Arthur Miller Timeline of Important Dates (2024)

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How It All Went Down

Oct 17, 1915

Arthur Miller Born

Arthur Asher Miller is born in Manhattan. He is the second son of Augusta and Isidore Miller, both Jewish immigrants from Poland. Isidore's business—S. Miller & Sons—is prosperous enough that the family can afford a sixth-floor apartment overlooking Central Park. Isidore rides a chauffeured car to work every morning.

Oct 24, 1929

Stock Market Crash Hits Miller Family

The stock market crashes. Isidore Miller, who has invested extensively in stocks, takes a hard hit in the subsequent Depression. Within two years, Miller is forced to give up his business and the family moves from Manhattan to Brooklyn.

1932

Miller Graduates from High School

Arthur Miller graduates from Brooklyn's Abraham Lincoln High School and begins work in an auto-parts warehouse in order to save money for college. He also attends New York City College night classes for a few weeks, but drops out when he is unable to keep up with both school and work.

1934

Miller at University of Michigan

Miller enrolls in the University of Michigan after having been denied admission twice before due to his poor grades in high school. Miller works as a reporter and night editor for the university newspaper, the Michigan Daily.

1936

Hopwood Award for First Play

Miller receives the Hopwood Award for his first play, No Villain, and uses the prize money to help pay tuition. A revised version entitled They Too Arise wins him a $1,250 scholarship from the Theater Guild's Bureau of New Plays the following year.

1937

Another Hopwood Award

Miller wins a second Hopwood Award for his play Honors at Dawn. Miller's third entry to the Hopwood Committee, a dramatic critique of prison conditions called The Great Disobedience, receives second place recognition.

1938

Federal Theater Project

Miller graduates from college and finds work writing radio plays for the Federal Theater Project in New York City. Two years later, the U.S. government cuts the Depression-era program after critics assail its leftist political leanings. An unemployed Miller accepts federal assistance.

Aug 5, 1940

Arthur Miller's First Marriage

Miller marries his college sweetheart, a Catholic woman named Mary Grace Slattery. Miller is unable to find a producer interested in his plays, The Half Bridge and The Golden Years. Slattery supports them both through her work as a waitress and an editor.

1941

Brooklyn Navy Yard

As the United States mobilizes to fight World War II, Miller begins work as a ship fitter's helper in the Brooklyn Navy Yard, choosing to work nights in order to write during the daytime.

1943

Arthur Miller in Hollywood

Miller finds work as a screenwriter for a war film, The Story of G.I. Joe, and quits his job in the Navy Yard. Frustrated with his employers and their lack of acknowledgement for his work, Miller eventually quits the job.

1944

The Man Who Had All the Luck

Miller's play The Man Who Had All the Luck receives the Theater Guild National Award and opens on Broadway. Despite the award, the play bombs with the public and closes after only four performances. Disheartened with his repeated failures in New York, Miller considers quitting writing. In the same year Mary Slattery gives birth to the couple's first child, a daughter named Jane.

1947

All My Sons

Miller's play All My Sons, based on a true story about a man who sold faulty machine parts to the U.S. military during World War II, becomes an instant hit. The play wins two Tony Awards and the New York Drama Critics' Circle Award, and is rated one of the ten best plays of 1947. In the same year, Miller's son Robert is born.

1949

Death of a Salesman

Death of a Salesman opens to huge acclaim on Broadway. The play wins the Pulitzer Prize, the New York Drama Critics' Circle Award, and the Tony.

1951

Affair with Marilyn Monroe

Miller meets actress Marilyn Monroe and they have a brief affair.

1953

The Crucible

The Crucible opens on Broadway. The play's setting in the Salem Witch Trials provides an allegory for Senator Joseph McCarthy's ongoing persecution of suspected communists, a process that disgusts Miller.

1955

A View from the Bridge

Miller produces two new moderately successful plays, A Memory of Two Mondays and A View from the Bridge. A View from the Bridge is based on the same story as Elia Kazan's Oscar-winning film On the Waterfront.

Jun 29, 1956

Second Marriage and HUAC

Miller divorces his first wife and marries Marilyn Monroe. Shortly after the marriage, Miller—who has attended party meetings, but never been a member of the Communist party—is called before the House Committee on Un-American Activities to testify. Committee chairman Francis Waters privately offers to let Miller off if he agrees to have Monroe pose with Walters for a campaign poster. Miller refuses and is questioned about his involvement with communist activities and probed for the names of other communists. Despite the pressure, Miller refuses to name names.

May 31, 1957

Contempt of Congress

A judge finds Miller guilty of contempt of Congress for refusing to name other alleged communists during his 1956 HUAC testimony.

Jul 8, 1958

Miller's Conviction Overturned

After a lengthy appeals trial, a judge overturns Miller's contempt conviction.

1961

The Misfits

The Misfits, a movie written by Miller and starring Monroe, premieres. Shortly afterward, the couple divorces. Monroe dies of a drug overdose nineteen months later.

Feb 17, 1962

Third Marriage

Miller marries Austrian-born photographer Inge Morath, whom he met on the set of The Misfits. In September, Morath gives birth to their daughter Rebecca.

1964

Two New Plays

Miller writes Incident at Vichy and After the Fall, two plays about the Holocaust. Critics assail After the Fall, calling it indulgent and exploitative of Marilyn Monroe's recent death. Miller denies any intentional similarity between the play's character and his former wife.

1965

Presidency of PEN

Miller is elected president of PEN, an international literary organization that advocates for a free press and against censorship and oppression of writers.

1966

Miller Rejects Son

Miller's son Daniel is born with Down Syndrome and his parents decide to commit him to an institution.

1968

The Price

The Price, a play about two brothers dealing with the death of their father, premieres. Miller's own father died in 1966. The Price is Miller's last major Broadway success.

1985

Miller Revival in Britain

After receiving lackluster reviews at its 1977 American premiere, The Archbishop's Ceiling opens to great acclaim in England and marks the beginning of a revival of Miller's work in that country. The play's themes reflect Miller's advocacy on behalf of censored writers in the Soviet bloc.

1987

Miller Writes Autobiography

Miller publishes his autobiography, Timebends. He also releases two plays, I Can't Remember Anything and Clara, both preoccupied with the themes of memory and remembrance.

1991

The Ride Down Mt. Morgan

Miller's The Ride Down Mt. Morgan, a distinctly political play about the Reagan years, premieres in England.

1994

Broken Glass

Broken Glass, a play about the Nazis' 1938 Kristallnacht attack against civilian Jews and their property, premieres.

Jan 30, 2002

Death of Miller's Wife

Inge Morath, Miller's wife of forty years, dies of lymphatic cancer.

Feb 10, 2005

Death of Arthur Miller

Arthur Miller dies at the age of 89 at his home in Roxbury, Connecticut.

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