[2] It went on to success on Broadway and received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, and remains popular today with frequent revivals.

The Stage Manager introduces the audience to the small town of Grover's Corners, New Hampshire, its geography and main buildings and institutions, as well as the people living there, as morning breaks on May 7, 1901.

Next, Editor Webb speaks to the audience about the town's socioeconomic status, political and religious demographics, and the accessibility and proliferation (or lack thereof) of culture and art in Grover's Corners.

The Stage Manager then leads the audience through a series of pivotal moments throughout the afternoon and evening, revealing the characters' relationships and challenges.

Underneath a glowing full moon, Act I ends with siblings George and Rebecca, and Emily gazing out of their respective bedroom windows, enjoying the smell of heliotrope in the "wonderful (or terrible) moonlight," with the self-discovery of Emily and George liking each other, and the realization that they are both straining to grow up in their own way.

The Stage Manager sets the scene by explaining three years have passed, and describing the many changes that can take place when "the sun's come up over a thousand times."

Howie Newsome is delivering milk in the pouring rain while Si Crowell, younger brother of Joe, laments how George's baseball talents will be squandered.

Emily confronts George about his pride, and over an ice cream soda, they discuss the future and confess their love for each other.

The Stage Manager, as officiant of the wedding, delivers a monologue on the institution of marriage: "people were made to live two by two" - but concludes, "I've married over two hundred couples in my day.

Nonetheless, the wedding completes and George and Emily leave, ending Act II, as Mrs. Soames exclaims, "I'm sure they'll be happy.

In a lengthy monologue, the Stage Manager discusses eternity ("we all know something is eternal"), focusing attention on the cemetery outside of town, which dates to the 1670s, including people who have died since the wedding - Mrs. Gibbs (pneumonia, while traveling), Wally Webb (burst appendix, while camping), Mrs. Soames, and Simon Stimson (suicide by hanging).

Town undertaker Joe Stoddard is introduced, as is a young man named Sam Craig who has returned to Grover's Corners for his cousin's funeral.

Mrs. Gibbs urges her to forget her life, warning her that being able to see but not interact with her family, all the while knowing what will happen in the future, will cause her too much pain.

Ignoring the warnings of Simon, Mrs. Soames, and Mrs. Gibbs ("our life here is to forget all that, and think only of what's ahead"), Emily returns to Earth to relive one day, her 12th birthday.

Emily asks the Stage Manager to return her to the dead, then hesitates and in a final monologue says goodbye to mortal life ("Oh earth, you're too wonderful for anybody to realize you").

It is believed Wilder drafted the entire third act during a visit to Zürich in September 1937, in one day, after a long evening walk in the rain with a friend, author Samuel Morris Steward.

The Stage Manager of the May 7, 1901, production introduces the play-within-the-play, which is set in the fictional community of Grover's Corners, New Hampshire.

The Narrator is supernatural as he is entirely aware of his relationship with the audience; as such it allows him freedom to break the fourth wall and address them directly.

The climax of this play needs only five square feet of boarding and the passion to know what life means to us.

For example, the scene in which Emily helps George with his evening homework, conversing through upstairs windows, is often performed with the two actors standing atop separate ladders to represent their neighboring houses.

Wilder called Our Town his favorite out of all his works, but complained that it was rarely done right, insisting that it "should be performed without sentimentality or ponderousness—simply, dryly, and sincerely.

[13] In 1946, the Soviet Union prevented a production of Our Town in the Russian sector of occupied Berlin "on the grounds that the drama is too depressing and could inspire a German suicide wave.

[17] A production at New York City's Lyceum Theatre, produced by Lincoln Center opened on December 4, 1988, after 27 previews, and ran for 136 performances until April 2, 1989; the cast included Spalding Gray as "Stage Manager," Frances Conroy as Mrs. Gibbs, Penelope Ann Miller as Emily, and Eric Stoltz as George.