A View From The Bridge

“A View from the Bridge”

‘A View from the Bridge’ is a play from Arthur Miller. He modelled the base of the play upon the Greek Tragedies that incorporated the hero and leading their life, showing the audience their heroic qualities. At some point, the hero of the play would be taken down, most likely killed, because of a fatal flaw, a weakness that exposes the hero for his faults, and brings them down from their heroic status, possibly even becoming a villain. The play, “A View from the Bridge” has its own modern hero in the form of Eddie Carbone, a seemingly ordinary man who works nearly every day on the docks of New York, and lives with his niece, Catherine, and his wife Beatrice, in an Italian-American neighbourhood where many ideals and beliefs are shared across this community.

At the start of the play, a lawyer named Alfieri introduces the neighbourhood to the audience, and to Eddie, starting the play. We see Eddie first as an influential figure for Catherine, as she wants Eddie’s opinion on how she looks “You like it…he’s here B?” This is the audience’s first sign of a hero in Eddie, respect from others, and others willing to hear your words. The audience sees Catherine kneeling by Eddie’s armchair, physically showing the audience her respect for Eddie. Another sign of a heroic Eddie is when he shows how caring he is for Catherine, almost paternal. He fusses over her looks, how men will see her, etc. Eddie’s reasoning behind his paternal attitude towards Catherine leads to a promise on Catherine’s mother’s deathbed. Third sign of a hero in Eddie, the ability to keep a promise, faithful to those close to him, and protective of those he is close to.

Eddie also shows that he can be self-sacrificial, for example, “Beatrice, all I’m worried…with you…out bed”. He gave up his own bed for other people that he hardly knows, showing compassion for others. This heroic act is emphasised to the audience when Beatrice places both her hands on Eddie’s face and says, “You’re an angel! God will bless you!”

As Eddie and his family talk around their dining table, we see that Eddie has his own beliefs about not snitching. It is seen as a sort of “taboo” for Eddie to do, as he expresses what he believes very heavily to Catherine and Beatrice, showing the audience that he is passionate, and has his own personality.

However, as the audience is being shown the Eddie Carbone that is the hero of this play, his flaws are being revealed very subtly. Firstly, we see that the protectiveness of Eddie towards Catherine is mainly about her developing relationship with other men and is mainly about looks and her transition from little girl to woman. Eddie seems to want to stop Catherine from staying out of his reach, and control her. His seemingly humorous one-liners about other men that he tries to protect from Catherine, for example, “Listen, I could tell you…no more”. To the audience, he is being protective, but he is showing early signs of his ability to not regard other people’s feelings, and his knowledge of other people’s bad actions. Secondly, as Catherine talks more about getting a job, Eddie still remains protective of her, but this time has a bit of an argument with Beatrice, arguing about the Catherine and Eddie’s hold on her that the audience can see, has a little effect on her, and is a method of foreshadowing later events in the play.

Act one is half-way through, and at this time it sees the introduction of Marco and Rodolfo, Beatrice’s cousins. Marco is first portrayed to the audience as a very quiet and shy man. He also shows lots of respect and gratitude towards Eddie and Beatrice for allowing them to live her, examples of this show Marco kissing her hand, and the stiff nodding actions of Marco towards Eddie. He also gives Eddie authorities over himself, telling Eddie “when you say go, we will go”. The audience can see that Marco is the more responsible, more respectable, and is conveyed ...

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Rodolfo is very different when the audience sees him for the first time. He plays the fun-loving, polar opposite version of his brother. In early conversations with Eddie and Beatrice, he talks of his dreams and of very happy, great places in Italy and his experiences. He really is being shown to the audience as a bit of warmth/light to the play, as most of the play has been very dark and has lots of talking about worries. Rodolfo does play a bigger part in the play, as he does impress Catherine with his singing skills, but makes an enemy in Eddie. Here, we see the flaws of Eddie revealed a bit more as we see him in what the audience can clearly see as an overprotective flaw in him for Catherine, which starts to affect others around him, the start of Eddie’s effect on others. Eddie insults Catherine, adding to the numerous references to her looks in this play. She gets mad at Eddie and runs of to her room.

After Rodolfo’s impression on Catherine, they are now together in a relationship. Eddie and Beatrice get into another argument about Catherine, and now the audience can see there is a lot more meaning to their arguing, and the start of the sexual theme in the play. The subject of the argument shifts from Catherine to Beatrice’s worries, which she reveals. She asks Eddie a question, “When am I gonna be a wife again?” What she is asking Eddie is, “When are we gonna have sexual relations again?” Eddie doesn’t want to talk about this issue, and gets a little mad at Beatrice.

After confronting Catherine about Rodolfo’s true intentions and Catherine’s negative reaction to what he has said, Eddie turns to Alfieri for advice on the situation. Eddie tells him about the way that Rodolfo conducts himself since he arrived, not concerned about suddenly getting deported, “This guy is here…” The audience can see the desperation of Eddie; he is trying too hard to achieve a selfish goal, an anti-heroic trait. As Eddie continues to try and gain the support of Alfieri, we see that the sexual theme of the play rises again. Alfieri actually asks Eddie, “She can’t marry you, can she.” This implies to the audience that Eddie has sexual feelings for Catherine, and is trying to prevent Rodolfo from being with her, so he can. As Alfieri says this, Eddie becomes furious. This can be interpreted as a sign of Eddie’s confusion over his feelings, and the fact that he cannot control them. At the end of this scene, we see the dual role of Alfieri, being used to end a certain part of the play. As the narrator, he has an ominous feel to the audience, and that transfers very well into his character who is a lawyer, a person of knowledge.

