I did Our Town last year at my international school in Nairobi, Kenya. It was so much fun. The kids were so skeptical when I described it. A few notes:
1. Reading Wilder's notes on the play, and even its opening production which he, in part, disliked, he said the play was "a martini, not a milkshake." The biggest mistake made was making it corny and nostalgic. The play was veery avante-garde at the time. As much as I was tempted by the really beautiful creative stage designs I saw online, I decided that these adornments worked against Wilder's intention of relentlessly keeping the focus on the story, so I staged it simply, with a long thin riser along the back wall (which was stacked into an abstract layered effect for Act 3's cemetery) where the whole cast sat and watched until their entrances. I hated the look of those curved trellises so I left them out. I also added tiny lights on lines high up for stars. The houses were delineated with strong lighting creating hard-edged rectangular spaces.
2. I had an extraordinary narrator, a Kenyan with a velvet voice and a very strong sense of gentle authority far beyond his years.
3. We spent an enormous amount of time getting the miming actions right, esp the two mothers and everyone entering and exiting the houses.
4. MUSIC: Our school has a strong musical program, and since we already have the hymns sung in the play, I wanted to add a bit more music. This was our most significant change. After the choir rehearsal, I had my Simon Stimson sitting at the piano playing Eric Satie's Gymnopedie 3, which cast the perfect mood in the blue moonlight. Returning from Intermission to Act 2, the morning of the wedding, we are told there had been a huge storm overnight. Just before Act 2 began, in barely visible light, the whole cast came out and did a finger snap, hand clap, thigh clap, jumping thunder storm for 2 minutes. Google it. Quite a cool effect and transition.
Most importantly, I ended the show with a song, Malcolm Dalglish's "A Psalm of Life". This began with piano mimicking Dalglish's hammered dulcimer, then a single voice, following the Stage Manager's final line. Others joined in, standing from their seat graves and others drifting in onstage, until everyone was singing strongly. The text is from a Longfellow poem, and I believe it honored the play while providing a transcendent message of hope to this sober ending, while in no way being flippant. It was an almost 'holy' sense at the end. Here is the song's text, taken from the poem:
Tell me not, in mournful numbers,
Life is but an empty dream!
For the soul is dead that slumbers,
And things are not what they seem.
CHORUS
Life is real! Life is earnest!
And the grave is not its goal;
Dust thou art, to dust returnest,
Was not spoken of the soul.
Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time;
CHORUS
Life is real! Life is earnest!
And the grave is not its goal;
Dust thou art, to dust returnest,
Was not spoken of the soul.
Let us, then, be up and doing,
With a heart for any fate;
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to labor and to wait.
CHORUS
Life is real! Life is earnest!
And the grave is not its goal;
Dust thou art, to dust returnest,
Was not spoken of the soul.
Dust thou art, to dust returnest,
Was not spoken of the soul.
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Steven Slaughter
Rosslyn Academy, Nairobi
Original Message:
Sent: 02-26-2016 08:02
From: Jennifer Jordan
Subject: Our Town
I have decided to do "Our Town" and am having auditions soon. I am wondering about a few things: First, has anyone double or triple cast roles as I have some concerns about turnout at auditions? Although the play is beautifully written as is, I wonder what nuances directors have used to keep the story fresh and relevant while honoring the script and style of the play. Lastly, how have others staged this piece successfully that may have not been in keeping with the original simplicity and style of the play?
Thanks in advance for your thoughts!