Discuss How The Nature Of The Relationships Between Catherine, Eddie and Rodolfo Are Made Evident In The Kissing Scene And How This Scene Contributes To The Play As A Whole

“A View From The Bridge”, written by a leading American playwright, Arthur Miller, is a relatively short play consisting of only two Acts which shows the reluctance of a “father” to let go of his “daughter”. Eddie Carbone, the main character, is faced with a decision as to whether to let his “daughter”, Catherine go, or to betray her “sub-marine” (immigrant) boyfriend to the Immigration Bureau. Consequently breaking the Sicilian honour code by betraying his wife’s cousin (Catherine’s boyfriend Rodolfo) and risk losing the respect of not only his family, but the whole community which eventually leads to his own death. The play deals with difficult issues such as how immigrants are forced to compromise their values so that they can live peacefully, however Miller knows that it isn’t always as simple as that, as his parents were in fact immigrants so he would have grown up watching their struggle between their own culture and their adopted American culture. In addition, Miller himself worked as a “ship lifter” for two years in Brooklyn, where he liaised with the Italian workers, during this time he gained knowledge of their way of life and the structure of their society. He also heard of a similar circumstance where a man betrays his family in order to keep his daughter at home with him. This personal experience gives “A View From The Bridge” an authentic yet poignant representation of Sicilian values and the clash with the immigrants adopted American values that his parents and co-workers must have felt all along. These feelings are expressed throughout the play by a lawyer named Alferi who talks directly to the audience in a monologue to break up and signify the stages which lead to Eddie Carbone’s

betrayal. This play conveys the struggle within Eddie Carbone, and with his death Miller painfully reminds us that “It is better to settle for half, it must be!”

Eddie and Catherine have a typical father-daughter relationship despite the fact that Catherine is actually his niece. We can see his overprotective nature very early in the first act where he refers to her skirt as being “too short”. This exchange shows how he sees her; as his little girl rather than a young woman of 17, he instinctively feels the need to protect her, he does not want to see her grow up and this fear of losing her only adds to his reluctancy to let her become a woman and lead her own life. Eddie then continues to tell her how she is “walking wavy” and how heads of local men “are turnin’ like windmills”. This again conveys Eddie’s fatherly nature and reluctance to accept that she is a young woman. She then breaks down almost in tears [at his disapproval], this shows her naivety and craving for her “father’s” approval even though she is seventeen and she should be able to wear whatever she likes. This can give us some possible insight into why Eddie treats her like a child. In addition towards the end of Act 1, Beatrice (Eddie’s wife) tells Catherine how she [throws herself] at him like [she was] twelve years old, this can show us why Eddie still treats her “like a baby”. These harsh words from Beatrice hit home with Catherine and awaken the desire inside her to go out to the world of work and fend for herself, which she reveals to Eddie later on in the play, with a devastating effect.

Shortly after this conversation Eddie drops a bombshell; that the two immigrants, Beatrice’s cousins Marco and Rodolfo, have arrived in the country; consequently all the issues are pushed under the carpet so as not to upset the visitors. The first, Marco, faces no problems, only admiration for his strong work ethic and commitment to his starving family. However the younger of the two brothers, the

“Blond” Rodolfo receives a mixed response; he seems to be well liked by everyone apart from Eddie, who is uneasy with Rodolfo’s apparent lack of masculinity. In addition to this, ...

