If you make your way across to the Hunters Hills Theatre you are in for a treat. This is such a beautifully written play, it won the Pulitzer Prize in 1938,  which it is  given a very respectable production.

OUR TOWN depicts the everyday life of two families in the fictional town of Grovers Corner, New Hampshire at the turn of the twentieth century.

Through the play a narrator addresses the audience, describing. commenting on  and participating in the three acts covering the daily life, love and marriage and death and the meaning of life of the Gibbs and the Webb families.

Flashbacks sketch in the everyday existence and work of the families, characters come and go, as the action focuses on the romance between Emily and George Gibbs from their schooldays through to their marriage.

Nine years on one sees  the end of their happy marriage when Emily dies in childbirth, but she is resurrected to join the mourners at her own funeral and happily recalls her twelfth birthday. She desperately  wants to share her happiness with her mother who cannot see her so she returns to her grave full of admiration for life though a bit saddened by how little people appreciate it.

Kaye Lopez’s production is a good one. Ross Alexander plays the Stage Manager and Howie, Ray Pittman plays Dr Gibbs, Lois Marsh plays Mrs Gibbs, Cooper Soo plays joe Crowell, Si Crowell and Wally, Liz Grindley plays Mrs Webb, Jasper Kyle plays George, Scarlett Moore plays Rebecca, Hayley Watkins plays Emily, Jim Burns plays Professor, Constable and Joe Stoddart, Bob Guest plays Mr Webb, Peter Tucker plays Simon Stimson, Chrissie McIntyre plays Mrs Soames and Penelope Korths plays Samantha Craig.

Christopher Hamilton’s set design features a bare stage apart from some chairs and tables and two step ladders.

Hunters Hill Theatre’s production of Thornton Wilder’s OUR TOWN  plays at the Hunters Hill Town Hall  until Sunday 1st December 2019,

https://www.huntershilltheatre.com.au/