“Pontine Theatre is a
small miracle. This theatre has used puppets, mime and stagecraft to
convey visions of the past to modern audiences for more than 35 years.
Artistic Directors, Marguerite Mathews and Greg Gathers, conspire to
fascinate the contemporary mind with original works based on the
stories and literature of New England. There’s really nothing else
like it anywhere.”
—New Hampshire Magazine
To bring Pontine to your community, contact us at: info@pontine.org
AVAILABLE DECEMBER 2024
A NEW ENGLAND CHRISTMAS
Featuring an original staging of William Dean Howell’s Christmas Everyday and Christmas in Our Town by Alice Van Leer Carrick.
Author, editor, playwright and poet, William Dean Howells (1837-1920) was a resident of Kittery, Maine. In his story Christmas Every Day, a little girl is granted a wish by the Christmas Fairy. Her wish is to have Christmas everyday for a whole year. The first day of Christmas is perfect. The following day it is Christmas again, and every subsequent day as well. It wreaks havoc with the economy. All the woods are cut down for Christmas trees. People get so poor, buying presents, that everybody had to go to the poorhouse. Finally, the little girl begs the Christmas Fairy to undo the spell; she doesn't want it to be Christmas ever again.
In her treasured reminiscence, Christmas in Our Town, Alice Van Leer Carrick tells of her treasured memories of a New England holiday in Hanover, New Hampshire in the mid-20th century. Her whimsical turn of phrase and witty allusions coupled with sheer sentiment goes straight to the heart.
AVAILABLE APRIL / MAY 2025
SOJOURNER STORIES:
New Englanders in Nature
Pontine Theatre presents original adaptations of two stories by New England authors:
Sarah Orne Jewett’s A White Heron, published in 1886, is a coming of age story about a young city girl, Sylvia, who comes to live with her grandmother in the country. She meets a young ornithologist who is hunting a rare bird he recently spotted in the area. Sylvia wants to please the young man by revealing the heron’s location, yet doesn’t want him to take its life. In the end, she embraces her passion for country life and the natural world around her.
Robert Frost’s The Star Splitter, published in 1923, explores the conflict between societal expectations and individual passions. A farmer’s reckless pursuit of a telescope leads to the loss of his farm and home. This loss initially evokes ridicule from the townspeople. However, their subsequent contemplation reveals the importance of forgiveness and understanding. Frost uses the image of a telescope, "a star-splitter," as a symbol of the farmer’s "life long curiosity about our place among the infinities.”