Word: biff
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...family relations, and the rivalry with the neighbors' son suggest a Jewish background), but expanded the character, rather than caricaturing him, concentrating on the universal qualities rather than the special heritage of the hero. To succeed in 1961 (without really trying), Miller's play would have to end with Biff and Happy going off to work on a Kibbutz...
...danger of this stage is role diffusion; as Biff puts it in Death of a Salesman: 'I just can't take hold, Mom, I can't take hold of some kind of a life.' . . . Youth after youth, bewildered by his assumed role, a role forced on him by the inexorable standardization of American adolescence, runs away in one form or another: leaves schools and jobs, stays out at night, or withdraws into bizarre and inaccessible moods. Once he is 'delinquent,' his greatest need and often his only salvation is the refusal on the part of older youths, of advisers...
...almost see it schematized in his mind: Linda--Mrs. Loman--at the center as the fulcrum and focus of the action, and perhaps in the larger sense the symbol of Woman as the base of stability in the family, her husband Willy at one end of the lever, and Biff, her oldest son, at the other end. She is the agent whereby the audience gains emotional entrance to the dramatic situation. Her sanity and sense of life amid the tragedy give a sense of reality to the maelstrom about her. Olive Dunbar gives a distinguished performance in this role...
...less excellent is Thomas Hill as Willy. Mr. Hill is through and through a professional actor and his every word and motion suggest absorption in the role. Robert Evans as Biff lacks the polish of the two older actors and at times seemed to communicate his nervousness. No doubt future performances will give him more confidence in his part...
...speech finished, he whizzed over to Broadway, slipped into the darkened theater in time to join Mamie for the final 40 minutes. Recognized by few in the audience, Ike and the First Lady left just before the final curtain, were outside being cheered by a crowd when Stage Manager Biff Liff came on stage and wrongly announced their presence inside. Next afternoon, Mamie saw Auntie Mame, dropped backstage at intermission to greet her old friend Rosalind Russell for tea, cookies and "girl talk...