‘Eddie is pleased and therefore shy about it’
This stage direction shows a good relationship between Eddie and his niece Catherine right from the beginning of the play. But, as the play progresses further the audience notice just how controlling Eddie is towards Catherine.
Eddie’s over powering behaviour is probably first emphasised when Catherine is talking to him about her job as a stenographer and he says
''why didn't you ask me before you took a job ?''
This shows that he wants Catherine to ask for his permission before accepting the job. He does this so he feels like he is the boss and because he wasn't consulted first he feels threatened. This is one thing that lead to his downfall because he was trying to be so manly he could not show any emotions, so he kept everything inside and bottled it up.
When Eddie first hears this news, the stage directions show he is shocked.
‘Pause. Eddie looks at Catherine, then back to Beatrice’
The stage directions show that Eddie is not happy with this, or in some ways disappointed that she is maturing so fast, and is perhaps frightened that she will be leaving him, and become independent. Eddie does not want her to be an independent woman or too mature, and in a way is protecting her.
When Eddie is questioning Catherine about her new job, the stage directions show us that he is ‘strangely nervous’. When he finds out about Catherine getting paid fifty dollars a week the stage directions also show us that he may be feeling threatened.
‘(To Catherine, surprised)’ Fifty?
Eddie acts like this because he has the responsibility of being the man of the house (Sicilian code of conduct), and should be the only one earning money. He has also always looked after Catherine financially, and when she finds a job, it just hits him that she is growing up right in front of him, and Eddie wants to stop it, but cannot.
When Eddie goes to look for his cigar, and it is not in his pocket, Catherine offers to get it for him. The Cigar is one of the many symbolic items that Miller uses to highlight the relationship between the two. Eddie has taken upon himself to be a father to Catherine and to give her the very best in life. Therefore, because of his 'fatherly´ affections Eddie and Catherine have developed a close family relationship. When Eddie becomes quite adamant that he disapproves of the way she walks, Catherine is 'almost in tears. This simple act of crying shows the audience immediately how naive and vulnerable she is. It is obvious however that she views him only as a father figure because she gets upset over the things that he says. She almost reduces herself to a baby just for him, to please him and in this way, she is almost behaving in a teasing manner towards Eddie. Therefore, She is always running around after him, doing the dishes, getting him a beer or a cigar and lightening it for him (‘stay there, I’ll get it for you’; ‘here! I’ll light it for you!’) and she constantly looks for his approval. Eddie’s intentions here are and throughout the play, questionable. Is he attracted or is it just parental pride? Although the audience do not know what to expect from this, it is already obvious that the relationship that Eddie has with Catherine is not natural.
After Eddie takes a puff of his cigar, he take out his watch and has a glace at it, and then puts it back in his pocket. The symbolism of the watch is that Eddie absolutely hates change, and when he looks at the time it shows how everything is happening so fast, with Catherine getting her first job, and her growing up so fast shows how much change is going on.
The idea that Catherine is growing up so fast in the play is emphasised when Beatrice’s cousins (Rodolfo and Marco) come to stay, especially with Rodolfo in particular. When the cousins arrive at the house it is obvious that Catherine and Rodolfo like each other. Catherine has always gone to Eddie for help, but now she has found work and now met Rodolfo (that she wants to marry), she has plunged into a mature life right in front of his eyes, and Eddie does not know what to do.
The stage directions reveal to us that Eddies and Beatrice’s marriage is not going too well because Beatrice is starting to become aware of Eddies secret desire for Catherine. They have not been talking too much and the stage directions show us that Beatrice is giving Eddie cold looks on a number of occasions, for example;
‘ In passing, she gives Eddie a cold look’
Beatrice then tries to talk to Eddie about her concern for their marriage. The sexual side of their relationship had weakened and Beatrice is concerned because she suspects Eddie has sexual feelings for Catherine. Beatrice has no luck with Eddie over their relationship or over Catherine. Eddie refuses to talk about anything because, yet again he has to keep his manly attitude and he can not be questioned about anything, as it is disrespectful in the Sicilian code of conduct.
