A View From The Bridge @ Tron Theatre

Tron Theatre Company is delighted to be presenting the award-winning play A View From The Bridge written by American playwright Arthur Miller. This play is the much anticipated directorial debut of the Tron Theatre’s new Artistic Director Jemima Levick, which promises a refreshed and modern take on the timeless classic about deep rooted and dangerously illicit desire.

Set in Brooklyn, A View From The Bridge focuses on longshoreman, Eddie Carbone and his wife Beatrice who welcome her cousins Marco and Rodolpho to the land of the free and into the home they share with their beautiful and much loved niece Catherine. It is when one of Beatrice’s cousins falls for Catherine and starts planning a future for them that Eddie’s jealous mistrust exposes a deep, unspeakable secret – one that drives him to commit the ultimate betrayal not only of his family but also the close-knit community in which they live, with devastating consequences.

The play explores themes of family, belonging and the consequences of suppressed desire, and despite being a story that pivots on questions of citizenship, immigration and the right to remain in 1950s America when it was written, it resonates strongly with events taking place in Glasgow and around the world today.

This play calls for a strong cast and that is exactly what Jemima has created with the lead role of the possessive Eddie Carbone being played by Mark Holgate (Maggie May (Leeds Playhouse); Maryland (Friargate Theatre); Twelfth Night, Hamlet, Macbeth, A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Shakespeare’s Rose Theatre)) and his wife Beatrice Carbone is played by Nicole Cooper who last appeared at the Tron in The Tempest in 2021 and is a twice ‘Best Female Performance’ CATS winner  for Coriolanus and Medea, Bard in the Botanics (Lear’s Fool, Hedda Gabler (Bard in the Botanics); Macbeth (An Undoing) (Rose Theatre, Kingston; Theatre for a New Audience, New York; Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh)) The niece that they brought up as their own and Eddie’s illicit love, Catherine, is played by Holly Howden Gilchrist who is currently in her final year on the BA Acting course at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. Holly is actually the daughter of Kath Howden who played the role of Beatrice at the Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh, the last time A View From The Bridge was staged in Scotland.

Beatrice’s cousins, and brothers – the outgoing Rodolpho who falls in love with Catherine, and the quiet Marco – are escaping poverty by illegally moving to the US and are brought to life by Michael Guest as Rodolpho (The Comedy of Errors (Winner: Best Ensemble CATS Awards 2022), A Christmas Carol, Red Riding Hood (Citizens Theatre), A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Scottish National Opera), Joke (A Play, A Pie & A Pint), Rumpelstiltskin (Platform)) and Reuben Joseph (The Outrun (Royal Lyceum Theatre); Macbeth (Royal Shakespeare Company); Hamilton (Victoria Palace Theatre); Orphans, Rapunzel, The Cheviot, The Stag and the Black, Black Oil (National Theatre of Scotland). Alfieri, the Italian American lawyer who represents both sides of the community, the Atlantic and the law is played by Nicholas Karimi (So Young (Traverse Theatre); Arabian Nights (Bristol Old Vic); Adventures With The Painted People (Pitlochry Festival Theatre); Henry VI (parts 2&3) (Royal Shakespeare Company)). Nicholas previously performed in A View From The Bridge at York Theatre Royal and Royal & Derngate Theatre, Northampton in the role of Eddie.

Director Jemima Levick says of the piece:

‘A View From The Bridge is epic – a classic play originally produced in 1955 that I’m excited to re-vision for a modern audience.  It’s a play that hinges on themes of citizenship, immigration and the right to remain, revolving around a central character whose low-level right wing sentiments intensify and swell to serve his own purpose. Set in a dockside community, with a docker (or Longshoreman in this case) facing an influx of new immigrants and challenges to what he deems to be ‘his own’, I see A View From The Bridge as an incredibly timely piece, with a strong resonance to Glasgow and the world as we know it now.  And having not been produced in Scotland for over ten years, it’s a piece that is more than ready for reinvention.’

Arthur Miller said of the play:

‘It always struck me that this [bridge] has commuter traffic going over it all day…

They were passing over this area where this Greek drama was taking place and nobody ever thought about it, nobody knew about it… The whole area, the different culture that was down there was unknown to the people on the bridge… This was an immigrant community… They felt separated by language, by background, by the kind of work they did… they had never properly entered the country, they had no papers…But at least they got into the country instead of starving.’

Arthur Miller was an acclaimed American playwright who won several awards for his work including two Tony Awards and an Olivier Award for A View From The Bridge for Best Revival of a Play.

Jemima Levick joined Tron Theatre in April 2024 as the new Artistic Director.  A View From The Bridge will be the first production she will direct in this role.  Jemima was, most recently, Artistic Director for A Play, A Pie & A Pint, and has also been Artistic Director at Dundee Rep and Artistic Director and Chief Executive of Stellar Quines Theatre Company.  She has directed over forty professional productions across her career to date.

Originally produced in 1955, this will be the first time on over ten years that A View From The Bridge has been presented in Scotland.

Running time – approx 120 minutes plus 20 min interval.

Recommended age – 14+ Contains violence and adult themes.

21 FEBRUARY – 15 MARCH 2025