SOURCE: Johnson, Malcolm. “Acting Lapses Undercut This Our Town Revival.” Hartford Courant (23 July 1994): D8.

In the following review of the Williamstown Theater Festival production of Our Town at Williams College, Johnson describes Wilder's play as an essential American play that has endured the test of time. He criticizes this production, however, for undermining the strengths of the play through poor acting.

Even in a less than perfect revival, Thornton Wilder's Our Town remains the essential American play, a sentimental yet thoughtful and philosophical look back to the innocent opposite end of our century.

Peter Hunt, the gifted artistic director of the Williamstown Theatre Festival, would seem an ideal choice to stage Wilder's Pulitzer Prize-winning 1938 play. Since taking command of the prestigious summer operation on the campus of Williams College, Hunt has successfully brought half-forgotten American theater pieces back to life: John Brown's Body, Inherit the Wind and last...