As the play reaches the end of Act One, the audience sees a totally different Eddie in comparison to the hero that we saw in the beginning of the play. He isn’t really the all-round, social hero, but more of a withdrawn person who thinks he’s right in all his actions. The last impression of Eddie here is important to how the audience interprets the remainder of the play. Rodolfo plays the song “Paper Doll” again, and asks Catherine to dance. This is important, as the audience can see that Rodolfo has purposely played that song to get at Eddie, a tactic that works as seen when Eddie scrunches and rolls his newspaper up as the song plays. Everyone in the play and audience sees this action, and he talks about how lucky Rodolfo is. He sounds very jealous. The next major scene involves Eddie and Rodolfo boxing. This is important to the play, as it sets out the last images of Eddie and how he is seen in everyone else’s eyes. The audience can clearly see that he is taking his anger, his emotions out on Rodolfo. Some of the audience can even go as far to say that he planned a boxing spar, and this makes him look very cunning and evil. He hurts Rodolfo, and smiles. The audience sees that Eddie has done this to make himself feel manlier, and show Catherine that Rodolfo cannot protect you, I can. However, Rodolfo fights back the only way he knows how. He gets up from the floor after his fight, plays “Paper Doll” again and dances with Catherine. Now the audience sees Marco being the big brother. He lures Eddie into another contest of manliness and gets the upper hand, using a chair as a potential weapon. It’s like saying to Eddie, “Mess with my brother, and I’ll mess with you”.

The relationship between Catherine and Eddie is frayed, mostly because of the overprotective actions that Eddie has taken, to “protect” her wellbeing and her innocence. Rivalries are brought out. Marco and Rodolfo against Eddie. It all starts to form together for Act Two, the downfall of Eddie Carbone.

Act Two starts off with a three-way confrontation between Eddie, Catherine and Rodolfo. A heavily drunken Eddie starts another argument with Rodolfo, the rivalry started between them is still seen by the audience, continued into the second act to develop. Then, Eddie kisses Catherine after she states she wants to leave. What was said before the kiss can leave to the audience to interpret what Eddie was saying to Catherine with that kiss. Firstly, the audience could see a true-love blossom out that kiss; Eddie’s inhibitions revealed through the many drinks that he has had. And since most of the characters knew that their was a feeling of sexual tension between the two, Eddie had nothing to lose really. Secondly, the kiss could’ve just been used to get at Rodolfo, and further establish Eddie as a fallen hero in the eyes of the audience. Just before they kiss, Catherine says, “I’m not gonna be a baby any more!” Eddie could’ve been waiting for that moment, so that he could finally reveal his feelings without feeling bad about it.

Moving further along in this scene, Eddie kisses Rodolfo. In Eddie’s weird drunken sense, he could’ve just provoked Rodolfo even more by kissing his possible wife and then Rodolfo himself. But then, going back to act one, Eddie implies to the audience and Alfieri that Rodolfo is gay. “Platinum blonde”, references to his feminine-like singing and his ability to mend dresses. This could be a feeble attempt to show Catherine that Rodolfo is gay, and then obviously not a good husband. Now the audience sees him as a fallen man, who has reduced himself to becoming a drunk.

Eddie then makes himself look disgraceful, selfish, and villainous in the eyes of the audience. The main reason for this is because he has turned his back on all his previous principles that he had at the start of the play. As the story developed, Eddie started to go back on his principles to get what he wanted. Catherine, control over others (Marco and Rodolfo), and what becomes a main issue at the end of act two, respect. From his overprotective nature, Eddie has crossed the line from paternal love, to sexual love, and this has caused him to feel jealously and hatred towards Rodolfo. The audience can see how Eddie feels about Catherine, he would do anything to keep her safe, and because of Eddie’s stubbornness, he believes that the only way he can keep Catherine safe, is to be with him. In the beginning, the audience saw Eddie as a person who was easy going, and was reasonable. Now, he is viewed as a manipulative man, who does whatever he can to make people do what he needs them to do. However, the characters in the play and the audience see his downfall, and his desperation to still be the heroic man that was once seen in the beginning. The audience can fully see how Eddie turns his back on his most emphasised principle, don’t snitch. He snitches on Rodolfo and Marco to the Immigration Bureau, and turns his back on all that he previously stood for. In doing this, he also turns his back on everyone he knew, and all except Beatrice cannot stand Eddie.

The situation gets even worse for Eddie, as his rivalry with Marco ends up with a final fight to end act two. Eddie speaks about losing his respect, and goes out into the neighbourhood to get back his respect back from Marco, and become the hero to the audience. The tension rises at this moment, as Catherine finally realises that Eddie has more sexual feelings for her when Beatrice says, “You want something else….never have her!” his makes Eddie’s emotions go out of control, and he becomes extremely angry. The final fight between Eddie and Marco results in Eddie losing and dieing in Catherine’s and Beatrice’s arms. This scene is important, because the audience sees Eddie’s fatal flaw end with the hero’s demise. However, Eddie dies with last words of “My B.” This could be interpreted to the audience as an apology to Beatrice to all he has done wrong.

The end sees Alfieri once again being the narrator, providing his outlook on the events that have taken place and ends the act.