Thornton Wilder's Our Town, Two Historic Productions on Two DVD
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Actor: Spalding Gray Hal HolbrookBrand: PBS
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Original Language)
Format: Color, DVD, NTSC
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 225 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2005-10-20
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Studio: Mastervision
DVD Reviews of Thornton Wilder's Our Town, Two Historic Productions on Two DVD
DVD Review: Our Town
Summary: 5 Stars
Both versions of Thornton Wilder's "Our Town" - the 1977 NBC production starring Hal Holbrook and the 1988 Lincoln Center production starring Spalding Gray - do this greatest American play justice. In both, the staging is comparably sparse, relying instead on mime to add depth to the dialogue; and, in both, the atmosphere generated by the lack of props and buildings is somber, even a little forboding. Similarly, the inclusion of a Stage Manager (Holbrook and Gray), serves as much to infuse this sense of forboding as it does to keep the play from devolving into a vehicle for extolling convential values; or, conversely, to keep the essential absurdity of the social and moral trappings humans devise to give their lives meaning from rendering those trappings meaningless (this is definitely not Theatre of the Absurd). The Stage Manager also keeps the audience from becoming overly involved in the characters' lives; in this way, the third act, with its emphasis on death, focuses the audience's attention on the play's deeper meaning rather than simply milking its emotions. In the final analysis, though, both versions being equally faithful to Wilder's larger purpose, all one can do is compare and contrast the actors in each.
In my opinion, the actors in the Lincoln Center production were better suited to their roles than those in the NBC production - the major exception being Hal Holbrook, who seemed slightly better suited to portray the Stage Manager than Spalding Gray. Both Penelope Ann Miller and Eric Stoltz, in the Lincoln Center production, seemed to bring a greater reality to Emily Webb and George Gibbs respectively - the two main characters - than did Glynnis O'Connor and Robby Benson in the NBC production. Miller was a more ambivalent Emily than O'Connor, more unsure of her physical self yet at the same time more confident of her intelligence; and in the crucial final scene, where Emily returns to the place of the living, there was more despair at being unable to become a part of her former life in Miller's Emily but, even so, greater reluctance to resume her place among the dead. Stoltz's George seemed shallower and less insightful than Benson's George; but this made for a George Gibbs better suited to the overall tenor of the play, as well as more realistically drawn; Stoltz's George could never have grasped what the playwright's larger purpose was - and shouldn't have been able to; whereas Benson's George evinced a greater capacity for growth than the character was actually endowed with. I also found James Rebhorn and Frances Conroy better matches for Dr. and Mrs. Gibbs than Ned Beatty and Sada Thompson; and Peter Maloney and Roberta Maxwell better matches for Mr. and Mrs. Webb than Ronny Cox and Barbara Bel Geddes. And, though a minor character, the church organist and town drunk, Simon Stimson, was better portrayed by Jeff Weiss than David Cryer.
Regardless how superb the two productions were, or which may have been the better production, it's truer about "Our Town" than almost any other play ever written that it must be seen on stage, in person, to experience its full effect. I had the good fortune to see "Our Town" produced in a local community theater; and though its staging, direction and acting couldn't equal either of these professional versions, it surpassed both because of the immediacy of seeing it first hand. Since the play itself, with its Stage Manager, sparse set and mimed actions, keeps the audience at bay, seeing it on film puts an even greater distance. It has to be seen right in front of you to be truly appreciated.
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Studio: Mastervision Release Date: 11/08/2005Bestsellers in DVD
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