This is a preview of the whole essay

“Blond” Rodolfo receives a mixed response; he seems to be well liked by everyone apart from Eddie, who is uneasy with Rodolfo’s apparent lack of masculinity. In addition to this, Eddie also finds the fact that Catherine and Rodolfo seem to get on well hard to cope with as he feels that she is being taken away from him. We can see very early on that there is the potential for a relationship between the two when she immediately asks him if he is “married?” Rodolfo also refers to her as “beautiful”. This shows the light hearted and flirty relationship which is built on and results in them dating. Consequently Eddie and Catherine start to drift further and further apart, which leads to Eddie resenting Rodolfo for taking Catherine away from him, he even refers to him as a “God dam thief!” This suggests that Catherine is his possession and that this argument is all because of Eddie’s pride and honour. Therefore Eddie and Rodolfo, to a certain extent have a difficult and somewhat awkward relationship, Eddie cannot face the fact that Catherine has found someone else to rely on and to make matters worse the new “submarine” is allegedly only interested in Catherine for his “papers” so he can claim residency in America. However the uneasiness started before Catherine and Rodolfo even began to date; Eddie’s dislike for Rodolfo becomes apparent when Rodolfo begins to sing, Eddie rises and moves upstage partly because Catherine seems to enjoy it, he doesn’t like anyone taking Catherine’s attention away from him, when he has raised her from a child, he doesn’t want to be sidelined and forgotten. In addition the lyrics state how difficult it is to “love a doll that is not your own” which is directly relevant to the situation concerning Catherine and Eddie. Eddie again feels uncomfortable which such a feminine man and he sees the singing as a sign of Rodolfo being “not right” (homosexual). In these times fathers would always be protective of their daughters, they wouldn’t have the freedom that girls have now. Therefore the audience would empathise with Eddie trying to hang on to his daughter. However it shocks the audience when his parental love is revealed as perhaps, something more sinister, this adds to their pity for him and keeps the audience gripped and guessing what he’ll do next.

Eddie’s growing dislike of Rodolfo becomes evident when he takes Catherine to the “Paramount”, Eddie lightly insults Rodolfo saying that he has “wacky hair”, that he gives him the “Heebie Jeebies” and he even refers to him as being “like a chorus girl”. Eddie clearly feels embarrassed by Rodolfo’s apparent lack of masculinity he even makes reference to his lack of strength to Alferi when he states that if he “[closes] the paper fast it could blow him over”. Rodolfo is seen as a joker among many of his co-workers; they refer to his character as, “humorous” yet although Eddie clearly doesn’t like Rodolfo he still sticks up for him by saying; “he’s got a sense of humour”. This small section of the play shows just how highly Eddie regards family values, which makes the audience disbelieve Alferi when he suggests that he “could have finished the story” after Eddie confided in him. This all adds to the tension of the play and makes the ending more intense and surprising.

At the end of Act 1 tension is building within the family and we all know that this will all come to a climax and this scene is the calm before the storm; it is the build up that prepares us for the kissing scene which occurs at the beginning of Act 2. At the time, all of the Eddie’s feelings are being expressed to Catherine, Alferi or Beatrice and this is all happening “behind closed doors”. However, in this scene Eddie’s feelings towards Rodolfo become apparent to Marco. It begins with Eddie talking about respect, directing most of this at Rodolfo after he said that America is

more “free”. Eddie sees this as an opportunity to character assassinate Rodolfo and belittle him in front of everyone. He begins to say how in Italy you wouldn’t just “drag off some girl without permission”, Rodolfo senses the bitterness in Eddie’s tone

and immediately starts to argue how he does have “respect for her”, yet at this point Marco is quick to tell Rodolfo to “come home early” which shows how they respect Eddie and don’t quite understand the true root of Eddie’s uneasiness. Yet Eddie is not

content with embarrassing Rodolfo in front of Catherine to that extent, he then tries to push it further by stating that the dock is “no place for him”. However when he realises that Rodolfo and Catherine stop dancing to listen to what he has to say he realises that he has gone too far and back tracks by starting to say how Rodolfo’s skills such as dress making, cooking and singing are an asset to him. Yet he still senses the tension so changes the subject to boxing and uses it as an opportunity to demonstrate his superior strength over Rodolfo by proposing to teach him. As a result of this conversation they begin to spar with a few gentle punches, then after some encouragement Rodolfo starts to throw some slightly harder punches, then Rodolfo grazes his jaw, Eddie then punches back which causes Rodolfo to [stagger]. This is the moment where Eddie’s underlying dislike for Rodolfo becomes apparent to Marco. Marco then decides to play Eddie at his own game; Marco then challenges Eddie to lift a chair from the bottom of the leg, Eddie fails the first time but tries again and again fails to lift the chair. Marco uses this as an opportunity to belittle Eddie the way he did it to Rodolfo. So Marco also attempts to lift the chair and lifts it on his first attempt, he then raises the chair over Eddie’s head, and conveys a glare of warning which Eddie absorbs, this was an attempt of Marco to intimidate Eddie using a test of strength, and the glare of warning is Marco informally telling Eddie to leave his little brother alone and pick on someone his own size. This scene is the catalyst that aggravates Eddie further and Eddie sees this as an insult to his honour. This leads to an explosion of anger in the “kissing scene” at the beginning of Act 2 which is a crescendo that has been building up ever since the “sub-marines” arrived, which we know from Alferi’s monologue will lead to some form of confrontation and ultimately to Marco’s deportation and Eddie’s death .

