Community News

Genesius Players present Thornton Wilder's, Our Town.

The Magdalen College drama group, The Genesius Players, will perform Thornton Wilder's, Our Town on Saturday, December 5th, at 7:30 pm and on Sunday, December 6th, at 2:00pm. All are invited. Donations are gratefully accepted!

Our Town is one of the most frequently staged American plays. It is an unconventional work in that it has no scenery or props except for tables, chairs, ladders, and a few other objects. When actors dine, they hold imaginary utensils and eat imaginary food. When looking out an upper-story window, they stand on ladders. When the milkman makes deliveries from his horse-drawn cart, there is no horse or cart, and so goes the entire play. Thornton Wilder presented the play in this way to force the audience to concentrate on the characters and the themes. Scarcely a day has passed since its opening in 1938 that Our Town has not been performed somewhere in this country - in productions from professional revivals to community theaters to colleges and high schools. Why? There is no scenery; the actors dress in everyday clothing for the early 1900s; there is not a suspenful plot; there is no harsh language or violence. Yet there is something in this play that draws people to it year after year. It is a story about an average town's citizens in the early twentieth century as depicted through their everyday lives. It paints a very vivid and poignant picture of life, its hardships and its joys.