Death of a Salesman (18 page)

BIFF [
crying, broken
]: Will you let me go, for Christ’s sake? Will you take that phony dream and burn it before something happens? [
Struggling to contain himself, he pulls away and moves to the stairs.
] I’ll go in the morning. Put him—put him to bed. [
Exhausted,
BIFF
moves up the stairs to his room.
]

WILLY [
after a long pause, astonished, elevated
]: Isn’t that—isn’t that remarkable? Biff—he likes me!

LINDA: He loves you, Willy!

HAPPY [
deeply moved
]: Always did, Pop.

WILLY: Oh, Biff! [
Staring wildly
] He cried! Cried to me. [
He is choking with his love, and now cries out his promise
.] That boy—that boy is going to be magnificent!

[BEN
appears in the light just outside the kitchen.
]

BEN: Yes, outstanding, with twenty thousand behind him.

LINDA [
sensing the racing of his mind, fearfully, carefully
]: Now come to bed, Willy. It’s all settled now.

WILLY [
finding it difficult not to rush out of the house
]: Yes, we’ll sleep. Come on. Go to sleep, Hap.

BEN: And it does take a great kind of a man to crack the jungle.

[
In accents of dread,
BEN’S
idyllic music starts up.
]

HAPPY [
his arm around
LINDA]: I’m getting married, Pop, don’t forget it. I’m changing everything. I’m gonna run that department before the year is up. You’ll see, Mom. [
He kisses her.
]

BEN: The jungle is dark but full of diamonds, Willy.

[WILLY
turns, moves, listening to
BEN.]

LINDA: Be good. You’re both good boys, just act that way, that’s all.

HAPPY: ’Night, Pop. [
He goes upstairs.
]

LINDA [
to
WILLY]: Come, dear.

BEN [
with greater force
]: One must go in to fetch a diamond out.

WILLY [
to
LINDA,
as he moves slowly along the edge of the kitchen, toward the door
]: I just want to get settled down, Linda. Let me sit alone for a little.

LINDA [
almost uttering her fear
]: I want you upstairs.

WILLY [
taking her in his arms
]: In a few minutes, Linda. I couldn’t sleep right now. Go on, you look awful tired. [
He kisses her.
]

BEN: Not like an appointment at all. A diamond is rough and hard to the touch.

WILLY: Go on now. I’ll be right up.

LINDA: I think this is the only way, Willy.

WILLY: Sure, it’s the best thing.

BEN: Best thing!

WILLY: The only way. Everything is gonna be—go on, kid, get to bed. You look so tired.

LINDA: Come right up.

WILLY: Two minutes.

WILLY: Loves me. [
Wonderingly
] Always loved me. Isn’t that a remarkable thing? Ben, he’ll worship me for it!

BEN [
with promise
]: It’s dark there, but full of diamonds.

WILLY: Can you imagine that magnificence with twenty thousand dollars in his pocket?

LINDA [
calling from her room
]: Willy! Come up!

WILLY [
calling into the kitchen
]: Yes! Yes. Coming! It’s very smart, you realize that, don’t you, sweetheart? Even Ben sees it. I gotta go, baby. ’Bye! ’Bye! [
Going over to
BEN,
almost dancing
] Imagine? When the mail comes he’ll be ahead of Bernard again!

BEN: A perfect proposition all around.

WILLY: Did you see how he cried to me? Oh, if I could kiss him, Ben!

BEN: Time, William, time!

WILLY: Oh, Ben, I always knew one way or another we were gonna make it, Biff and I!

BEN [
looking at his watch
]: The boat. We’ll be late. [
He moves slowly off into the darkness.
]

WILLY [
elegiacally, turning to the house
]: Now when you kick off, boy, I want a seventy-yard boot, and get right down the field under the ball, and when you hit, hit low and hit hard, because it’s important, boy. [
He swings around and faces the audience.
] There’s all kinds of important people in the stands, and the first thing you know . . . [
Suddenly realizing he is alone
] Ben! Ben, where do I . . . ? [
He makes a sudden movement of search.
] Ben, how do I . . . ?

LINDA [
calling
]: Willy, you coming up?

WILLY [
uttering a gasp of fear, whirling about as if to quiet her
]: Sh! [
He turns around as if to find his way; sounds, faces, voices seem to be swarming in upon him and he flicks at them, crying,
“Sh! Sh!”
Suddenly music, faint and high, stops him. It rises in intensity, almost to an unbearable scream. He goes up and down on his toes, and rushes off around the house.
] Shhh!

LINDA: Willy?

[
There is no answer.
LINDA
waits.
BIFF
gets up off his bed. He is still in his clothes.
HAPPY
sits up.
BIFF
stands listening.
]

LINDA [
with real fear
]: Willy, answer me! Willy!

[
There is the sound of a car starting and moving away at full speed.
]

LINDA: No!

BIFF [
rushing down the stairs
]: Pop!

