Jackson R. Bryer is Professor Emeritus of English at the University of Maryland, College Park, where he taught undergraduate and graduate courses in American Literature for 41 years. He is the President of the Thornton Wilder Society and one of the editors of the Thornton Wilder Journal. He is the editor of Conversations with Thornton Wilder and co-editor of The Selected Letters of Thornton Wilder, Thornton Wilder: New Perspectives, and Thornton Wilder in Collaboration: Collected Essays on His Drama and Fiction.

Zoey Deutch makes her Broadway debut in Our Town. Known for her dynamic and versatile performances, Deutch most recently wrapped production on a trio of films including Richard Linklater’s New Wave, starring as legendary French actress Jean Seberg; Clint Eastwood’s Juror # 2, and Anniversary directed by Jan Kosoma. In 2022, Deutch co-starred in Focus Feature’s The Outfit, earning a Best Supporting Performance nomination from the British Independent Film Awards, as well as Not Okay for Searchlight/Hulu, and Something from Tiffany’s for Amazon/Hello Sunshine. She starred in and produced the latter two films. Additional credits include Buffaloed as actor and producer, Zombieland: Double Tap, Set It Up, Flower, The Year of Spectacular Men as actor and producer, Rebel in the Rye, Before I Fall, Everybody Wants Some!!, Why Him?, and Beautiful Creatures, among many others. She also starred in Ryan Murphy’s Netflix series The Politician with the first season receiving a Golden Globe nomination for Best Television Series – Musical or Comedy. In 2020, Deutch was named to the Forbes 30 under 30 list.

Kenny Leon is a Tony Award–winning director who has been honored with The Actors Fund Medal of Honor, an Obie Award, and an NAACP Image Award. Mr. Leon is also a proud honoree of the George Abbott Lifetime Achievement for American Theatre. Mr. Leon is on the producing team of Some Like It Hot. His Broadway credits include Purlie Victorious: A Non-Confederate Romp Through the Cotton Patch, Ohio State Murders, Topdog/Underdog, A Soldier’s Play, American Son, Children of a Lesser God, Holler If Ya Hear Me, A Raisin in the Sun, The Mountaintop, Stick Fly, Fences, Gem of the Ocean, and Radio Golf. Off-Broadway, he has directed The Underlying Chris, Everybody’s Ruby, Emergence-See!, and Smart People. His television credits include Robin Roberts Presents: Mahalia, Colin in Black & White, 4400, Amend: The Fight for America, American Son, Hairspray Live!, The Wiz Live!, Steel Magnolias, Dynasty, and In My Dreams. Mr. Leon is the author of Take You Wherever You Go. He is the Artistic Director Emeritus of Kenny Leon’s True Colors Theatre Company and Senior Resident Director at the Roundabout Theatre Company. Leon directed the Broadway revival of Our Town, currently running on Broadway.

Jeremy McCarter is the literary executor of the novelist and playwright Thornton Wilder. He is the co-author, with Jon M. Chu, of the newly published memoir Viewfinder. With Lin-Manuel Miranda, he co-wrote the New York Times bestseller Hamilton: The Revolution. He is the founder and executive producer of the acclaimed audio storytelling company Make-Believe Association, and co-created Lake Song, an audio-drama series that was an Official Selection of the Tribeca Festival. He served on the artistic staff of The Public Theater and the jury of the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. McCarter has written about culture and politics for New York magazine, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and other publications.

Jim Parsons recently starred in the world premiere of Paula Vogel’s Mother Play on Broadway, opposite Jessica Lange and Celia Keenan-Bolger. He also starred alongside Ben Aldridge in Focus Features’ Spoiler Alert based on Michael Ausiello’s acclaimed memoir of the same title. Parsons' That’s Wonderful Productions produced the film, which was nominated for Outstanding Film––Wide Release at the GLAAD Media Awards. He recently led the Off-Broadway revival of A Man of No Importance for The Classic Stage Company. Parsons' breakout role was that of Sheldon Cooper from the CBS smash hit The Big Bang Theory, which garnered him numerous awards from the Emmys, Golden Globes, and Critics' Choice, among many others. He then turned that character into a successful spin-off and serves as Executive Producer and Narrator on Young Sheldon. Through That's Wonderful Productions, Parsons executive produced Netflix’s first short-form, award-winning series Special. That’s Wonderful Productions produced the four-part HBO Max docuseries Equal, which chronicled landmark events and the forgotten heroes of the LGBTQ+ Movement. He also partnered with Mayim Bialik for Fox's Emmy-nominated Call Me Kat, and co-starred in and produced, along with That’s Wonderful Productions, A Kid Like Jake. Parsons voiced writer Truman Capote in Truman & Tennessee. In 2020, he starred in the Netflix movie The Boys in the Band alongside Zachary Quinto, Andrew Rannells, and Matt Bomer, and in the Netflix series Hollywood, for which he received Emmy and Golden Globes nominations. Prior to appearing in the Broadway production of The Boys in the Band, Parsons starred in An Act of God and Harvey. Parsons received a Theatre World Award and Emmy nomination for his debut Broadway performance in The Normal Heart. His additional stage performances include The Castle for the Manhattan Ensemble Theater, The Countess for the Globe Theater, as well as The Tempest and As You Like It for the Houston Shakespeare Festival. Previous film credits include starring roles in Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil, And Vile and Hidden Figures, voicing the lead role in the box office hit Home, the Blumhouse Production thriller Visions, Todd Phillips' School for Scoundrels, Chris Terrio's Heights, Zach Braff's Wish I Was Here and Garden State, Kevin Connolly's Gardener of Eden, and Danny Leiner's The Great New Wonderful. Additional television credits include an Emmy-nominated performance in The Normal Heart. He also produced and lent his voice to the 3-part docuseries First In Human, which aired on the Discovery Channel. Parsons currently stars in the Broadway revival of Our Town.