Eddies face becomes puffed with trouble when Catherine offers Rodolfo some sugar;
Catherine ‘You like sugar?’
Rodolfo ‘Sugar? Yes! I like sugar very much!’
Eddies becomes annoyed at this point because he knows what Rodolfo is thinking, and it was not about sugar. This also makes him feel like he is loosing Catherine because before she only used to do things for Eddie, and now she is doing stuff for Rodolfo, which makes Eddie very jealous.
When Catherine and Rodolfo come back from the cinema, Catherine is still happy to see Eddie, and Eddie is also happy to see her, as the stage directions show us:
‘ he can’t help smiling at sight of her’
This tells us that Eddie does not even realise that he is obsessed with Catherine, but when he sees her with Rodolfo he gets very upset and takes his anger out on him, and this is mainly shown in the play when Eddie and Rodolfo have a boxing fight.
Later on into the play you can start noticing that Eddie is loosing his Sicilian role as the dominant male of the house. The stage directions show us that both Catherine and Beatrice have started talking back to Eddie a lot more, and when Eddie goes to Beatrice for backup she goes against him. Eddie is trying to tell Catherine that Rodolfo is only after her so he can get his papers to become an American citizen. When Catherine tries telling Eddie that he is wrong and mentions that he loves her the stage directions show how Eddie is shocked by this:
‘ with deep alarm’ Don’t say that for God’s sake!
This shows that Eddie does not want to believe what is going on between Rodolfo and Catherine, even though it could be true. But again she is growing up and there is nothing he can do about it.
After Catherine has run off, Eddie turns to talk to Beatrice and says:
‘Why don’t you straighten her out?’
This makes Beatrice become suspicious, and makes her wonder why he cares about her so much. Beatrice replies angrily and says:
‘When are you going to leave her alone?’
When Eddie tries to argue that he is no good for Catherine the stage directions show us the Beatrice is furious:
‘Suddenly, with open fright and fury’
Eddie has lost his respect from Beatrice now and has just walked away, trying to keep his dignity. The stage directions prove to us that he is loosing his Sicilian role as Catherine and Beatrice have started standing up for them selves.
Rodolfo came to America with no responsibilities and has come for pleasure, unlike his brother Marco that has come to earn money for his family back in Italy. The fact that Rodolfo has no responsibilities means he has lot of time to go out with Catherine and have fun, this creates competition for Eddie, the very fact that Catherine likes Rodolfo makes Eddie frustrated and jealous. Stage directions show us that Eddie does not want to show that he is annoyed or jealous, but cannot help it:
‘He has been unconsciously twisting the newspaper into a tight role. They are all regarding him now; he senses he is exposing the issue and he is driven on’
I think this stage direction is crucial in showing us how jealous of Rodolfo Eddie is, as he is twisting the newspaper when Catherine and Rodolfo are dancing.
At this point in the play Eddie is making fun of Rodolfo, and trying to say in the nicest way possible that Rodolfo is gay. To Eddie the fact that a man can sing, cook and make dresses makes him gay.
Eddie then invites Marco and Rodolfo to see a fight with him and uses this opportunity to ‘teach’ Rodolfo how to fight. It is obvious to the audience that Eddie uses this as an excuse to take his anger out on Rodolfo, and punch him.
The stage direction:
‘He has bent the rolled paper and suddenly it tears in two’
shows that there was a lot of tension building up as he thinks about Rodolfo and watches him dance with Catherine. There are then many stage directions to show that Eddie knows what he is about to do, or in fact has planned it, one of the most effective is him pulling up his trousers which symbolises the fact that Eddie ‘means business’ and this makes him feel very powerful
‘He is weirdly elates, rubbing his fists in his palms’
Once Eddie starts teaching Rodolfo some moves he lets Rodolfo hit him lightly, then again takes advantage of the opportunity and punches Rodolfo hard. As soon as this happens there is an immediate shift in power, from Eddie to Marco. We can see this from the stage direction straight after the hit:
‘…it staggers Rodolfo. Marco rises’
After this Eddie goes back to his chair, as he always does to avoid an awkward situation. However Marco will not take the fact that someone just hit his little brother, and you could say that he is now picking up the dominant role, and following the Sicilian code, which is that you must look after your family. Marco take things further, and insults Eddie in the worst way, by showing him up, and proving how strong he is. He does this by asking Eddie to lift a chair with one hand, Eddie just about manages to do so but only lift it a couple of inches off the ground, unlike Marco who raised the chair above his head. This creates tension between the two men, and it is Marco’s warning to Eddie not to mess around with Rodolfo. Eddie was trying to threaten Rodolfo and show him up by showing him his strength, but Marco just turned around and did the same to Eddie. This is a similarity between Eddie and Marco, like Eddie Marco does not speak his warning.
