OBSESSION, HONOR,
AND THE COST OF BETRAYAL

A riveting staging, driven by a ferocious central
performance, fully unleashes Miller’s tragic power

In a riveting production from Apollinaire Theatre Company, under the tight direction of David R. Gammons, a masterful Jorge Rubio wrings every ounce of sexual frustration and cultural rage as Eddie in Arthur Miller’s A View from the Bridge. Set in 1950s Red Hook, in the shadow of the Brooklyn Bridge, it tells the story of a man who can neither face nor shake his obsession with his niece, ultimately pitting the written law of the United States against the unwritten laws of Sicilian culture.

First performed in its present form in 1956 (a one-act version preceded this one by a year), Miller’s script derives much of its power from what is never stated but so clearly shown. Words such as sex, incest, and homosexuality are never uttered, and yet there is no doubt that these are very much the topics at hand.

Jorge Rubio and Sehnaz Dirik

Things happen quickly in this play. When the story begins, Catherine (a charming Naomi Kim), Eddie’s seventeen-year-old niece, is brimming with excitement over a job offer. Raised by Eddie and his wife Beatrice (played with depth and nuance by Sehnaz Dirik) following the death of Beatrice’s sister, Catherine is eager to embark on her life as a young adult. Eddie is protective, but that instinct stems from his awareness of Catherine’s allure. The smart yet compassionate Beatrice who understands her husband better than he understands himself. Yet Beatrice dances around directly naming Eddie’s obsession, knowing how painful the revelation will be (and indeed, once it is explicitly stated, Eddie is horrified). The question of what it means to be a wife is examined: “When am I gonna be a wife again, Eddie?” Bea asks. She is wondering when they will have sex again. For Eddie, being a wife means something different. “A wife is supposed to believe her husband,” he insists, demanding that Bea accept his version of reality, despite her deeper understanding of what ails him.

Though Catherine is on the cusp of adulthood, she is still under the thumb of this uncle, a man whose feelings for her are anything but avuncular. And though Eddie appears to be in charge of this little household, we see another source of power in Bea’s skilled cajoling.

Jorge Rubio, Naomi Kim, Sehnaz Dirik, Rohan Misra, Andres Molano Sotomayor

Shortly after Eddie grants his niece permission to accept the job, Bea’s cousins arrive from Sicily. The brothers Marco (a taciturn, smoldering Rohan Misra) and spirited Rodolpho (Andres Molano Sotomayor) have entered the United States illegally and will be employed on the docks until they pay off their debt to the syndicate that smuggled them into the country. They are vulnerable, but so are those who harbor them. Even before they arrive, Eddie emphasizes to Bea and Catherine the importance of never revealing the status of the men who will be living in their household. By the unwritten laws of the community, those who snitch face ostracism and even violent retribution. (And yet, Eddie blames the immigrants who are living with them for his inability to couple with Bea. Like so many things blamed on immigrants, this makes no sense, as the situation predates their arrival.)

Sehnaz Dirik, Jorge Rubio, and Naomi Kim

Marco is in the United States to make money for his wife and children in Sicily. Rodolpho has no such ties and is simply seeking greater opportunity. He is distinctively handsome and has numerous talents: singing, cooking, and fashion design. Catherine falls in love, and Rodolpho proposes marriage.

The prospect of losing Catherine to this interloper drives Eddie to violate the laws of his culture by calling on the legal system of the United States government. He consults Alfieri (Dev Luthra), a lawyer who functions as the “bridge” between the laws of the old world and the legal strictures of the United States. He tells Eddie that no law prevents Catherine from marrying a man Eddie despises. Like Bea, Alfieri sees in Eddie what Eddie cannot see in himself: there will never be a man Eddie would want Catherine to marry, because Eddie himself wants to be the man in Catherine’s life. Alfieri also serves as the narrator of this tragedy, a sort of one-man chorus who warns and mourns.

Dev Luthra

Terrific acting is enhanced by Kevin Fulton’s lighting design and by Joseph Lark-Riley’s creative set and sound design. Nearly all the action takes place in Eddie and Bea’s apartment, but the set has all the trappings of a dock, a subtle but constant reminder of the economic foundations of their community and the power of the corrupt forces who exploit desperate immigrants.

The acting and staging are impeccable; most impressive, however, is the powerful script and Miller’s ability to keep tightening the tension and sense of inevitability in this tragic tale of a man caught in the grip of emotions he doesn’t comprehend. We can’t tear our eyes away from Rubio’s dramatic depiction of Eddie’s plummet from a life of prosperity and stability to his destructive destiny. As Alfieri says, “He allowed himself to be wholly known and for that I think I will love him more than all my sensible clients… And so I mourn him—I admit it—with a certain alarm.”

✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦

photos by Darlene DeVita and Danielle Fauteux Jacques

A View from the Bridge
Apollinaire Theatre Company
Chelsea Theatre Works, 189 Winnisimmet St in Chelsea, MA
two hours, one intermission
Fri and Sat at 8; Sun at 3
ends on March 22, 2026
for tickets ($15-$65), call 617.887.2336 or visit Apollinaire

for more shows, visit Theatre in Boston

✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦

Lynne Weiss is a member of the Boston Theater Critics Association. Her work has also appeared in Literary Ladies Guide and in The Common, Black Warrior Review, and the Ploughshares Blog. She has an MFA from UMass Amherst and has received residencies from Yaddo, the Millay Colony, and Vermont Studio Center and grants from the Massachusetts Cultural Council. A lifelong social justice activist, she is at work on a novel set in 1930s Cornwall. Her reviews, travel tales, and progressively optimistic opinions are on her substack.