Writers of Today; Arthur Miller

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Series
Writers of Today
Episode
Arthur Miller
Producing Organization
Dynamic Films
Contributing Organization
Library of Congress (Washington, District of Columbia)
AAPB ID
cpb-aacip/512-wh2d796f16
NOLA Code
WROT
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Description
Episode Description
Walter Kerr discusses the theater and its dilemma today with one of America's most prominent playwrights, Arthur Miller. Mr. Miller believes that the theater is the last way man has of confronting people face to face without some intervening mechanism. It has more intimacy and impact, he feels, and is closer to reality than other media. He contends that the audience is not beneath deep and serious concern over a "theme" if the work is well done. With these points in mind, Mr Kerr and Mr. Miller examine some of the dramatist's outstanding plays?Arthur Miller, who won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1949 and in 1955, says of his work: "I care about all my plays, but the only story I like is 'Monte Saint Angelo' published in Harper's and in Prize Short Stories of 1951." Of his goals in writing, he says: "My aim is what it has been from the beginning--to bring to the stage the thickness, awareness, and complexity of the novel."?"I was born," he says, "in the Harlem section of Manhattan. My father was a well-to-do manufacturer of little education, my mother the daughter of a manufacturer. Until the age of seventeen I can safely say that I never read a book weightier than Tom Swift or The Rover Boys, and only verged on literature with some of Dickens. I was more interested in football, hockey, and just plain tooling around. I was a poor student and failed many subject, algebra three times. When my name became known through my writing, my high school teachers leafed through the records, found my name, sure enough, but none of them even vaguely recalled me. I passed through the public school system unscathed. A book that changed my life was The Brothers Karamazov, which I picked up, I don't know how or why, and all at once believed I was born to be a writer. This was after I had graduated from high school and was working in a warehouse on Tenth Avenue in Manhattan. On the subway to and from work I began reading and concurrently saving my money to go to school, for our family fortunes had gone with the boom. I entered the University of Michigan partly by virtue of my writing, for the school had turned me down on the basis of my weird scholastic record. After several very emotional letters, however, they finally gave me a try. I entered under the disguise of a journalism student, for I dared not speak of writing aloud. For one thing, I couldn't even spell yet. I wrote my first play in the ten days of spring vacation. I had seen but one play in my life and had read the tragedies of Shakespeare. The play won several prizes and made me confident I could go ahead from there. It left me with the belief that the ability to write plays is born into one, and that it is a kind of sport of the mind, as though one had to be knocked on the head in a certain way before one could practice the craft."?Among his awards have been the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1949 (for "Death of a Salesman") and in 1955 (for "A View from the Bridge"), The New York Drama Critics Circle Award in 1947 and in 1949; the Theatre Guild National Award in 1938; the Antoinette Perry Award in 1953; and the Gold Medal Award for Drama from the National Institute of Arts and Letters in 1959. Miller recently married for the third time after his much publicized second marriage to and divorce from a blonde cinema star. Episode Running Time: 29:17 (Description adapted from documents in the NET Microfiche)
Series Description
Designed to explore the important literary expressions of outstanding contemporary authors, Writers of Today is a series of filmed interviews with novelists, poets, and dramatists. The interviews concentrate on the goals, abilities, and preferences of the writers, their reasons for writing, how and what they write, and the background and environmental influences on their particular modes of expression. Writers of Today consists of 17 half-hour episodes that were distributed by NET in four different seasons in 1956-1957, 1959-1960, 1962, and 1963. The first season was seven episodes, and every subsequent season included some episodes from the previous seasons and some new episodes. The fact that episodes were repeated multiple times and there was no consistent numbering of episodes between seasons makes it difficult to create logical or accurate episode numbers, which is why there are not any episode numbers in these records. (Description adapted from documents in the NET Microfiche)
Broadcast Date
1962-00-00
Broadcast Date
1957-00-00
Asset type
Episode
Genres
Talk Show
Topics
Literature
Theater
Rights
Published Work: This work was offered for sale and/or rent in 1960.
Media type
Moving Image
Credits
Director: Bobker, Lee R.
Executive Producer: Zucker, Nathan
Guest: Miller, Arthur
Host: Kerr, Walter
Producing Organization: Dynamic Films
AAPB Contributor Holdings
Library of Congress
Identifier: 2341734-1 (MAVIS Item ID)
Format: 16mm film
Generation: Copy: Access
Color: B&W
Library of Congress
Identifier: 2341734-1 (MAVIS Item ID)
Format: 16mm film
Generation: Copy: Access
Color: B&W
Library of Congress
Identifier: 2341734-1 (MAVIS Item ID)
Format: 16mm film
Generation: Copy: Access
Color: B&W
Library of Congress
Identifier: 2341734-1 (MAVIS Item ID)
Format: 16mm film
Generation: Copy: Access
Color: B&W
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Citations
Chicago: “Writers of Today; Arthur Miller,” 1962-00-00, Library of Congress, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC, accessed May 8, 2025, http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-512-wh2d796f16.
MLA: “Writers of Today; Arthur Miller.” 1962-00-00. Library of Congress, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Web. May 8, 2025. <http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-512-wh2d796f16>.
APA: Writers of Today; Arthur Miller. Boston, MA: Library of Congress, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Retrieved from http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-512-wh2d796f16