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Alison Stewart: This is All Of It. I'm Alison Stewart. Happy Tony Season. Live Theater had a pretty rough time through the pandemic, but with ticket sales creeping back up to pre-COVID levels and with about 40 different shows currently running this season, we wanted to take the opportunity to say that Broadway is back. This year's Tony Awards will be presented live Sunday, June 11th, hosted by Ariana DeBose who joined us on the show.

This hour we're going to talk about the Pulitzer Prize-winning play, Cost of Living, which explores the complex and intimate relationships between two disabled people and their caregivers. We'll also hear from Jessica Chastain and playwright Amy Herzog about their sleek scaled-back production of Ibsen's classic feminist play, A Doll's House, but first, let's get into it with some members of the first-ever all-Black Broadway cast of Death of a Salesman.

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Alison Stewart: The first time that Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman was produced on Broadway, it was 1949. Since then, the play has been revived five times, and over those runs, the titular salesman named Willy Loman has been played by two different actors named Hoffman. Dustin starred in 1984. Philip Seymour starred in 2012. The Pulitzer Prize-winning family drama returned to Broadway last year and for the very first time on a Broadway stage, the Lomans were played by Black actors, which added some additional texture to the play.

The details of the story are the same. A salesman hoping for a bright future with his loyal wife by his side but faced with the reality of a withering career and his son's inability to thrive. When Willy can't understand why other salesmen are doing better and are welcomed more warmly, we understand racism could be at play. When Willy wonders why his son hasn't been able to catch a break when the kid's White best friend is done well, race is the subtext. When Willy goes to ask his White boss for a more stable job, the confrontation is full of tension.

The New York Times review of the production says, "Made new and unfamiliar once again. In this production, the Lomans look like all of us." In this production, Willy Loman was played by Obie Award-winning actor Wendell Pierce who you might know from TV's The Wire. This year he's Tony-nominated for his performance in this role. Linda Loman is played by Sharon D. Clarke who won an Olivia Award for her performance when the show ran in London. I began by asking Wendell Pierce how he wanted audiences to distinguish this production of Death of a Salesman from other productions.

Wendell Pierce: It's really interesting since I've met so many people who have never read the play-

Alison Stewart: Interesting.

Wendell Pierce: -who aren't aware of it, young people and old, and then a lot of people who have read it and are very familiar with it, as you said, but are awakened to a new understanding of it. An awareness of things, parts of the play that they always question us as to say, "Was that really in there? I don't remember that part." That's the thing that I'm proudest of. A perfect example of that was a woman who was 100 years old. She had saw the original production.

Alison Stewart: Wow.

Wendell Pierce: She waited afterwards for us outside the theater to say how much she enjoyed it. She has seen every incarnation of the play over a 73-year history and she had never seen it like this, meaning she was awakened to themes in the play and moments in the play that she wasn't aware of before and that were highlighted in a way that she hadn't really perceived before and so contextually it just opened up all of these new windows of understandings and dramatic impact for her. That was one of the greatest compliments to receive from someone who was there in 1949 and was there just last week to say, "I had never seen Death of a Salesman until now."

Alison Stewart: I guess my English major bias was showing thinking everybody had seen Death of a Salesman. [laughter] To your point, Wendell, Sharon, I had not forgotten, or maybe it wasn't the case when I'd read it, how prominent Linda Loman is in the play. I hadn't remembered it. Your portrayal of her felt much more like a partner to me than a supporter of her husband. How have your thoughts about Linda Loman evolved over the course of playing her?

Sharon D. Clarke: Well, one of the things that Wendell and I discussed when we first started doing it was that we wanted this to be a strong loving couple. In the past, for me, with Death of a Salesman, I've always wondered, "Why is Linda with this man if she's just being treated so terribly and there is no love binding them together?" One of the first things we did was say we wanted their love to be strong. We wanted the audiences to see a wonderful example of Black love on stage. If you can feel their love and devotion to each other, you understand why they are together in this situation and why Linda is ever supportive of her man. In a time, 1949, when you're dealing with mental illness, which is a subject we're only just starting to talk about now, how do you support someone going through that when you don't know the avenues to go through to help them?

One thing that you would key into that is the love that would hold you together. That would be the support, that would be the strength, that would be the uplift for that relationship, and so that's something that we concentrated on. I think when you are dealing with that love, it puts Linda in a different position. She's not just a supporter. She is part of that relationship. She's going through what Willy is going through with him because she loves him and she wants to find a way to help him.

For the women that have gone before me, women like my mother and my aunts, those strong Black women who held families together in honor of them, Linda, for me, couldn't be wishy-washy. She had to be a strong person who was a big presence in the house. Arthur Miller says it throughout the play. She holds the house together. Willy comes to her to say, "What do we owe? What do we need to pay? How is the house run?" It's run by Linda. She is the glue in that family. If she is the glue, then you have to see that. [laughs]

Alison Stewart: Yes. For people of that generation, my parents' generation, for Black families, the I got you, I got your back is part of how they survived.

Wendell Pierce: Absolutely. I think that's one of the things that it's so wonderful about the portrayal of Linda in that way. It opens up the portrayal of Willy because he is this paradox, this continual paradox and contradiction going back and forth thematic in the play. He is a reflection of the American paradox of what the American dream is about. He has moments of epiphany when he is going off the edge, moments where he stops himself and realizes, "Linda, you are my foundation and my support. I'm never going to get on the road again. I'll be home with you."

