Death of a Salesman climax with Biff hugging Willy and crying as he tries to get Willy to let go of the unrealistic expectations. Rather than listen to what Biff actually says, Willy appears to believe his son has forgiven him and will follow in his footsteps, and after Linda goes upstairs to bed (despite her urging him to follow her), lapses one final time into a hallucination, thinking he sees his long-dead brother Ben, whom Willy idolized. In Willy's mind, Ben approves of the scheme Willy has dreamed up to kill himself in order to give Biff his insurance policy money. Willy exits
Willy Loman rope". Lowry described the production as depicting "the end of a man when his dream world is shattered". Creator Arthur Miller described the role as one for a large character in a small physical body and noted he had difficulty finding the right actor at first. The part was originally written for a physically small man with Willy at one point saying to his wife "I'm short. I'm very foolish to look at." When Cobb was cast, the line was changed to "I'm fat. I'm very foolish to look at," and a reference to Willy being called a "shrimp" was