‘And he transforms what might appear like a glare of warning into a smile of triumph’
The stage direction above shows us that even though Marco will not say it, he is telling Eddie that he is better and stronger then him.
The stage directions describe the chair as a weapon and Marco uses this as a symbol of triumph over Eddie. The rest of the stage directions show Eddie’s shocked reaction.
‘Marco is face to face with Eddie, a strained tension gripping his eyes and jaw his neck stiff, the chair raised like a weapon over Eddies head - Eddies grin vanishes as he absorbs his look.’
At this point Eddie realises it is not a joke and realises his competition is not Rodolfo but actually Marco.
Eddie comes home drunk when, for the first time, Catherine and Rodolfo are alone. When Eddie comes in Catherine rushes out of their room looking a mess. It is obvious to Eddie what they were doing, and Eddie screams at Rodolfo telling him to leave. This is when Eddie’s worst nightmare comes true, when Catherine tells Eddie that she is leaving with Rodolfo. It is at this point that you might say Eddie loses it. When Catherine tells him that she “ain’t gonna be a baby no more” Eddie takes the opportunity to prove to her that she is and does it by:
‘He reaches out suddenly, draws her to him, and as she strives to free herself, he kisses her on the mouth’
This may have been done because it is what Eddie has dreamed of all along, and this was his first excuse to. However, we never know if Eddie wants Catherine sexually or not, but there are things that occur throughout the play to suggest he does. There is sexual tension between the two, such as when at the beginning of the play, when Catherine goes and gets his cigar for him, and lights it for him. This shows the intimacy between the two and could be look upon as a sexual act.
The shocking part to us is that after Eddie kisses Catherine, he then turns to Rodolfo, pins him down and kisses him too. Eddie only does this to prove to Catherine in some way that he is gay, and also to humiliate him in front of Catherine. Finally, also jealousy motivates Eddie to doing this outrageous and terrible thing because he was jealous of Rodolfo and Catherine's relationship. When he kissed Catherine and Rodolfo "he kisses her on the mouth" and "and suddenly kisses him" I think he does this because he is jealous of what they have together, because of this Eddie thinks that Rodolfo is gay. Eddie thinks if he kisses Rodolfo, Catherine might realise that he is gay. Eddie is jealous because he knows he can not have her so he try's to make sure no one else can but he does not succeed he just drives her away from him. Miller’s stage directions here deliberately compare the two of them to animals fighting each other for the domination of the female, and also for superiority. Eddie’s actions towards Rodolfo (the kiss) and physical attack is pure animal behaviour.
The whole of this play involves symbolism, on many different levels. The end scene, in which Eddie takes his own life with his own knife is symbolic of the self-destructive nature that led to such an ending. As Arthur Miller wished to write 'a modern Greek tragedy´ it is likely that the symbolism of the dagger is Eddie´s sexuality, which drove him to his drastic actions and eventually death. During the confrontation earlier in the play Marco raised a chair like a weapon, symbolic of the fight yet to come. Rudolpho danced with Catherine when she had previously been attending to Eddie, symbolic of him taking her from Eddie´s life.
Since this play is supposed to be a modern version of a Greek tragedy, tragic events take place throughout the play. The idea of coming doom is something that is threatening to happen, and throughout this essay, I will go into depth about how Arthur Miller created this atmosphere through his written language and stage directions. This thrilling and tragic drama is about incestuous love, jealousy and betrayal.
