• Journal of Korea Entertainment Industry Association
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• v.14 no.4
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• pp.155-167
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• 2020

The stage manager role of "Our Town"(1938), a representative work of Thornton Wilder(1897-1975), is a unique theatrical device that presents a wide range of interesting and diverse perspectives in the actor's acting approach, the director's stage-shape methodology, and the audience's theater experience. Why did Wilder call stage manager role a stage manager, not just a simple narrator? Because "Our Town" intentionally lacks the basic elements that dramas must have, it needed a more self-reliant and omnipotent role in creating the margins of dramatic writing, including boldly omitted time and space, with infinite imagination. For this reason, stage manager role plays a much more complex and multi-functional role than a narrator. In response, this paper accurately articulates the concept of theatrical style and theatrical convention on the premise of the stage manager role in "Our Town," followed by making theatrical convention, the director of scene progress and scene change, the messenger of the writer's thoughts, and dramatic rhythm control.