One of the great whodunnits

It starts on a beautiful summer’s morning in the suburbs of America. A prosperous middle-aged dad is chatting with his neighbours in the garden of his comfortable home, but by nightfall his family has been destroyed. This is one of the most momentous convulsions in all drama. Arthur Miller’s masterful plotting, which he never again surpassed, is a match for the best. By the best I mean Oedipus.

Jeremy Herrin’s production emphasises the lush fertility of America in the late 1940s. Trees in full leaf overlook the timber house that is perhaps a little too small for its millionaire owner. Joe Keller is a pioneering industrialist who served a brief jail term for supplying faulty components to the air force during the war. More than 20 pilots died. A retrial found Joe innocent and the blame was shifted to his partner, Deever, who was imprisoned and ostracised by his family. Deever’s son, now a lawyer, suspects malpractice at the second trial and he arrives at the house to stop his sister from marrying Joe’s son and accepting money from the tainted Keller firm. Another mystery surrounds Joe’s other child, Larry, who was serving as a pilot until his plane went missing.

Bill Pullman stresses Joe’s easy-going chumminess but misses his ambition and shark-like cunning. Overdoing the meekness, he seems more of a chief scout than a giant of industry. Not a complete performance. Sally Field’s turn as the batty matriarch on the verge of a breakdown is more convincing but she has a lot more to play with. She’s casually bitchy to her son’s girlfriend, she trembles with horror as she describes her prophetic dreams, and she coos and purrs over George, the former neighbour, who reminds her of her missing son.