I think the phone box on stage is interesting. It is there from the start of the play, but it is only lit after the second lawyer scene. Alfieri realises that Eddie is a desperate man. So desperate, he'll do anything. In the first lawyer scene, Alfieri told Eddie that the only option in the law he had was the way in which the cousins entered the country. It is at this point that Eddie realises it is the only way he can stop the marriage. Alfieri knows that Eddie loves Catherine in a way he shouldn't, but Eddie won't admit it. He thinks that Rodolfo must be in the wrong, because all the other alternatives are too painful for him. It is at this point in the play that the phone box starts to glow. In the past, the phone box has represented the outside world. It is introduced slowly, with Alfieri trying to discourage Eddie between each stage direction to make it brighter. The rate at which it is shown to the audience give them time to think about what it could mean. By the time they've worked it out, Eddie is walking out of the office for the last time, and the phone box is the only lit item on stage.
The scene with much dramatic irony starts with Eddie's speech on page 54, just before the immigration officers enter the apartment. A sudden intrusion into any scene, in any play can cause tension, but in "A view from the Bridge" all of the characters know, or suspect, that it was Eddie who called for the Immigration officers, so dramatic tension is raised even more. It ends when the officers take Marco and Rodolfo. In this scene tension is raised to a peak, and the relationship between Beatrice and Eddie is stretched, as is the relationship between Eddie and Catherine. Earlier in the play we see Eddie call the immigration bureau, however, when the officers arrive, he tries to deny all knowledge of calling for them. "Where's who?" and "We've got nobody here" are just two examples. This is quite ironic as he intended to get rid of his rivals once and for all, but he must have changed his mind when he saw Beatrice’s reaction to this,
Miller includes the “Pause of darkness” to illustrate Eddie’s confused mental state as well as the approaching doom that has befell him. The ‘darkness’ truly illustrates the dramatic shift in the play, and in Eddie’s fortunes. From being a confident, honourable and hard working man to someone who is losing respect in his marriage, family, and the community. Eddie is now threatening to kill Marco for accusing him of betraying them. He also realizes that the entire neighbourhood knows that he called the Immigration Bureau and betrayed the Italians thus breaking the code of honour. When everyone walks away from him, and he calls out their names to no avail. This shows Eddies increasing desperation. The dramatic tension rises at a very sharp rate in a matter of lines. "For Christ’s sake, I kept them, I gave them blankets off my bed!, Arthur miller has used subtext, so that what Eddie is really trying to do is convince people that he did not call for the immigration and betray the others.
The end of the play is somewhat ironic. It is a Greek tragedy, the phone that has been on stage since the beginning of the play now comes into use, and is of course used for Eddie to ring the immigration officer and report Eddie and Marco. The introduction of the immigration officers is ironic as previously Eddie spoke to Beatrice and Catherine about a story of a boy who told of his family members staying illegally in his house, this was especially hypocritical of Eddie as he was warning Catherine and Beatrice what would happen to them if they were to tell. His emphasis on their silence can be shown by the stage direction
(“Eddie suppose somebody asks if they’re living here”) ‘He looks at her as though already she had divulges something publicly. Defensively.’
In this play, the stage directions are very important as they give the movement and life to characters, and also allow further expressions through movement. It gives the audience a clearer view of positions on stage, social and physical, "She hurries out. There is a slight pause, and Eddie turns to Beatrice, who has been avoiding his gaze." This is particularly important to this play as it reveals how Beatrice feels towards Eddie at the time and although she respects him, she is now deeply concerned over his thoughts and actions.
For a second time in the play we see Catherine choose Rodolfo over Eddie, as she "throws herself into Rodolfo's arms." Simple words like enraged (Eddies reaction) in the stage direction add emotion to the characters, increasing tension to an extraordinary high. 'Accusingly' in Marco's reaction, yet another example of how powerful stage directions can be. As the audience does not see the stage directions, this all depends on the ability of the actors. Even a simple gesture, such as a hand held up to stop a person talking, can increase tension, and in my chosen scene there is plenty of evidence of this.
