Give it up for OT!

Why Our Town is a perfect play:

1. Meant for the stage - A perfect play should be the epitome of theatre, making it untranslatable to other artistic media. We need to ask: why is it a play and not a novel, poem, song, or film? Our Town thoroughly utilizes the theatricality of the stage in such a way that makes it work exclusively as a theatre piece. Meanings are expertly layered and the audience’s role defined in an almost Brechtian way (identifying the actors names, detailed pantomimed activities, the Stage Manager speaking directly to the audience, planted actors in the audience, etc).

2. The play magnifies the “eternal” conditions of human life and community by setting its sights on the specificity of individual lives in a particular time and place. Through a handful of folks, Wilder speaks volumes on the nature of life, community, relationships, and death.

3. The way Wilder constantly focuses his lenses in and out and speeds up time to highlight moments of the play. For example: the Stage Manager freezing the action to tell us when and how a character dies after they’ve just entered; describing the “time capsule” in the new cornerstone of the new bank which will contain a copy of the play; “the mountain got bit away a few fractions of an inch; millions of gallons of water have passed by the mill; and here and there a new home was set up under a roof.”

4. “…it seems to me that once in your life before you die, you ought to see a country where they don’t talk in English and don’t even want to.” (Mrs. Gibbs). Wilder, like the most caring and detailed artist, paints a magnificent portrait of a community reined in by their inability to see beyond their immediate circumstances. As Emily remarks, “we don’t have time to look at one another.”

5. The Stage Manager. An ingenious creation who, like Boal’s Joker, serves as a mediator, instructor, and friend for the audience. Simultaneously a stand-in for the spectator and for God, he (or she) alone can be a character in the play, an audience member, and a manipulator of the theatrical world. If the central characters are limited by their perspectives, geography, and mortality, the Stage Manager provides the perfect counterpoint as one who is able to both transcend and traverse these boundaries.

6. Soda Fountain Scene (Act II) – An extremely rich scene brimming with subtext and enough sexual tension to choke a cow (Bessie, that is). Very fun for actors and director alike.

7. Rebecca’s description of the letter her friend received. It’s a simple moment, but an effective one that sums up our place in the metaphysical scheme of things, just in time for the closing of Act I:
“REBECCA: …Jan Crofut; the Crofut Farm, Grover’s Corners; Sutton County; New Hampshire; United States of America.
GEORGE: What’s so funny about that?
REBECCA: But listen, it’s not finished: the United States of America; Continent of North America; Western Hemisphere; the Earth; the Solar System; the Universe; the Mind of God,--that’s what it said on the envelope.
GEORGE: What do you know!”

8. It is easy to screw up. I figure that if a play is perfect, then it should be nearly impossible for imperfect directors, actors, and designers to put together a good production. Out of the three or four times I’ve seen Our Town, only one production has been good—and it was VERY good, which convinced me of its worth. If the artists involved don’t make full use of the play’s theatricality, depth, and simple beauty but instead dwell in sentimentality, the piece simply drowns in boredom.