Jason Southerland’s production of Our Town takes off from the patronizing view that the play " provides a humorous but dated look at early 20th-century New England. " The Boston Theatre Works director therefore " jumped at the chance to tackle this American icon and offer an insightful perspective on the 21st century. "
Southerland realizes his perspective in a production that utilizes gimmicky visual elements like a tiny forest of suspended cuckoo clocks, revolving chrome-rimmed doors, and translucent panels behind which some actions take place in silhouette. There is a scratchy old Victrola that plays almost unrecognizable music before the performance begins but has no further role. Southerland also adds an annoying electronic soundtrack that mixes minimalist note spinning with assorted clicks and ticks that variously suggest cicadas buzzing and pipes rattling in an old house. These touches, as well as the obsessive choreography of Mrs. Webb and Mrs. Gibbs as they navigate their " kitchen " work triangles, are all meant to have symbolic value. Life is a repetitious round on both a daily and a cosmic level. Time ticks by inexorably. We get the picture.
In fact, Wilder’s stripped-down production values and stage directions, and the theatrical device of having a Stage Manager present glimpses of life in Grover’s Corners, imbue the Pulitzer-winning 1938 play with a built-in timelessness and universality. The author’s themes could have been demonstrated in almost any time or place; turn-of-the-20th-century New Hampshire is simply a representative example. The charge of datedness, then, seems both misguided and mistrustful.
Fortunately, this production boasts a splendid ensemble cast who personify the quotidian life with all its major and minor humor and tragedy. With her urban edge and sophistication, Bobbie Steinbach’s Stage Manager is an unconventional persona — I didn’t quite believe her when she kept saying " ain’t. " Yet in compensation she evinces a wry tenderness that balances her portrayal between Olympian distance and human compassion.
Emily Webb and George Gibbs are beautifully played by Lindsay Joy and Scott Adams: she’s blonde, appealingly outspoken, and self-confident in her book learning; he’s all loose joints, mussed hair, and goofy grin. Wilder asks the audience to recall how it felt to be young and in love, and these two actors reminded me poignantly of the sweetness, the pain, and the ridiculousness of that universal condition. In the last act, with the widowed George mutely grief-stricken and the dead Emily already assuming some of the detachment of the dead, Joy and Adams are an affecting embodiment of Wilder’s urging that we live life with full awareness.
Sharon Mason and Elizabeth Wightman provide a solid family foundation as the two selfless mothers, Mrs. Gibbs and Mrs. Webb; Wightman actually stepped into the part on just a few hours’ notice during previews. John Furse and James Bodge as Dr. Gibbs and Mr. Webb seem the quintessential small-town dads. Olivia Wise as Rebecca Gibbs strikes just the right bratty chord as George’s little sister. And there are effective performances of town folk from Mia Anderson, John Rosie Geier, Gabe Goodman, Tom Lawlor, Alex Wallace, and Murray Wheeler.