A Singer’s Notes 30 by Keith Kibler: Our Town, at Hubbard Hall. Go to this!

A Singer’s Notes 30: Our Town, at Hubbard Hall. Go to this!

The Cast of Thornton Wilder's "Our Town" at Hubbard Hall. Photo © 2011 Jonathan Barber.

Thornton Wilder's Our Town, at Hubbard Hall, Cambridge, New York


Thoreau told us that the bluebird carries his sky on his back. He knew if we could see this we would know the color of Heaven. This is the way Our Town works. It is quiet. One scene — the one at the soda fountain — makes the difficulty of talking almost a touchable thing. Laconic sentences in the play mean more than just their sense; they pull the listener. "Know they will" says Howie Newsome, a couple of times. Syntax made into sound. To Wilder this seemed to be the language of New England. And this is precisely the sound that the Theatre Company at Hubbard Hall production found so directly last weekend. It was all going along well enough until the scene between the two young ones in the soda fountain. Then it was one of those times when that little voice says, "This is really good. I've never heard anything so good. This is one of those nights when it's going to happen. I will not forget this. How did they hear it so well? This is how I knew it would sound. Will it ever be like this again —  even tomorrow night?" You know what I mean. There was nothing much to see in the scene, just a board over two chairs, but there, two very, very fine young actors made us believe that their love was not only carried but embraced by their reticence. It's a quiet scene, full of stops. It's a proposal, but one in which the word "marry" is never said. Alexandra Jennings's Emily was an astounding creation, like no other Emily I have seen. It was jerky, abrupt, strong, awkward, penetrating. She seemed like a real teenager, not a sentimental version of a teenager from a hundred years ago. She made you hear the waiting that women must do, and somehow you felt she led even then. Jim Staudt as George had an even tougher task. Being a wonderful actor, really wonderful, he made us believe he had a lot of trouble speaking. Most powerful in this scene was the utterly creative listening these two marvelous actors did, short terse sentences made into music, and the listening in between the most profound eloquence of all. I have to say that this was one of the finest 15 minutes on stage I have seen in years. I will not forget it. They made me see how beautifully the play works when the actors hear.

Read the full review on the Berkshire Review, an international journal for the Arts!

Michael Miller