Staging

• Stage Design

  Miller changed his mind about the stage design of the play several times, finally deciding on Jo Mielziner's vision.
• Original concept

  • Miller’s initial idea for the stage design of the play which would become Death of a Salesman was highly original.
  • In order to compliment his initial working title, “The Inside of his Head”, Miller imagined “an enormous face” the height of the stage which would “then open up”.
• Changing design

  • As he drafted the play, both the title and the concept behind the stage design changed radically.
  • Miller now wanted a very minimal design with three simple black platforms used to signify different settings.
• Mielziner's influence

  • Miller was persuaded by his original set designer, Jo Mielziner, to once again change his ideas.
  • Mielziner argued that the Loman house should be “the most important visual symbol in the play” and that the stage design should reflect this.
• Significance

  • The house dominates many of Willy and Linda’s discussions in the play and the play ends with Linda telling Willy’s grave that they have paid the final mortgage payment meaning that, after twenty-five years, the house finally belongs to them.
• Stage design

  • Mielziner wanted to give the house a physical reality and it is his design which is captured in the opening stage direction of the play: “we see a solid vault of apartment houses… the kitchen at centre… a kitchen table with three chairs, and a refrigerator etc.”
• Props

  Jo Mielziner, the stage designer, helped to create the illusion of realism through his use of props.
• Choice of props

  • Although minimal, confined to just a few material objects, Mielziner decided to use objects and appliances that would be found in almost every lower-middle-class household of the time and took care to ensure that key props such as the refrigerator did not look brand new.
• Socio-economic status

  • It was important that the Loman household looked lived in, and that it reflected the Loman's inability to buy top-of-the-range appliances.
• Contemporary times

  • Moreover, Miller uses real, contemporary brands and celebrity endorsements in his dialogue in order to make the world of the play as close as possible to that of his audience.