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Our Town
NORTHERN LIGHTS The Chance outdoes itself with "Our Town," Thornton Wilder's 1938 classic, a timeless parable of human life directed by Ian Downs, as a second billing on their Evolving Stage before their main offering of "For Pete's Sake." An impressive cast of eighteen, including four children, fills the stage with the lives of ordinary folks in Grover's Corners, N.H. from 1901 to 1913. The three acts each depict a slice of life a few years apart in his unremarkable country town of a couple of thousand souls. This little gem continues to be offered regularly by Orange County house and speaks to us as clearly as over sixty years ago in its astute analysis of the human condition's evanescent futility in spite of the cardinal importance each individual gives to his or her own life. Also noteworthy, is the role of the narrator, who chronicles the events for the audience, breaking down theatrical convention's "fourth wall" as he addresses us. Like many small towns of the early Twentieth Century, the social elite is anchored by the families of Dr. Gibbs and Mr. Webb, the local Sentinel's Editor, at a time when newspapers such as this one were the labor of love of one caring person rather than an anonymous team. The two families' teenagers, George Gibbs and Emily Webb, are falling in love, and, in the limited circles of such locales, cannot but marry, a fate endured by most civilized people for millennia. For better or worse, couples form to procreate, ensuring continuity of the genetic species through countless generations. The women are strong and accepting, tacit in their going about the business of the endless chores of running a house without modern appliances. The men are meek and resigned, mildly content to earn a living to keep their household fiscally sound while being docilely obedient to their all-knowing wives. In close communities the world and centuries over, everyone's business is everybody else's through the scrutiny inherent to proximity and the women's gossip. This God-fearing, Republican stronghold deplores the church organist's propensity to drink, but the men keep an eye out for his welfare, prescient of his ominous end by his own hands. As each day dawns, its rituals unfold, with the morning express to Boston's distant whistle, the arrival of the milkman with his faithful mare Betsie delivering fresh milk to the fussy women. The children get up and prepare for school. Small chitchat about predicting the weather unite young and old. The doctor delivers babies and attends to the sick, the reporter decides what is newsworthy and decent to print. The minister performs ceremonies and the undertaker buries the dead. Towns folks are busy living their lives, just like we do a century later, spending and wasting time as if it were never to run out, afraid to pause and ponder about its meaning, repressing dark fears about its only possible outcome. And for the starstruck young people in love, there is an eternity of endless bliss ahead of them in spite of wedding day jitters. In those days, "till death us parts" had a more concrete meaning that that of today's divorce courts. George is cornered into marriage by Emily. Before women's liv, it was crucial for a young woman to secure a provider. The final scene takes place in the cemetery. Different sections house older and younger generations, with recurring names since the late 1600's. Up in the newer area, the dead are having quiet conversations in stilted stances frozen in death and stone. Mrs. Gibbs is there, and the organist, of course. Emily dies in childbirth as so many women did. She is buried in her wedding lace and comes up to take her place next to her mother-in-law. This very concrete representation of life after death parallels the Chance's "For Pete's Sake"'s paradise, minus God. Here too, the deceased look down on us and want to join us again. The Gibbs father and son are united in their widowed sorrow. The narrator, as THornton Wilder's voice, forces us to confront our mortality and question our deliberate, blissful ignorance of our numbered tomorrows. The staging is superbly sober, with its minimalist palette
of black, white, gray and navy blue. There are no props and the actors
do a good job of miming actions. Jack Rubens is an effective narrator,
his age bringing depth to the role of the commentator, with the wisdom
of maturity. Kevin Williams brings great sensitivity to his role as George
against Kelli Tager's sweet portrayal of Emily. Molly Dewane is a vivacious
Mrs. Gibbs and doubles as costume designer for the play. Young Nomi Abadi
has real stage presence as George's young sister, Rebecca. Ian Down's
production is a piece suitable for the entire family with the added bonus
that adults will enjoy it on a philosophical level and can share their
own thoughts on life with their children.
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