Thornton Wilder's classic American play, "Our Town," which opened the other night as a strong, intelligent, entertaining production by Stray Dog Theatre, is a drama most people know about, but is not performed often enough on any sort of professional level. Why? Well, it has 24 characters who show up on stage and off, here and there around the theater at Tower Grove Abbey and that's a very large cast.
Director Gary F. Bell has trimmed the number to 17, with some actors doing more than one role, and that works. It's also a three-act play, of the style when "Our Town" was new in 1938, and it has to be performed in three acts today. Changing it would be absurd. That means some additional length, bothersome to those theater-goers who simply must get home in time to turn on their television sets.
But it remains a wonderful play, classic in the sense that it's still meaningful, still accessible, still vital after 72 years, and Bell brings some fine work from his cast, especially from David K. Gibbs, as the Stage Manager, and Michelle Hand and Colleen M. Backer, as the women who hold their families together.
Gibbs, tall and slender in a white suit, with a most proper sense of irony in his delivery, is brilliant. Hand and Backer, two-thirds of the original Orange Girls, are very strong, Hand as the wife of Dr. Gibbs (an excellent Mark Abels) and Backer as Emily, daughter of the newspaper editor who lives next door. Hand shows real maturity, as the character needs, and Backer is a charming, flirtatious, delightful high-schooler. Kevin Boehm, as the doctor's son who is attracted to the girl next door, shows his panicky teenage indecision quite well. Abels, in addition to a fine portrayal, also displays the rare ability to stand on stage, look at the audience and tie a bow tie that looks right.
Leslie Wobbe, as Emily's mother and the editor's wife, creates a proper small town woman in the early days of the 20th century, and watching her and Hand, often as mirror images, pantomime all the house work of the mornng, give the plays its rhythm. John Reidy is the editor, but his part is written so weakly as to give him almost no personality. Jan Niehoff, an enthusiastic wedding guest, and Viktor Freesmeier, a newsboy, also stood out
The bare set, as is traditional with the play, has a few chairs and tables to represent the houses, and they benefit from Jay V. Hall's intelligent and stylish props. Tyler Duenow's lights are effective. Bell's direction is intelligent and first-rate throughout, with the drama of the third act highlighted by Hand's intelligent, stoic expression that says everything we need to know.
Our Town, by the Stray Dog Theatre Company, at the Tower Grove Abbey through June 26
–Joe