Few if any modern plays retain their scalding currency decade after decade like Arthur Miller’s heartrending commentary on the hollowness of the American Dream, Death of a Salesman. Joe Mantello’s psychologically probing Broadway revival takes place more than ever inside the head of its weary protagonist Willy Loman, played by Nathan Lane in an expertly judged performance that hits every lacerating note of pathos without denying the self-deluding character’s belligerence or entirely muffling the actor’s innate humor. He’s flanked by a superlative ensemble in a transfixing production directed with piercing clarity. In addition to being a play uncannily keyed into whatever period in which it’s staged, Salesman is also a work that touches different nerves depending on an audience member’s age. I’ve seen productions in four different decades, all with formidable casts, but I can’t recall one in which the jagged collision of past and present felt so unsettling, or the dissonance between comforting illusion and cold reality so cruel.  The tragedy of the ordinary man that the play represents is all around us if we care to …