How does Arthur Miller gain and hold the audience's interest in The Crucible?

The first 200 words of this essay...

How does Arthur Miller gain and hold the audience's interest in The Crucible?

I have been looking at the play 'The Crucible' by Arthur Miller. Whilst studying this play, I have read the book and seen two different films which were different interpretations of the play. One of them was the BBC version and the other one was the Daniel Day-Lewis version.

As I have read and seen different versions of it, I have seen different ways of putting the information of witchcraft in Salem across. Although all of them were based on the same story, they all seemed to be able to hold my interest throughout.

The play is based in a little town called Salem in the Massachusetts in 1692. Although the book was written in the 1950's, Arthur Miller knew how people reacted to witchcraft. People in those days were very religious and nearly everyone was against witchcraft.

The whole play was divided into four acts.

In act 1, straight away, it shows some form of witchcraft. This was performed by some relatively young girls. Parris, the reverend of the village had seen some girls 'dabbling in magic and dancing.'