The structure of Odets' plays has been misinterpreted. To some extent the playwright himself is responsible for this critical confusion. "I was influenced a little by Chekhov," Odets told Mendelsohn in 1963. "Not by Ibsen, because you see my forms are not Ibsen's. But my chief influence as a playwright was the Group Theater acting company…." Invariably, critics and scholars of the drama refer to Odets' plays as Chekhovian in structure. The truth of the matter, however, is that the basic structure of an Odets play is Ibsenite; that is, one can perceive in it a single rising line of action which can be analyzed in terms of a point of attack, a turning point, and a resolution composed of a crisis, climax and conclusion. Chekhov's plays do not have this single action structure…. It was Odets' achievement to integrate a basic Ibsenite action with certain structural techniques of...