(OUTview NW) RE-view: Seattle Rep's A View from the Bridge is a Triumph!

Torn?            Photo: Alan Alabastro

by MK Scott 

Back in the early 90's during my first visit to New York, I remember taking a walking tour through Brooklyn Heights and I remember seeing this little red Cottage on a street filled with brownstones and was told this is where the playwright, Arthur Miller lived when he was married to Marilyn Monroe, it felt like a piece of Hollywood in this little tiny Burrough of New York.

Knowing of Miller's experience of Brooklyn, I knew his 1955 play, A View of the Bridge, would be be slice of Americana  now on stage at the Seattle Rep.

Miller and Monroe's Cottage in Brooklyn     Photo: MKS

I attended the Opening night and I was reminded early of such classics from 1950's Brooklyn, like On the Waterfront. The play is a time capsule but has a current theme about working class and immigration.

We first meet Fieri (Leonard Kelly-Young) a Small town lawyer who narrates the play in an Our Town, sort of way, but a sense that Tragedy is coming.

Fieri tells the story of Eddie (Mark Zeisler) a longshoreman, with an Archie Bunker-Esq demeanor about him and his wife Bea  (Kirsten Potter) and his wife's niece,  Catherine (Amy Danneker).  Eddie and Catherine have a devoted father and daughter kind of relationship that goes a little incestuous on both parts.

Famly Drama!              Photo: Alan Alabastro

When Eddie's Sicilian cousins, Marco (the always wonderful, Brandon O'Neil, most recently reviewed in 'Cat on a Hot Tin Roof) and his more Dutch looking Brother, Rudolfo (Frank Boyd) Illegally arrive to find work, Eddie doesn't like Rudolfo's interest in Catherine and doesn't think he is man enough for his niece. When Rodolfo gains a reputation with his colleagues for his effeminate nature, which includes singing and the fact he has blond hair. A rumour suggests that he may be homosexual, worrying Eddie and who suggests that Rudolfo wants to marry Catherine to stay in the country.

By Act 2, Eddie's jealously goes into overdrive and kisses Catherine and then Kisses Rudolfo (as the audience is shocked) to prove that this courtship is a sham. Later Eddie even calls INS and Marco seeks revenge on Eddie. OK, All I will say Tragedy strikes at the climax, Italian style.

Scott Bradley's hemmed-in urban set, with tantalizing glimpses of the Manhattan skyline and Brooklyn Bridge reminds us where we are and where we are going.

A View from the Bridge, compared other productions the Rep and Braden Abraham have staged over the last few years (yes, I am talking about 'Virginia Wolff'), has made a classic that still relatable to today's audience. A Standing Ovation for Everyone.

Seattle Rep's A View from the Bridge continues through October 18th, click HERE for Tix and Info.