Thornton Wilder's genius was in finding the universal in the commonplace. His oft-produced 1938 "Our Town" celebrates shelling peas and sipping strawberry ice-cream sodas while exploring the meaning of life and death. What makes it a classic is the connection between the two extremes: the idea that the answer to the riddles of the cosmos could be found in everyday actions of ordinary people. Wilder began developing these themes in a series of deceptively simple one-acts, two of which are being given straightforward and clean stagings by Keen Company.
Like "Our Town," these brief pieces are presented on a bare stage and narrated by a folksy stage-manager figure (a perfectly understated Jonathan Hogan). The curtain raiser, "The Happy Journey to Trenton and Camden," details a road trip of a family visiting their eldest daughter. Comments on the New Jersey scenery and arguments between the kids are interspersed with acknowledgments of mortality. "Someday we'll all be holding up traffic," the mother observes as a funeral passes. Only in the final moments do we learn the daughter is recovering from delivering a stillborn child and almost died herself.
"Pullman Car Hiawatha" marks a similar voyage. It squeezes the entire universe into a 1930 railroad sleeper. In addition to speeches by characters representing the planets, the hours, and the towns through which the train passes, we hear the thoughts of the passengers, including a young woman who dies during the night. Her farewell to the beauty of the workaday world is heartbreaking and prefigures the lovely adieu bid by Emily in "Our Town."
The large cast has many bright cameos. Ann Dowd exudes the homey wisdom of the New Jersey mother. Wilbur Edwin Henry is an understanding father. Maria Dizzia as the dying young woman is convincingly real.
Carl Forsman's direction of "Trenton and Camden" accentuates the deep bond of the family, while Henry Wishcamper's staging of "Hiawatha" evenly balances the complicated demands of the production with the emotionally powerful message. Jenny Mannis' costumes capture the 1930s period.