Our Own Our Town

I know it’s been done, undone, and poorly done more than any other American-written play—"'Tain't very choice"—but I’m a big fan of Thornton Wilder’s Our Town. This timeless play grabbed me the first time I read it in 1976 and never let go. A year later, PBS aired the last production that had the playwright’s input.* That show featured then-famous Robby Benson, but the production was shouldered by veteran Hal Holbrook as Stage Manager.

Ten years later, in 1987, I had the privilege of directing Our Town with a great group of sensitive and talented students in a high school of about 100. Since the play required all of my male leads from previous plays (as well as every first-timer who tried out), I was "Stage Manager." It came together very well. I’ve nothing funny or unusual to tell except that the lines and emotions of Grover's Corner, New Hampshire have been deeply etched in my mind ever since.

Act II is called “Love and Marriage,” and scenes and lines from it have been coming to me the closer we get to my daughter’s wedding in June. (I know that date is a long way off, but plans and details are peaking now.)

We watched a videotape of our high school's rendition from 1987 this afternoon. In the second Act, there’s a conversation between Mr. and Mrs. Gibbs [Jeff H. and Ann C.] as they are trying to decide whether or not to allow their son George [Mark H.] to get married. Mrs. Gibbs is ironing her husband’s shirts (with the gnawed collars) when he confesses:

Mr. Gibbs: Julia, do you know what one of my terrors was in marrying you?
Mrs. Gibbs: Ah, Pshaw! Go on with ya...
Mr. Gibbs: I was afraid that we would have enough material for conversation more than to last us a few weeks. I was afraid we’d run out—eat our meals in silence. That’s a fact. You and I have been conversing now for more than twenty years without any barren spells.
Mrs. Gibbs: Well, good weather. Bad weather. ‘Tain’t very choice, but I always manage to find something to say.

Here’s how that scene played out in our house this morning:
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Mr. Tom: (Reading news) Honey, what brand of peanut butter do we use?
Mrs. Julie: (from other room)
I'd have to go check. Why?
Mr. Tom: Because the FDA just recalled tainted Peter Pan peanut butter. Here I’ll read it out loud: “All Peter Pan peanut butter bought since May 2006 should be discarded, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration said on Friday in a statement about salmonella-contaminated peanut butter. More than 290 people from 39 states have become ill with food poisoning. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has identified the strain of bacteria as Salmonella Tennessee, one of many strains of salmonella bacteria."
Mrs. Julie: (entering room with a jar of peanut butter) The name of the town is “Salmonella, Tennessee”? Who would name a town Salmonella?
Mr. Tom: Salmonella is not the name of the town—although if it were, Tennessee makes sense. (In my best generic Southern accent with apologies to my friends down south.) “Hey, y’all, I’m from Salmonella, Tennessee, just north of Botulism, Alabama.”—Honey, “Salmonella Tennessee” is the name of the strain. Evidently they name the bacteria after where it was first found.
Mrs. Julie: That doesn't seem right. Having state quarters is one thing...
Mr.Tom: Don't feel bad. I didn't know it either.
Mrs. Julie: Oh, Well. (Holding up jar.) We use Jiff so it doesn’t matter.
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Mrs. Gibbs was right: Good peanut butter; bad peanut butter. ‘Tain’t very choice, but we always manage to find something to say.

There is a quiet contentment in shared life that supports and transcends all else in between. TK
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*Wilder also had input in the 1940 film version of his Pulitzer Prize winning play.