“A father is a father!” (All My Sons)

Sooooo… I actually don’t have much to say about All My Sons that I haven’t already talked about in class.

I enjoyed the play way more than I thought I would. I was expecting another mild disappointment a la Joe Turner. Hooray for pleasant surprises!

This was an explosive drama.  There was boatloads of anger and sadness, etc. and all of it was readily expressed by the characters, either with shouting, threats of phyisical violence, or actual physical violence. There was little that was subdued about All My Sons.

I liked the way that the tension built.  It was interesting that, whenever it felt like, okay, here’s the climax… one of the neighbors seemed to come in and “ruin it.”  It resulted in a bunch of mini climaxes in the 2nd half of the second act, and the third act.  Kind of like a roller coaster ride.

I couldn’t  condemn Joe completely.  His methods, yes.  But his intentions, no.  He was trying to do his best by Chris in terms of money and business.  Or, y’know, at least what he thought was best, since Chris honestly didn’t care about all that stuff.

So, I was curious… did anyone think that after Joe’s suicide, Chris and Ann still get married? That they take Kate’s advice, and “live”?  I’d like to think so…

~Jessie

P.S. I looked on Youtube for a good clip.  I found “All My Sons Final,” I thought it was going to be the part where they read Larry’s letter and Joe shoots himself.  As it turned out… well, you’ll see:

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