Despite its ubiquity in high school English classrooms, despite its comfortable status in the canon of American theater, Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman remains a surprisingly modern play.  Compare its structure to the other major works of the ’forties: A Streetcar Named Desire, The Iceman Cometh, even The Glass Menagerie and The Skin of Our Teeth.  All are more or less chronological.  In contrast, the structure of Death of a Salesman adheres to the mind of its protagonist, Willy Loman (Nathan Lane), and the action is guided by his memories as well as his behavior on the eve of his suicide.  His past, present, and future are compounded.  We see scenes from all points in his adult life.

The new revival, directed by Joe Mantello at the Winter Garden Theatre, seizes on these strengths, and the production is designed to look like a dreamscape.  The set is simple but by no means underwhelming; it looks a bit like an empty factory.  At the beginning of the play, Lane drives a Chevy onstage.  At the end of the play, he drives it off.  A strong, evocative symbol of American freedom and success.  (The jingle “See the U.S.A. in your Chevrolet” debuted the year before Salesman.)  The actors use simple props, and scene changes are effectively communicated through staging and lighting.

Lane has the face of an aging clown.  With his big, expressive, but greying eyebrows, you can see the ghost of another Willy Loman, the younger one who may have been liked, even well-liked, by his buyers.  At some point, they stopped laughing with him and started laughing at him.  The result is heartbreaking; he reminded me of Chaplin in Limelight.  Metcalf is unusually understated, and both Christopher Abbott (Biff) and Ben Ahlers (Happy) are strong as Willy’s half-grown “boys.”

Before seeing this revival, I would have told you there was no need for another revival of Death of a Salesman.  Wendell Pierce did it four years ago.  So much of Miller’s work does not get revived: what about After the Fall, on the centenary of its subject’s birth?  Now, however, I would tell you there’s room for both.  This is an outstanding production.

Death of a Salesman runs through August 9th at the Winter Garden Theatre.  1634 Broadway  New York, NY.  2 hours 50 minutes.  One intermission. Photograph by Emilio Madrid.