In “the kissing scene” the ulterior motives and hidden intentions of the leading characters become apparent. The character assassination no longer happens in secret, “behind closed doors”, in this explosive scene Eddie’s true feelings towards Rodolfo are shown and all it takes for this to happen is a “case of scotch whisky”. The scene begins with Eddie entering the house to see Catherine and Rodolfo in the bedroom doorway, at this sight Eddie’s arm jerks slightly in shock, which shows his discomfort which then leads to Eddie exploding with anger and ordering Rodolfo to “pack it up” and to “get out”. This provokes Catherine, although trembling with fright to make the difficult decision to leave him. As a result of this Eddie is consumed with rage as he has a deep love for her. Eddie’s pride also comes into the equation; he simply cannot face the fact that a man has come into his house and taken his “daughter”, and to add insult to injury she actually wants to go. This seems to awaken a hidden desire deep within Eddie to be with her, whether it is in a parental or romantic way it is unclear, all the audience can see is that he would do anything to keep her near and this conveys his love for her however innocent, or not in this case it is. This becomes apparent when he draws her to him and kisses her on the mouth. Consequently Rodolfo flies at him in an attack however Eddie pins his arms and kisses him. Eddie

then exclaims “you see” as if Rodolfo wanted the kiss and is therefore a homosexual. This shows Eddie’s desperation, he is ready to be seen as a homosexual just so he can stop Catherine form marrying Rodolfo. This would have been extremely controversial as homosexuality wasn’t yet accepted in America at the time, so this would have made Eddie’s attempt to keep Catherine seem even more irrational and desperate to the audience.

“The kissing scene” is the climax of the play. All of Act one has been building up to this point, this point where Eddie makes his hate for Rodolfo and some might also say the true nature of his love for Catherine apparent. Which the audience know thanks to Alferi’s prediction that this scene will lead to Eddie making irrational, impulsive decisions. Such as reporting Marco and Rodolfo to the Immigration Bureau

which therefore leads to his own tragic death. However the scene also depicts Eddie’s high held family values crumbling beneath him, this will induce empathy in the audience as they will see his difficult circumstances, the audience feel sorry for him regardless of his unforgivable betrayal, this make his death even more tragic which grips the audience and therefore adds to the play as a whole. (This scene helps to maintain the tension that is built throughout the play and prepare the audience for the explosive ending that we are warned about throughout the play by Alferi.)

In conclusion “the kissing scene” brings all of the feelings out into the open and sets in motion the chain of events that leads to Eddie’s death, the scene is the climax of the play that prepares the audience for the tragic ending. Alferi is also used to give the play a clear structure; within each scene he adds his own insight, thoughts on the characters and even predictions as to possible outcomes of the play. This may seem like he is giving away the plot, however his predictions help to build the tension as we do not want to believe that Eddie will betray his family. The audience feels tied to the fate of the characters; they want a happy ending, however sue to Alferi’s predictions they experience dramatic irony in that they know that it cant work out as they had desired, they know that Eddie will betray his family and that there is nothing they can do about it which induces frustration which also adds to the play.

Miller used other techniques to help bring tension and a shock element into “A View From The Bridge”. Miller inserted some socially unacceptable elements to the play such as suggested homosexuality, which would shock and disturb some viewers as plays at that time were more conservative. In addition he also hinted that the relationship between Catherine and Eddie may be more than a father-daughter relationship; that it is in fact romantic and therefore that Catherine has an Electra complex. An Electra complex is where a father and daughter have an unnaturally close relationship which eventually grows and leads to sexual relations. This is hinted at near the end of the play when Beatrice exclaims “you can never have her”. Moreover “the kissing scene” also suggests this theory as Eddie kisses Catherine on her mouth which is traditionally sign of affection between those in a relationship. These techniques are used to shock and grip the audience.

It is small details like this that make the play what it is; a play with intricate and complicated relationships which develop and lead to deportation, death and romance.

Tom Gavin Coursework Draft page