HOME WRECKER— Sabina, (Taylor Bradley), posing as Miss Atlantic City 1942, attempts to lure Mr. Antrobus away from his wife in Thornton Wilder’s classic play, “The Skin of our Teeth,” running through Nov. 1 at Moorpark College. For tickets, call (805) 378-1485. If you see only one play this year, make it “The Skin of Our Teeth” by the Moorpark College Theater Arts Department.

Playwright Thornton Wilder is better known for “Our Town,” the staple of every amateur theater. Both plays won a Pulitzer Prize, but “Skin” is rarely produced. “Town” offers low-cost minimal staging, a liner story and a friendly, hometown setting. “Skin” requires complex stage work, doesn’t follow a chronological narrative and demands more attention from the audience. The play is challenging to follow, but a careful viewing is worth the effort.

The title and theme refer to humanity’s ability to overcome calamity “by the skin of our teeth.” The three-act play follows the middle-class suburban Antrobus family of New Jersey as it confronts turmoil inside and outside the home with an approaching glacier, Noah’s flood, and war.

Patrons may find the play’s conventions confusing. Forty-fiveyear-old George Antrobus celebrates his 5,000th wedding anniversary. He invents the alphabet and the wheel in a modern office. The family pets are a dinosaur and woolly mammoth. Biblical motifs are juxtaposed with a 1940 American lifestyle. Characters break the “fourth wall” to speak to the audience and “understudies” come on stage to “rehearse.” Characters speak in lengthy, philosophical monologues.

The best way to approach this apparent hodgepodge is to treat the story and characters as metaphor. The Antrobus family is humanity itself. They face the difficulties common to all: family strife, generational conflict, marital temptations, providing for one’s family in poverty. The human race, like the Antrobus family, in the face of disaster manages to avoid extinction with resurrection.

The references to ancient stories and telling time in thousands of years means the family isn’t limited to its own mortality but is connected to generations spanning the ages.

“Our Town” uses the Stage Manager to narrate the action. “Skin” has the family maid Sabina (Alyssa Carrillo, Taylor Bradley), who opens the play by introducing the family and admitting she’s puzzled by the script. Bradley is a smart, sassy Sabina with plenty of spunk to carry the show.

Other top-notch actors are Shannon Hewitt as daughter Gladys (double cast with Danielle Kaufman), the whiny kid sister who longs for her father’s love, and Ryan Lefton as Henry, aka Cain, the hyperactive, misunderstood brother prone to violence.

Mr. Antrobus (Josef Knauber, R. Shane Bingham) is more Everyman than Superman, an ordinary guy who achieves great things yet can’t keep order in his own family. Bingham is almost too easygoing to believe as a man who invents marvelous things, but he shines in Act 3 during an emotional showdown with his son.

Mrs. Antrobus (Taryn Allen, Melissa Pinza) cares nothing for others, only for her own children’s welfare. Pinza could temper her rigid nature with more compassion to flesh out the role.

A number of actors adroitly play multiple parts, especially noteworthy as the background “extras” in Act 2. Eileen Kennedy directs the large cast well and interposes boisterous scenes with quiet moments, stunning and riveting in their effectiveness.

The technical aspects surpass even the usually high quality of Moorpark College productions. The creative and detailed set design is breathtaking, especially the Atlantic City boardwalk marquee lights and thunderstorm effects in Act 2. Come early to enjoy the 1940-50s newsreel footage and commercials on the big screen.

The show contains no objectionable material, although the didactic speeches and complex themes will bore young children.

The ending is open to interpretation. For the optimist, humans will survive. For the pessimist, Homo sapiens are trapped in an endless cycle of strife. Is the purpose of life to persevere with ingenuity or tough it out through sheer determination? The playwright lets the audience decide.

The two-hour, 30-minute play runs through Nov. 1 at Moorpark College Performing Arts Center. For tickets, call (805) 378-1485 or visit www.moorparkcollege.edu.