Berkeley historical images courtesy of the Berkeley Historical Society.

OUR TOWN written by Thornton Wilder, Berkeley High, ‘15 directed by Jonathan Moscone September 9–October 23, 2005 The Roda Theatre running time: 2 hours and 30 minutes, including two 15 minute intermissions “exceptional 14-person ensemble…a gallery of beautifully nuanced performances.”—San Francisco Chronicle “wonderful and wholesome”—KGO Radio 810AM “glows…burns brightly moment by moment.“—San Jose Mercury News “brilliance…breathes new life into American classic.”—Oakland Tribune Berkeley Rep brings Our Town back to our town! “It’s a little play with all the big subjects in it,” Thornton Wilder wrote to his friend, Gertrude Stein—and that little play proved him right by forever changing American theatre. Opening in the first years of a new century, Our Town still speaks to us about the beauty and transience of life through its bittersweet portrait of a small American town. Like life, the story moves from the carefree to the profound: characters grow up, fall in love, get married, bear children and—in the heart-rending final act—encounter untimely death. The Pulitzer Prize-winning script from one of Berkeley High’s most illustrious graduates has become so familiar that we forget how its debut revolutionized theatre. Under the direction of Jonathan Moscone, who brought Ghosts to Berkeley Rep in 2004, our production cleaves to this revolutionary spirit. “Across the nation,” writes Berkeley Rep Artistic Director Tony Taccone, “we are engaged in a debate about what it means to be an American. Issues that had become dormant, rights that we had taken for granted are being argued in a public forum and polarizing our country. What better time to revisit the play that has come to symbolize the ideal of how we live among each other? And what a perfect combination of irony and logic: this script that has become an ode to patriotism was written by a Berkeley radical attempting to shake things up.”