September 26, 2014 - October 19, 2014
by Will Eno
directed by Marcella Crowson
Winningstad Theater - 1111 SW Broadway, Portland, OR 97205
The residents of Middletown lead lives that are probably not too different from ours. They wake up, go to work, say hello to their neighbors, fix the plumbing, seek advice on parenting, and try to live lives that are as rewarding as possible. It’s all fairly ordinary. And yet…ordinary doesn’t even begin to scratch the surface of this quirky, word-frenzied refraction of Thornton Wilder’s Our Town. Middletown is a quizzical fable about life in all its sweetness and pain, joy and wonder, beginnings and endings.
Reviews
When the play does address matters of life and death, it becomes unexpectedly moving, and yet never loses its humor. The cast of ten is uniformly terrific, capturing the language beautifully and making the characters both archetypical and very specific…As usual at Third Rail, the technical and design work is specific and excellent, and adds to the enjoyment of the play.
Broadway World
Eno’s characters speak with such disarming, if often bemused, honesty that deep emotion shines through.
Oregon ArtsWatch
The play moves briskly, yet leaves plenty of breathing space for the audience and characters…Eno may be full of surprises, but he’s got the human rhythms of thought and expression, a theatrical sense of cosmic silence, down solid in this whacky, thoughtful ode to the mystery of existence. This is a show not to miss.
The Oregonian