[
As the car speeds off, the music crashes down in a frenzy of sound, which becomes the soft pulsation of a single cello string.
BIFF
slowly returns to his bedroom. He and
HAPPY
gravely don their jackets.
LINDA
slowly walks out of her room. The music has developed into a dead march. The leaves of day are appearing over everything.
CHARLEY
and
BERNARD,
somberly dressed, appear and knock on the kitchen door.
BIFF
and
HAPPY
slowly descend the stairs to the kitchen as
CHARLEY
and
BERNARD
enter. All stop a moment when
LINDA,
in clothes of mourning, bearing a little bunch of roses, comes through the draped doorway into the kitchen. She goes to
CHARLEY
and takes his arm. Now all move toward the audience, through the wall-line of the kitchen. At the limit of the apron,
LINDA
lays down the flowers, kneels, and sits back on her heels. All stare down at the grave.
]

REQUIEM

CHARLEY: It’s getting dark, Linda.

[LINDA
doesn’t react. She stares at the grave.
]

BIFF: How about it, Mom? Better get some rest, heh? They’ll be closing the gate soon.

[LINDA
makes no move. Pause.
]

HAPPY [
deeply angered
]: He had no right to do that. There was no necessity for it. We would’ve helped him.

CHARLEY [
grunting
]: Hmmm.

BIFF: Come along, Mom.

LINDA: Why didn’t anybody come?

CHARLEY: It was a very nice funeral.

LINDA: But where are all the people he knew? Maybe they blame him.

CHARLEY: Naa. It’s a rough world, Linda. They wouldn’t blame him.

LINDA: I can’t understand it. At this time especially. First time in thirty-five years we were just about free and clear. He only needed a little salary. He was even finished with the dentist.

CHARLEY: No man only needs a little salary.

LINDA: I can’t understand it.

BIFF: There were a lot of nice days. When he’d come home from a trip; or on Sundays, making the stoop; finishing the cellar; putting on the new porch; when he built the extra bathroom; and put up the garage. You know something, Charley, there’s more of him in that front stoop than in all the sales he ever made.

CHARLEY: Yeah. He was a happy man with a batch of cement.

LINDA: He was so wonderful with his hands.

BIFF: He had the wrong dreams. All, all, wrong.

HAPPY [
almost ready to fight
BIFF]: Don’t say that!

BIFF: He never knew who he was.

CHARLEY [
stopping
HAPPY’S
movement and reply. To
BIFF]: Nobody dast blame this man. You don’t understand: Willy was a salesman. And for a salesman, there is no rock bottom to the life. He don’t put a bolt to a nut, he don’t tell you the law or give you medicine. He’s a man way out there in the blue, riding on a smile and a shoeshine. And when they start not smiling back—that’s an earthquake. And then you get yourself a couple of spots on your hat, and you’re finished. Nobody dast blame this man. A salesman is got to dream, boy. It comes with the territory.

BIFF: Charley, the man didn’t know who he was.

HAPPY [
infuriated
]: Don’t say that!

BIFF: Why don’t you come with me, Happy?

HAPPY: I’m not licked that easily. I’m staying right in this city, and I’m gonna beat this racket! [
He looks at
BIFF,
his chin set.
] The Loman Brothers!

BIFF: I know who I am, kid.

HAPPY: All right, boy. I’m gonna show you and everybody else that Willy Loman did not die in vain. He had a good dream. It’s the only dream you can have—to come out number-one man. He fought it out here, and this is where I’m gonna win it for him.

BIFF [
with a hopeless glance at
HAPPY,
bends toward his mother
]: Let’s go, Mom.

LINDA: I’ll be with you in a minute. Go on, Charley. [
He hesitates.
] I want to, just for a minute. I never had a chance to say good-bye.

LINDA: Forgive me, dear. I can’t cry. I don’t know what it is, but I can’t cry. I don’t understand it. Why did you ever do that? Help me, Willy, I can’t cry. It seems to me that you’re just on another trip. I keep expecting you. Willy, dear, I can’t cry. Why did you do it? I search and search and I search, and I can’t understand it, Willy. I made the last payment on the house today. Today, dear. And there’ll be nobody home. [
A sob rises in her throat.
] We’re free and clear. [
Sobbing more fully, released
] We’re free. [BIFF
comes slowly toward her.
] We’re free . . . We’re free . . .

CURTAIN

DEATH OF A SALESMAN

A PLAY BY ARTHUR MILLER

STAGED BY ELIA KAZAN

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

CAST
(in order of appearance)

 

 

WILLY LOMAN

LINDA

BIFF

HAPPY

BERNARD

THE WOMAN

CHARLEY

UNCLE BEN

HOWARD WAGNER

JENNY

STANLEY

MISS FORSYTHE

LETTA

Lee J. Cobb

Mildred Dunnock

Arthur Kennedy

Cameron Mitchell

Don Keefer

Winnifred Cushing

Howard Smith

Thomas Chalmers

Alan Hewitt

Ann Driscoll

Tom Pedi

Constance Ford

Hope Cameron

 

 

The setting and lighting were designed by JO MIELZINER.

The incidental music was composed by ALEX NORTH.

The costumes were designed by JULIA SZE.

Presented by KERMIT BLOOMGARDEN and WALTER FRIED at the Morosco Theatre in New York on February 10, 1949.