All My Sons - Rose, Kingston

David Horovitch and Penny Downie are the leads

Regardless of the casting, I despair at yet another production of a play which is performed so often. This doesn't apply only to Arthur Miller but to many other well-known playwrights (eg Coward, Ibsen, Pinter and above all Shakespeare). I know there are always people (particularly younger, newer audience members) who have not seen it and some plays may be exam texts, but why on earth not something less frequently seen, either by the same author or another? That still leaves plenty of options without resorting to the obscure or deservedly forgotten work.

I think we sometimes forget the size of the potential theatre audience, and wrongly assume that we should each be interested in every production. As part of the crowd at Roald Dahl's City of the Unexpected at the weekend - one estimate was seventy thousand - I was reminded that we are many!

It's on at Kingston. It will be half-full at best even for a familiar play like this. It would be empty for Finishing the Picture.

Financial constraints too I suppose. It is the job of the heavily subsidised (Arcola - I'm looking at you) or fringe venues to stage lesser known works. There is a small but dedicated audience in London for them. For example I tried to book for the Noel Coward rarity currently at the Finborough only a day or so after booking opened and it was already sold out. Maybe with Miller getting the rights to produce at a fringe venue is tricky, not sure.

I'm really surprised to hear that, Jan Brock, as I spent days havering over which date to book and checking how far ahead performances were sold out, and even so I had no difficulty booking, albeit not for my initially-preferred date - but that was due to my dithering.

Dare one suggest "paucity of great roles for the slightly older woman"?

Of course. Forgot about her family circumstances… so sad...