Ann Patchett is the author of nine novels, four books of nonfiction and three children's books in collaboration with the illustrator Robin Preiss Glasser. An annotated version of Bel Canto, which won both the PEN/Faulkner and The Women's Prize in England, is forthcoming this November. Her novel The Dutch House was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. Patchett is the recipient of many awards, most recently the Thornton Wilder Prize and the Carl Sandburg Award from the Chicago Public Library. Time magazine named her one of the most influential people in the world. She is the owner of Parnassus Books in Nashville, Tennessee.

Ephraim Sykes was nominated for Tony, Grammy, Outer Critics Circle, and Drama League awards for his performance as David Ruffin in Ain’t Too Proud: The Life and Times of the Temptations. Additional Broadway credits include Hamilton, which is also streaming on Disney+, Motown: The Musical, Newsies, Memphis, and The Little Mermaid. Off-Broadway, Sykes co-starred in Black No More with The New Group, for which he received an Antonyo Award nomination, and Rent at New World Stages. On screen, Sykes was seen in Kathryn Bigelow’s Detroit as well as the HBO series Vinyl, Luke Cage on Netflix, Crisis in Six Scenes on Amazon, Russian Doll on Netflix, and the NBC broadcast of Hairspray Live! opposite Ariana Grande, earning an MTV Movie + TV Awards nomination for Best Musical Moment for “You Can’t Stop the Beat.”

Amos Tappan Wilder is Thornton Wilder’s nephew and served as his uncle’s literary executor from 1995–2023. In this role, he managed Wilder’s intellectual property, promoted interest in the literary and dramatic subsidiary rights of the works, and spoke widely about his uncle’s life, family and artistic legacy. He oversaw the re-issue of all of Wilder’s novels and major plays in the HarperCollins Thornton Wilder Library edition, to which he contributed Afterwords, The Selected Letters of Thornton Wilder edited by Robin Gibbs Wilder and Jackson Bryer, The Library of America’s three Wilder volumes, and the definitive biography of his uncle by Penelope Niven entitled Thornton Wilder: A Life. He also supported dramatic adaptations and operas of Wilder’s fiction and drama, including the Our Town opera composed by Ned Rorem with libretto by J.D. McClatchy, and arranged publication of lost works, including Wilder’s Broadway record-breaking translation of A Doll’s House. Tappan is a graduate of Yale and holds advanced degrees in history from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and in American Studies from Yale. He is Honorary Chair of The Thornton Wilder Society, a member of P.E.N. (American Center), Honorary Trustee of Long Wharf Theatre, and member of the National Council of Graywolf Press.

Thornton Wilder (1897–1975) was a pivotal figure in the lit­erary history of the twentieth-century. He is the only writer to win Pulitzer Prizes for both fiction and drama. He received the Pulitzer for his novel The Bridge of San Luis Rey (1927) and the plays Our Town (1938) and The Skin of Our Teeth (1942). His other bestselling nov­els include The Cabala, The Woman of Andros, Heaven’s My Destination, The Ides of March, The Eighth Day and Theophilus North. His other major dramas include The Matchmaker (adapted as the musical Hello, Dolly!) and The Alcestiad. The Happy Journey to Trenton and Camden, Pullman Car Hiawatha and The Long Christmas Dinner are among his well-known shorter plays. Wilder’s many honors include the Gold Medal for Fiction from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the National Book Committee’s Medal for Literature, and the Goethe-Plakette Award. Wilder was born in Madison, Wisconsin, on April 17, 1897. He spent part of his boyhood in China and was educated principally in California, graduating from Berkeley High School in 1915. After attending Oberlin College for two years, he transferred to Yale, where he received his BA in 1920. His post-graduate studies included a year spent studying archaeology and Italian at the American Academy in Rome (1920–21) and graduate work in French at Princeton (Master’s degree, 1926). In addition to his talents as a playwright and novel­ist, Wilder was an accomplished essayist, translator, research scholar, teacher, lecturer, librettist and screenwriter. In 1942, he teamed up with Alfred Hitchcock on the classic psycho-thriller Shadow of a Doubt. Versed in foreign languages, he translated and adapted plays by Ibsen, Sartre, and Obey. He read and spoke German, French, and Spanish, and his scholarship included sig­nificant research on James Joyce and Lope de Vega. Wilder enjoyed acting and played major roles in several of his plays in summer theater productions. He also possessed a lifelong love of music and wrote librettos for two operas, one based on The Long Christmas Dinner (composer Paul Hindemith) and the other based on The Alcestiad (composer Louis Talma). One of Wilder’s deepest passions was teaching. He began this career in 1921 as an instructor in French at The Lawrenceville School in New Jersey. During the 1930’s he taught courses in Classics in Translation and Composition at the University of Chicago. In 1950–51, he served as the Charles Eliot Norton Professor of Poetry at Harvard. During WWII, Wilder served in the Army Air Force Intelligence. He was awarded the Legion of Merit Bronze Star, the Legion d’honneur and the Order of the British Empire. In 1930, with the royalties received from The Bridge of San Luis Rey, Wilder built a home for himself and his family in Hamden, Connecticut. Although often away from home, restlessly seeking quiet places in which to write, he always returned to “The House The Bridge Built.” He died here on December 7, 1975. More information on Thornton Wilder and his family is available in Penelope Niven’s definitive biography, Thornton Wilder: A Life (2013).