Our Town
by Thornton Wilder
Dates: Thursday 5th June to Saturday 7th June. Includes matinee performances on Friday 6th June and Saturday 7th June.
Times: All evening performances will begin at 19:30. All matinee performances will begin at 14:30.
Venue: Rex Doyle Studio Theatre, Ivy Arts Centre
Duration: approximately 2 hours and 15 minutes including two short intervals
GENERAL BOOKINGS FOR THIS PRODUCTION WILL OPEN ON THURSDAY 1st MAY AT 12:00PM
Thornton Wilder’s Our Town is a poignant and timeless exploration of human existence, set in the unassuming yet profoundly significant town of Grover’s Corners, New Hampshire. Spanning the years 1901 to 1913, the play follows the intertwined lives of its residents, most notably George Gibbs and Emily Webb, through an intimate reflection on daily life, love, and mortality.
In Act One, Daily Life, the Stage Manager serves as a guide, introducing the town’s inhabitants and revealing the quiet rhythms of their everyday existence. The simplest routines; preparing breakfast, delivering newspapers, exchanging pleasantries, become a meditation on the unnoticed beauty of ordinary moments.
Act Two, Love and Marriage, follows George and Emily as they navigate the tenderness and uncertainty of young love, culminating in their wedding. Through their journey, the play highlights the raw, unfiltered emotions that define human connection and the inevitability of change.
In the final act, Death and Eternity, the play takes a deeply moving turn. Emily, having died in childbirth, returns as a spirit and is given the chance to revisit a single day from her past. What she experiences is both wondrous and heartbreaking, watching life unfold with a newfound awareness of its fleeting nature. Through Emily’s perspective, Our Town delivers its most profound message: that we rarely recognize the full weight of our own lives while we are living them.
With its minimalist staging and direct narration, Our Town strips away theatrical artifice to reveal something profoundly human: the universal experience of moving through time, of loving, losing, and yearning to hold on to what inevitably slips away.
Genre: Drama, musical
Age Recommendation: Suitable for all ages
Setting: 1901-1913 Grover's Corners, New Hampshire
This live production features BA Actor Musician final year students in collaboration with BA Theatre Production and MA Stage Management students.
Director: Dan Smith
Musical Director: Ben Barrow
If you require accessible seating or have any other enquiries including booking difficulties, please email:
[email protected] or call 01483 686876.
This amateur production of "Amelie" is presented by arrangement with Concord Theatricals Ltd.
www.concordtheatricals.co.uk
