"Our Town," Long Beach Playhouse Mainstage Theatre, by James Scarborough

Thornton Wilder’s “Our Town,” directed by Sharyn Case for the Long Beach Playhouse Mainstage Theatre, wonderfully examines the seemingly pedestrian life of a small New England town. Fine direction and a more-than-capable ensemble performance distinguishes this story of the comings and goings of two families but it’s Andrew Vonderschmitt's set design, especially, which parlays the production into a taut reminder of the eternal significance of these seemingly insignificant lives.

The story begins in 1901, in the fictional town of Grover’s Corners, New Hampshire. Stage Manager (Brian J. Page), an omniscient sage who knows everything, past, present, and future about everyone, narrates directly to the audience. He recounts the story of the Gibbs, whose Doc (Gregory Linde), is the town’s physician, and the Webbs, whose Mr. Webb (Brian Canup) runs the town’s newspaper. Their children George Gibbs (Sam Carter) and Emily Webb (Erica Farnsworth) fall in love, marry, have a child and then learn something only those much older should learn.

If you’ve seen the play, you understand the near-setless stage and the pantomime gestures of the actors. If you haven’t, the first two acts will seem like a puzzle that the stunning third act, a testament to Case’s spot-on ability to build a rising crescendo, will resolve. Someone’s died. The figures that appear to be sitting on boxes are actually dead souls in their graves, conversing with each other as if they were still alive. While the actual funeral service occurs in the background, the person who died appears atop the empty box: he/she, the recently departed, is not used to this in-between state and wants to return to life. One of the dead people warns him/her not to pick a happy day, for reasons that quickly become clear.

Plenty are the scenes of humor and enchantment: Simon Stinson (Bruce Thomas Eason), the town drunk, is treated as an oddity, like Otis on The Andy Griffith show. George’s connecting with Emily from their windows (the ladder scene) for help with his homework is breathtaking, and his and Emily’s jitters on their wedding day is endearing. She jokingly wishes she were dead.

The third act, a dramatic kick in the stomach, explains the robotic gestures and the practically empty stage. Only from the vantage of death do you fully understand that, no matter how trivial things may seem to be, they are nonetheless the threads that hold your together and which, once unwoven, can never again be made anew.

Though Page as Stage Manager does most of the talking – and, with his avuncular Burl Ives demeanor, what an inspired casting choice that was – it’s Farnsworth’s Emily that steals the show. She brings nuance to a character that, given the way things turn out, had to be shaded in many, many tones. She was hopeful, scared and then, all of a sudden, became preternaturally wise beyond her years.

Performances are 8 pm, Fri. & Sat, 2 pm, Sun. The play runs until March 6. Tickets are $12-22. The Playhouse is located at 5021 E. Anaheim St. For more info call 494-1014 or visit www.lbplayhouse.com.