If you include the stage direction, the first words of Thornton Wilder’s 1938 play “Our Town” are these: “No curtain. No scenery.”
It was Wilder’s belief that the theatre of his day had become too obsessed with spectacle. Directors loaded the stage with period furniture and elaborate costumes and realistic set design — what Wilder called the “obtrusive bric-a-brac” of stagecraft.
The move toward a comprehensive realism, which included a playwright’s dialogue too, irritated Wilder. “In Chinese drama, a character, by…
IHS brings ‘Our Town’ to life
