Our Town

Our Town
1938 first edition cover from the Library of Congress Rare Book and Special Collections Division
Written by	Thornton Wilder
Characters	Stage Manager Mrs. Myrtle Webb Mr. Charles Webb Emily Webb Joe Crowell Jr. Mrs. Julia Gibbs Dr. Frank F. Gibbs Simon Stimson Mrs. Soames George Gibbs Howie Newsome Rebecca Gibbs Wally Webb Professor Willard Woman in the Balcony Man in the Auditorium Lady in the Box Mrs. Louella Soames Constable Warren Si Crowell Three Baseball Players Sam Craig Joe Stoddard
Date premiered	January 22, 1938
Place premiered	McCarter Theatre Princeton, New Jersey
Original language	English
Subject	Life and death in an American small town
Genre	Drama
Setting	1901 to 1913. Grover's Corners, New Hampshire near Massachusetts.

Our Town is a 1938 metatheatrical three-act play by American playwright Thornton Wilder. It tells the story of the fictional American small town of Grover's Corners between 1901 and 1913 through the everyday lives of its citizens.

Throughout, Wilder uses metatheatrical devices, setting the play in the actual theatre where it is being performed. The main character is the stage manager of the theatre who directly addresses the audience, brings in guest lecturers, fields questions from the audience, and fills in playing some of the roles. The play is performed without a set on a mostly bare stage. With a few exceptions, the actors mime actions without the use of props.

Our Town was first performed at McCarter Theatre in Princeton, New Jersey in 1938. It later went on to success on Broadway and won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. It remains popular today and revivals are frequent.

The Stage Manager introduces the audience to the small town of Grover's Corners, New Hampshire, and the people living there as a morning begins in the year 1901. Professor Willard speaks to the audience about the history of the town. Joe Crowell delivers the paper to Doc Gibbs, Howie Newsome delivers the milk, and the Webb and Gibbs households send their children (Emily and George, respectively) off to school on this beautifully simple morning.

Three years have passed, and George and Emily prepare to wed. The day is filled with stress. Howie Newsome is delivering milk in the pouring rain while Si Crowell, younger brother of Joe, laments how George's baseball talents will be squandered. George pays an awkward visit to his soon-to-be in-laws. Here, the Stage Manager interrupts the scene and takes the audience back a year, to the end of Emily and George's junior year. Emily confronts George about his pride, and over an ice cream soda, they discuss the future and their love for each other. George resolves not to go to college, as he had planned, but to work and eventually take over his uncle's farm. In the present, George and Emily say that they are not ready to marry—George to his mother, Emily to her father—but they both calm down and happily go through with the wedding.