moments of Belgian director Ivo van Hove's meticulously minimalist revival of “A View From the Bridge” depict despair so starkly, so viscerally it almost takes your breath away.
Van Hove's remarkable re-imagining of Arthur Miller's play - remounted here as Goodman Theatre's season opener - is about as pure an expression of Greek tragedy as you'll experience. If catharsis is what you seek, you will surely find it in van Hove's stripped-down, superbly acted production, which unfolds over two unrelenting, intermissionless hours within what appears to be a boxing ring.
Surrounded on three sides by audience members, the ring (by set and lighting designer Jan Versweyveld) is an appropriate setting given the pummeling the members of the Carbone family inflict and endure. The space is empty. There are no props, except for a simple wooden chair. The actors are barefoot. Their clothes, by costume designer An D'Huys) are mostly muted.
The effect focuses audience attention on Miller's rough poetry; his flawed, conflicted characters and the inevitable fate that befalls a traitor.
Lust and betrayal propel the tale, which begins on a stage bathed in red with dockworkers washing away the day's grime. It ends with a gripping, blood-drenched finale with a shattered family united in their shared grief. A tragedy fulfilled.
Serving as narrator is Alfieri (a fervent turn by Ezra Knight), the astute, world-weary attorney who serves as de facto Greek chorus. While spending much of the play on the periphery, Alfieri senses the catastrophe pending but is powerless to stop it.
It begins during the mid-1950s, in an Italian-American Brooklyn neighborhood where middle-aged longshoreman Eddie Carbone (a bravura turn by the combustible Ian Bedford) lives with his wife, Beatrice (the informed, expressive Andrus Nichols), and her niece Catherine (an authentic, transformative Catherine Combs), who the couple raised from infancy.
Eager to be out from under the watchful eye of her beloved but overprotective uncle, 17-year-old Catherine informs the couple she's been offered a stenographer's job at a plumbing company. Eddie objects, while Beatrice - who senses her husband's affection for her niece has taken a decidedly unpaternal turn - supports Catherine's bid for independence.
Carbone family life is further disrupted by the arrival of Beatrice's cousins: family man Marco (Brandon Espinoza) and his younger, more garrulous brother Rodolpho (Daniel Abeles). Unable to find work in their native Sicily, the undocumented immigrants arrive in the U.S. illegally hoping to get jobs to support their family.
To Eddie's dismay, Catherine is immediately attracted to Rodolpho, a charmer who likes singing, sewing and cooking and wants more than anything to become an American citizen. Consumed by passion and jealousy he can neither comprehend nor articulate, his pride wounded, Eddie betrays the brothers and makes himself a pariah.
He is the classic, tragic figure: undone by his own ego and a lack of self-awareness. Like Miller's Willy Loman, Eddie Carbone does not know himself. He fails to recognize what everyone else ultimately perceives: the love he bears for his niece - however it began - has become obsessive, unnatural and dangerous.
For lacking understanding, we might pity him. But betrayal of his kin leaves no room for sympathy. Not in the stark, unflinching world reflected in van Hove's production, which premiered in 2014 at London's The Young Vic theater, transferred to the West End and then to Broadway where it earned 2016 Tony Awards for revival and direction, which is inspired.
Just how inspired is evidenced by the ferocious, finely tuned performances, the spare design, the faint echoes of a requiem and the occasional rumbling that underscores the action. And van Hove's skill is reflected in a brilliantly executed scene late in the play. Fueled by anger, suspicion and jealousy, the tension among the extended family members is palpable. It's reflected in the strained staccato dialogue, in the distance the characters place between themselves and in their anguished expressions. Uncomfortable to watch, it's impossible to turn away.
That's van Hove's vision. And that's what sustains this unforgettable “View.”
“A View From the Bridge”
★ ★ ★ ★
Location: 170 N. Dearborn St., Chicago, (312) 443-3800 or
Showtimes: 7:30 p.m. Wednesday; 2 and 7:30 p.m. Thursday; 8 p.m. Friday; 2 and 8 p.m. Saturday; 2 and 7:30 p.m. Sunday through Oct. 15. Also 7:30 p.m. Oct. 3. No 7:30 p.m. performance Oct. 15
Tickets: $20-$99
Running time: About 2 hours, no intermission
Parking: $22 with Goodman validation at the Government Self Park at Lake and Clark streets
Rating: For adults, contains mature themes