In his very first play, Arthur Miller gave himself a problem he couldn't quite write his way out of: can you make heavy drama out of something that doesn't happen, near tragedy out of the mere fear of tragedy? He gave it a game try, though, creating a character who, blessed with constant good luck, develops a neurotic dread of the misfortune that has to be just around the corner. It's a workable conceit, but David Beeves' reactions are so extreme, the piece stops being a universal drama and turns into a less convincing, less interesting look at aberrant pathology.
It's significant that the best scene (at least in Roundabout's solid revival) concerns David's baseball-playing brother and the big-league scout who crushes his dreams with the truth. We can already see Willy Loman and his boss in the rear-view mirror of history.
