The Foolish Mortals will present
Our Town for Our Town
on April 19th, 20th, 21st, and 22nd at Bethel Lutheran Church’s new Parrish Hall (Bethel Church Road, Edinburg). Directions...
Time: 7:30
Price: $8 Adullts
$5 Children 12 and under
All proceeds to benefit charities towns in our immediate community and those in our global community.
Tickets on sale at The Watchful Tiger in Edinburg. Tickets can also be purchased through cast members and at the performance (if available). Due to limited seating, advance purchase is highly recommended.
A Pulitzer Prize winning play, Our Town, by Thornton Wilder finds universal meaning in the ordinary lives of the citizens of Grover's Corners, New Hampshire. With a sparse set and no props, Our Town “turned the theater world on its ear" when it premiered in 1938 and is still one of the most produced American plays.
Summary of the Play:
Grover's Corners, New Hampshire's small, rural, out-of-the-way fictional town. 1901 to 1913. Life is pretty much the same for small towns in America. There is no apparent threat of global conflict or war. Such is the setting of Wilder's play, Our Town.
Received with mixed reviews at its premiere in 1938, but awarded the Pulitzer Prize, Our Town has become one of the most popularly produced plays of the twentieth century.
There are echoes of classic Greek drama: the Stage Manager as Chorus and the three-act structure as trilogy. Like its Greek ancestors, Our Town concerns itself with the continuing cycle of life, humankind's nearest understanding of eternity.
The central values of the play—Christian morality, community, the family, appreciation of everyday pleasures—are traditional. Yet, Wilder's methods of presenting these values on the stage are anything but. No scenery, few props, mimed actions, a. dramatis persona who fluidly travls both in and out of the action of the play—all these make for a radically innovative way of presenting a drama. This was certainly a risk at a time when theater productions were known for their lavish costumes and scenery. However, these "experimental techniques" allow the audience to focus on the characters themselves rather than on their location and how they related to objects that surrounded them.
In Our Town, Thornton Wilder artfully manipulates time and place and relates the here-and-now of a small, New England village to the timeless concerns of all humankind. He builds the action of the play toward the dramatic revelation that human life, however painful, dreary, or inconsequential its daily events, is both a precious gift in its own right as well as a portion of the mysterious plan that rests in the "Mind of God."
Directions:
From Edinburg:
South on 11 to Bowman's Crossing,
Turn Right onto South Middle Road,
Pass Foltz's (Gores) Meat Market,
Next Right onto Bethel Church Road,
Church is on the right 1 1/2 miles down the road.
Directions: From Edinburg
Head south on Rt 11
Take RIGHT at South Middle Road.
Take RIGHT on Bethel Church Road
Look for Bethel Lutheran Church (on Right)
Contact: jeanner@shentel.net for more information.
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