THE SKIN OF OUR TEETH
BY THORNTON WILDER
“ …the events of our homely daily life –this time the family life – are depicted against the vast dimensions of time and place. It was written on the eve of our entrance into the war and under strong emotion and I think it mostly comes alive under conditions of crisis. It has been often charged with being a bookish fantasia about history, full of rather bloodless schoolmasterish jokes. But to have seen it in Germany soon after the war, in the shattered churches and beerhalls that were serving as theatres, with audiences whose price of admission meant the loss of a meal…was an experience that was not so cool.”
THORNTON WILDER
DURATION
ACTS I AND II: 100 MINS
INTERVAL: 10 MINS
ACT III: 45 MINS
DIRECTOR NOTES
The Antrobus family of Excelsior, New Jersey, seem like a typical American family, but they are living in the last Ice Age, and the world is about to end - again!
Mr. and Mrs. Antrobus have been married for 5000 years, but can they survive a wall of ice, a great flood, famine and war, their disappointing children, and their own fracturing relationship?
As the United States entered World War 2, Thornton Wilder wrote a madcap comedy about how human beings cope with disaster and our capacity for both good and evil. Spanning different eras, and combining mythology, history, satire and allegory, The Skin of Our Teeth was a surprising popular success and has maintained its relevance and influence since its opening.
“Almost any evening, somewhere in America, the curtain is going up on a play by Thornton Wilder. Last year alone, there were four hundred productions. His play “The Skin of Our Teeth,” from 1942, made up about a quarter of those productions...”
THE NEW YORKER, 2017
This meta-theatrical masterpiece is part American sit-com, part parable. Time and place and the very fabric of the theatre warp and collide, as the play grapples with essential questions about humanity: its destiny, and its future survival.
TAFE Queensland Acting would like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land on which we learn, teach, and perform, the Jagera and Turrbal people. We would like to pay our respects to all elders past, present, and emerging. We acknowledge that Aboriginal people havebeen performing on and caring for this land, now known as Brisbane, for tens of thousands of years.
Sabelle Morrow-Woods
Hannah Pollard
Benjamin Walton
Matthew Woods
Video documentation
Duncan Wood
Touchwood Productions
Live photography
Jade Ellis
“Dear Milena, I wish the world were ending tomorrow. Then I could take the next train, arrive at your doorstep in Vienna, and say: ‘Come with me, Milena. We are going to love each other without scruples or fear or restraint. Because the world is ending tomorrow.’ Perhaps we don’t love unreasonably because we think we have time, or have to reckon with time. But what if we don’t have time? Or what if time, as we know it, is irrelevant? Ah, if only the world were ending tomorrow. We could help each other very much.”
FRANZ KAFKA
ABOUT THE PLAYWRIGHT
Thornton Wilder (1897-1975) was an American playwright, novelist and teacher. He won Pulitzer Prizes for his novel ‘The Bridge of San Luis Rey”, and for the plays ‘Our Town’ and ‘The Skin of Our Teeth’. The latter play opened on October 15, 1942, at the Shubert Theatre in New Haven, Connecticut; transferring on November 18, 1942 to the Plymouth Theatre on Broadway. It was directed by Elia Kazan and starred Tallulah Bankhead as Sabina.
The play opened in London in 1945, starring Vivien Leigh and directed by Laurence Olivier, before touring to Australia and New Zealand in 1948. A recent notable professional production was in 2022, at the Lincoln Centre Theatre in New York, with an all-African American cast.
CAST CREDITS
2nd years
Sydney Astill-Torchia
Bosco De Souza
Rhys Duxbury
Sonny Green
Gina Greer
William McLeod
1st years
Karina Abbasi
Jacob Bougoure
Georgia Chalmers
Grace Dunn
Bailey Lowe
Hannah Pollard
Matthew Wood
Guest graduates
Frances Foo
Amy Hauser
Direction and design
Anatoly Frusin
Lighting design & operation
Geoff Squires
Video documentation
Touchwood Productions
Live photography
Jade Ellis
Special Thanks to: Sophia Drakos at The Costume Cottage - Brisbane Arts Theatre, Frances Foo for help with costume design, Helen Broadhurst for the mammoth head. Miles O’Leary for voice recording. Frances and Amy for participating in the show.
Thanks to: TAFE Queensland Marketing, Management and Administration of the Faculty of Creative Arts and Digital Design, Downer, University of Canberra, Jackie French: Faculty Director CADD, Industry partners: Metro Arts, NIDA & Australian Acting Academy. The students also wish to thank the teaching staff: Lisa O’Neill, Anatoly Frusin, Dr Patrick Mitchell, Brian Lucas, Rosalind Williams, Stephen Lance & Kate Schirmer
This event is an initiative of the students from TAFE Queensland Brisbane region as part of their assessment.