25 years mortgage is a great thing. All of the things, the pillars of their love and what they've created, every once in a while, Willy has an epiphany and realizes it, and then, unfortunately, puts the blinders back on and loses sight of the very wealth that he has. This wealth of love in this woman, Linda, that he doesn't quite see and recognize fully or he wouldn't be on this pursuit of some materialistic wealth that will never satisfy him like her love.

Alison Stewart: My guests are Wendell Pierce and Sharon D. Clarke. We are talking about Death of a Salesman running at the Hudson Theater through January 15th. Sharon, one of the most famous moments in the play happens towards the end when Linda declares attention must be paid to her husband and to his life. We actually have a clip of that moment. We can talk about it on the other side. Let's listen.

Linda Loman: I don't say he's a great man. Willy Loman never made a lot of money. His name was never in the paper. He's not the finest character that ever lived, but he's a human being and the terrible thing is happening to him so attention must be paid. He's not to be allowed to fall into his grave like an old dog. Attention. Attention must be finally paid to such a person.

Alison Stewart: First, what is it like to say an iconic line like that? There are certain lines an actor gets to say tomorrow, tomorrow, tomorrow, out, out, damn spot. I think attention must be paid isn't that category, in my opinion. What is it like to say that?

Sharon D. Clarke: I've never really thought about it in that way. In the moment, it's just telling Linda's truth and how she sees their situation. I'm not thinking, Oh gosh, this is one of the greatest lines in the American canon and I've got to get it right." I'm just thinking about where I am in that moment and trying to convey to my son, how he should be looking at his father and the love and the support and the dreams that his father has for him and for him to look into that and shape up [chuckles]. It's just about playing the truth of the scene and not really thinking about the words that I'm saying, but actually giving true life and depth and meaning to what that means for Linda in that moment.

I don't have a very cerebral intelligent actor's response to that, it is just playing the truth in the moment then and that is about her love for her man again. Do you know what I mean? You need to be respecting your father.

Alison Stewart: Yes, she's fierce about it.

Sharon D. Clarke: Yes, because Arthur Miller said, "He is the dearest man in the world to me and I won't have anyone making him feel unwanted and low and blue." She's telling that to her son, she's saying, "At this moment in time, I am putting Willy in front of everybody, even you, you who have come from my womb, who I love deepest more than anyone else, do not come before this man."

That's what that's about for me. It may be famous lines, but it's what touches Linda's heart and her soul for how she feels for her man, and that her sons have to stand up and recognize everything that he has put into them.

Alison Stewart: What are you both doing to take care of yourself? This is a deeply emotional play. A whole lot of time, you both are on stage for so long. Wendell, What are you doing to take care of you, the human being, and your instrument?

Wendell Pierce: Getting as much rest as possible. Even though I've turned into a vampire during this play-

Alison Stewart: [laughs]

Wendell Pierce: -I love afterwards to go and hear music, I have a late night supper and then I go hear music and I come home and I read. I've been calling it my me-time in the quiet wee hours of the morning reading or binge-watching something, a film or a television show, and then sleeping most of the morning. I'm speaking to you, at the top of my morning in the afternoon, my day begins around midday. The alarm clock woke me for this interview.

Alison Stewart: I'm grateful.

Wendell Pierce: No, I'm grateful for you. Thank you. Also, when it comes to the emotional, I have found that that moment I was expressing to you before with my mother, there's another moment with my brother that I have before I shied away from it when we did it in London and now I know that it's the time, this moment to commune with my ancestors to my family on the other side.

My grandfather was a sugarcane farmer. This new thing that I found when I'm doing the seeds, I can see my grandfather, he would ask us as grandkids to just walk the fields with him as he is looking at his crops or figuring out how to plant or figuring out how to harvest and just this week, I have started to feel him as I'm planting my seeds. It is all moments that I've now is the opportunity to commune with people that I have not seen in a while and I haven't communicated with in a while and now I'm getting to on a nightly basis and that brings me great comfort.

It brings me a great deal of comfort, to remember their humanity and live their humanity and mourn for them. As I mourn my family falling apart [unintelligible 00:14:37] on the stage and that gives me great sense of satisfaction. That's the thing that cares for me, it's I am going through the experience so that actually can commune with those that I haven't seen in many years and spiritually adjust across the veil. That has been very uplifting for this part of the run for me.

Alison Stewart: Sharon, how about you, how do you take care of you?

Sharon D. Clarke: Oh, again, like Wendell, sleep. I've never ever been a morning person. [laughter] [unintelligible 00:15:18] people say, work me through till five o'clock in the morning. Don't ask me to get up at 5:00 and work, I'm just not a morning person. Sleep again, music. When we've finished the show, and it's been such a heightened emotional experience, you can't just come home and go to bed, there's so much going on in your head and emotionally to your body so it's like letting that all work its way out and I do that through music.

I will put on some music, either funky music or some classical or some jazz, whatever it is, I feel for that night if I need to have a little quick dance around my kitchen or I need to sit down and have some music that helps me ball out what I need to ball out but I haven't been able to cry out from stage. A bit of reading, a bit of light cooking, and then try and see if I can get myself to sleep without the brain going work [unintelligible 00:16:10]

Alison Stewart: [laughs]

Sharon D. Clarke: Same thing. Just looking after, and rest, just rest so that vocally we've got the power and the stamina to do the show.

Alison Stewart: That was my conversation with Wendell Pierce and Sharon D. Clarke who starred in Broadway's all-black cast production of Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman.

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Coming up, Academy Award winner Jessica Chastain stars in the new Broadway adaptation of the classic feminist play, A Doll's House. Chastain and playwright Amy Herzog join us to discuss the new pared-back production.

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