Marco and Rodolfo are led off the stage, whilst the audience is left pondering what Eddies next action will be. Amazingly, the simplest turn from Lipari (the butcher) and his wife can anger Eddie even more than the thought of Catherine and Rodolfo being together. "Lipari! For Christ's sake,…" is all that Eddie can say, trying to regain friendship, unsuccessfully. Where this occurs, the tension has dropped since Marco and Rodolfo's departure, but leaves the audience hanging as Alfieri appears, almost as if just the image of him reminds us of his warning, "you won't have a friend in the world, Eddie!… even the ones who feel the same will despise you! Put it out of your mind! Eddie!"
Marco and Rodolfo's arrival signals the start of the turning point in Catherine and Eddie's relationship. Eddie's open greeting to Beatrice's cousin’s reveal his warm and confident character. Marco shows he has a lot of respect for Eddie and reflects this by thanking people frequently, quietening his brother and refusing food. He is keen to avoid taking liberties whereas; Rodolfo is excitable and less mature. There is also contrast in the physical appearance of the brothers, "He's practically blonde," This is Catherine and Beatrice's surprised reaction. The brothers' background is important, as it reflects how they act towards other people and their surroundings. "In our town there are no piers only the beach and little fishing boats," this now shows us that as poor peasants looking for work they will have high expectations of America, "The New Colossus."
To summarise the play we need to understand why the action took the course it did. We know from the start that Eddie brought up Catherine in perhaps the wrong way, it is displayed throughout the play and although she fostered his feelings, he could have changed. To begin with Catherine had a lot of respect for Eddie adopting her but she realises herself through Eddies continuous jealous actions, he is wrong. I personally feel as a play, Arthur Miller created Catherine to act this way as a sympathy tool for the audience, by including her, the audience can relate to her and easily distinguish the so called "good and bad" characters of the play.
The characters actions are only brought around by love and it is this that fuels the violence. Catherine's love for Rodolfo is real but as Eddie indicated, I feel that she is perhaps just taking the first man she can, to become more independent. She has love for Eddie as a father, but this is soon smashed by his jealous actions. Eddie loves Beatrice as his wife struggled to have only "fatherly" love for Catherine. Beatrice always loved Eddie but this is complicated by his feelings for Catherine. We even see Marco has genuine love for his family, not just in helping his brother but also by his intentions to help his family back home.
At this stage, the audience suddenly realize Eddie’s changing character. Eddie visits Alfieri again and it reveals how helpless he is and that this is a last desperate attempt to prevent them getting married. A striking simile here is "His eyes were like tunnels" this phrase could resemble a missing fulfilment in Eddie's life or perhaps a terrible sense of danger waiting to be released. Alfieri becomes irritated at Eddies persistence, "morally and legally you have no rights." This only makes Eddie more frustrated by the lack of legal rights to intervene. The only option he can see is to call the immigration office reporting Beatrice's cousins. This connects ironically back to Italian code of honour where no one should betray anyone else.
We see how Eddie's character has now changed, "get them out." He constantly worries about the two immigrants from Lipari's family, as this will increase knowledge of what he has done. Up to the entrance of the immigrant officers Eddie becomes understandably more frantic, Catherine and Beatrice could seem a little naÏve, "She stands a moment in realised horror." They only realised what has happened at the point of the officer's entrance, which astonishes them. Marco is also shocked, "he spits into Eddies face." This shows his disgust; Eddie does not seem to understand the concept of natural law, though when it is being used on him, "Oh, you mothers-!" He is also threatening, "I'll kill you for that." Although it is just a play it is still shocking to read how outrageous his response to Marco's action are, and how from now all Eddies vengeful feelings are directed to Marco, instead of Rodolfo.
Now that the immediate neighbourhood have been alerted, Marco sees this as the ideal opportunity to take further revenge by exposing what Eddie has done, "That one, he killed my children!" although he changes the truth his accusation is still just as shocking. This obviously has a powerful effect as everyone now turns their backs physically and mentally leaving Eddie by himself in shame.
