Andy Arnold's Arches Theatre Company has a long tradition of presenting incisive US dramas. They have chosen the perfect time to produce the Scottish premiere of Arthur Miller's beautifully crafted short play The Last Yankee.
Set in a publicly run psychiatric hospital in small-town New England, the drama is a sophisticated treatise on the fear, disappointment and self-loathing of white middle America. Ageing businessman Mr Frick and Leroy, a lawyer's son and struggling carpenter, meet in the waiting room of the hospital where their wives are patients. The awkward pleasantries of forced conversation soon give way to Frick's blunt, neo-conservative opinions and Leroy's febrile sensitivities.
The men's argument exposes a brooding sense of dissatisfaction with the American dream. As they join their wives, it becomes difficult to tell whether the patients or visitors are most in need of shelter from the storm of social expectation.
There is something disarmingly delicate about this investigation of the fragile psychology of the modern US. No character carries a terrible secret, no one's life or liberty is riding on these interactions. The tragedies of the play lie in the past, but cast a long shadow over the present.
Miller's status as America's greatest living playwright has been achieved, largely, by his capacity for combining sharp naturalism with startling symbolism. Here, the grey paralysis of confused people is illuminated by a brilliant and darkly comic moment. As Frick wrestles with a hated modernity he associates with the decline of old legal and racial certainties, his wife Karen seeks solace in cinematic nostalgia. Her retreat into a Ginger Rogers fantasy is presented with poignancy and knowing irony by the superb Kay Gallie.
Selina Boyack is similarly impressive as Leroy's troubled and determined spouse Patricia, who talks of going "clean" by secretly discarding prescribed medication as if she is a recovering heroin addict.
Director Arnold brings the perfect touch to everyday Americans who speak either too little or too much, because they simply don't know what to say.
· Until March 22. Box office: 0901 022 0300.
