Review #2 of 2: All My Sons by Arthur Miller, Filigree Theatre
by Michael Meigs

Arthur Miller's 1947 All My Sons was of its moment although as an American tragedy, it went against the country's vigorous optimism after victory in Word War II. The action takes place three and a half years after the Kellers' older son Larry, a pilot, disappeared on the Pacific front. Soon after that,  protagonist Joe Keller's son Chris came hom, having  survived the massacre of the company he commanded. Kate, his mother, stubbornly refuses to believe that her older son Larry is dead.

 

Arthur Miller later said that only Brooks Atkinson's positive review in the New York Times had saved it. Perhaps; but the work won him his first Tony award, so Atkinson can't have been its only admirer. 

 

 

The set at Austin's Ground Floor Theatre depicting the Keller's back yard is an achievement in itself. Patrick Anthony, technical director Beau Harris, and the crew constructed for us a house and porch that is as solidly engineered and deftly detailed as Miller's plot.

 

The action opens with neighborly exchanges in the Kellers' back yard. Joe's on friendly terms with the neighbors—the local doctor and his wife, a busy handyman and his pretty wife who have three young children, and an overgrown but eager kid whom Joe's encouraged to become a constable on the lookout for bad guys. Miller rouses our sympathies for Joe and for his wife before introducing Ann Deever, girlfriend of the vanished older son. His brother Chris, living at home and reluctantly working at Keller's factory plant, has invited Ann to visit.

 

 

 

We're probably halfway through Act I when hurried conversations between Chris and Ann let us know that her father is in prison, held responsible for defective parts from Keller's factory that caused twenty-one P-40 fighters to crash. We learn that Joe Keller was also arrested as well but was exonerated at trial.

 

Keller himself, as portrayed by J. Kevin Smith, is serene about all this, having returned to the neighborhood, where he's still running his factory. But he's surrounded by big emotions that this play will unravel. Tonie Knight as his wife Kate is angrily adamant that their older son must still be alive. Chris (James Caleb Lindsley) is frustrated and at loose ends, yearning to re-encounter his vanished brother's fiancée; Ann herself is fascinated by Chris despite a three-year silence; Dr. Bayless (Mike Ooi) serves as a wry narrator/commentator but wishes he was doing medical research instead of making housecalls; Bethany Harbaugh as the doctor's wife is scandalized by the budding romance.

 

And then there's Jon Edward Cook as Ann's brother George, dispatched by Miller from New York to the Ohio penitentiary to the Keller household He's a detonator cap to set off the explosion of Act II.

 

Director Elizabeth V. Newman winds up Miller's plot machine and keeps it steadily ticking, showing the stakes rising throughout. Her persistence to staging andmarks of twentieth-century U.S. theatre history has reminded us again and again of the stresses and contradictions of the "American Dream." The structure of All My Sons foreshadows the playwright's 1949 Death of a Salesman, which was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Drama and the Tony award for Best Play. Striving but flawed, both Keller and Willy Loman think they're doing the best for their families, seeking success and security in the commercial world of the post-war; their wives Kate and Linda anguish over their husbands' hidden failures but cannot ameliorate or cure them; the children, all male, reluctantly honor their fathers but deal with brutal honesty that destroys the older men.

Partly for that and because of earlier associations, in 1957 Miller was hauled before the House UnAmerican Activities Committee, where he testified about his own activities but refused to name names, getting slapped with a contempt of congress citation (later overturned by the courts).

 

 

Aspects of the casting require some indulgent willing disbelief. Kevin Smith, vigorous and trim, has full mastery of the role but doesn't look like a 61-year-old man who'd like to retire. Teddy Coltman-Oliver as the sneaker-and-beanie wearing nextdoor kid towers over Smith. The capable James Caleb Lindsley as Chris appears young, almost skinny, unlikely to have been a leader in combat four years before (I do grant the possibility, however!). If I'd been casting the play, I'd have switched the roles of Chris Keller and Ann's brother George. Jon Edward Cook gives George the strength, authority, and self-mastery to plunge into this complex situation and hold his own against all the others present.

 

The women in this production are spot on. Tonie Knight is strong when insisting Larry's alive, uneasy around Ann the new arrival, and anguished as Joe's deceit is revealed and acknowledged. Harbaugh's sharp with Ann, to the point of menacing, and indulgent with her vaguely discontented husband. Laurie Ellie MacLeod shows fragile strength and sweet idealism that will enable her character Ann Deaver to survive the disasters of the Keller household.

 

EXTRA

Click to view Filigree Theatre's program for ALL MY SONS

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All My Sons
by Arthur Miller
Filigree Theatre

October 30 - November 14, 2026

WEEKEND 1:  Friday Oct - Sun Nov 1
WEEKEND 2:  Thurs Nov 5 - Sun Nov 8
WEEKEND 3: Thurs Nov 12 - SAT Nov 14

GROUND FLOOR THEATRE 979 Springdale Rd #122, Austin, TX 78702