Directors mourn giant of the stage

The Auckland Theatre Company's former artistic director Simon Prast has paid tribute to Arthur Miller. Prast, who directed Miller's Death of a Salesman a few years ago, says: "Arthur Miller was widely regarded as the world's greatest living playwright, the last-surviving giant of the American stage. His writing made him famous, a celebrity eclipsed only by his 1956 wedding to Marilyn Monroe.

"Miller's passing strikes a personal chord. In 1979, I played Willy Loman in a school production of Death of a Salesman. This first encounter with the man and his masterwork ignited a passion for the theatre that would never diminish.

"The following year, I played one of the sons in a New Independent production. Twenty years later, I directed Jonathan Hardy in the title role for ATC's 50th anniversary production. Jonathan, one of the world's longest-living heart transplant recipients, was rushed to hospital halfway through the final dress rehearsal. I thought he was going to die. My only consolation was that it seemed somehow fitting for an actor to die doing this role. Of course, he recovered and his performance still lives as one of ATC's finest moments.

"The school matinees were the most memorable. For many students it would have been their first theatrical experience. From the moment the lights went down, they were gripped by the story and its relentless momentum towards its tragic climax. At the end, they cried and went wild.

"Miller's words, potent and poetic, had worked their magic on a new generation, just as they had done for another school pupil all those years ago. Few moments in my career have been as satisfying.

"Preparing for the production, I had the great fortune of speaking to Miller on the phone. I sputtered and stumbled over some question about the play's autobiographical significance. He listened with patience and answered with grace and humour, a rare and decent man.

"Arthur Miller was not a dime a dozen. He changed so many lives, my own included. His words set me free. He will be sorely missed."

Veteran New Zealand director Raymond Hawthorne said his Mercury Theatre production of A View from the Bridge "was one of the best things we ever did".

Hawthorne, who teaches drama at Unitec, said when he directed a Unitec production of Miller's The Crucible a couple of years ago, few of his students had heard of McCarthyism and the 1950s anti-communist hysteria, which inspired the play. "But after doing some research, the students responded to the work enormously and understood the validity of it.

"It was quite educative because few of them had heard of the House of Un-American Activities so they really understood the importance of defending your name. It is still such a resonating theme and it is relevant today in the United States.

"Everything Miller wrote struck a nerve. He seemed to write it when the nerve ends were twanging and he hit on it. He was a man of great culture. His language is so powerful and his sense of the storytelling is so extraordinary and timeless, his work will never stop."