The American Clock - Old Vic

thank you! I'm okii, a bit of a sore head, but I'm at home in bed now so hopefully a bit of sleep will clear it up a bit!

So sorry to hear about your accident this evening at the Old Vic. Cold compress and keeping the lights low will help.

American Clock is a long boring evening. Why be bored at the theatre, when you can nap at home for free. Save up your strength for All My Sons and avoid that concrete that done you in this time.

Thank you for the lovely messages. From what friends of mine have told me on here and on other social media, I had a lucky escape anyway. 😂

Maybe this isn't the best Miller play to start on anyway.

I like The Crucible, I've seen the film, so that may be the one for me, and I know Death of a Salesman is an iconic piece so definitely that sounds like a good one too. It's interesting reading the Wikipedia for The American Clock that it appears alot of critics and audiences agree this is one of Miller's weakest, if bits the weakest.

I'm better today thank you, I have a lump but it's on the side of the top of my head under hair so luckily it's not visable too much. I'm just glad it wasn't more serious.

I am glad you aren't too broken. I hope you are back out on the town soon

Finally caught up with this and I'm glad I did. I thought the music and dancing integrated well into the piece, the first act, which had most of it, played better because of it. Where I thought director Rachel Chavkin overthought things and let us down was in the three way casting of the members of the Baum family, the centrepiece characters of the story.

I get what she was after - the play is, in part, a mosaic of America in the Depression so why not have that fact underlined and reflected in the family itself? But that point doesn't need to be made. And using multiple actors for the same roles diffuses our involvement with the people they're playing. The Baums are archetypal Arthur Miller creations, versions of his own family, under economic stress and splintering as a result. In a Big Picture play like this - something new for Miller - they are the heart and soul of the thing, the foundation upon which the whole epic is grounded. Ms Chavkin's concept severely undercuts that.

Still, there is much to enjoy and the cast are first rate. There is a great deal of passion, raw seething anger, in this play - Miller doesn't pull any punches - and that comes through loud and clear. And I suppose, ultimately, that is the real message of The American Clock.

At the interval, christ what a mess! Prime example of director's ego taking over. Oh well im not walking. Coz god alone knows when this will be revived again. Poor Arthur!