|
|
|
April 2005, Evince
True West Comes to The North Theatre
by William E Spruill
|
| |
True West, Sam Shepard's
Pulitzer Prize-winning play about two brothers cursed by
their family, is coming to the North Theatre in a production
directed by the theatre's managing director, Jerry Meadors.
The North Theatre's third production since its February
25th opening, True West leads what promises to become a
stable of heralded stage productions at the newly-renovated
landmark in Danville's North Side.
"A lot of people I've talked with think Sam Shepard
is on the edge, and he is, but his is also the truly contemporary
voice in American theater," says director Meadors.
Meadors is bringing three young actors from California to
star in the production. Bryan and Denny Kirkwood (twins
in real life), will play the roles of Austin and Lee, the
two brothers in the play. Nathan Bexton, who starred in
the film Go, will also star in the play as a Hollywood producer.
Meadors has announced a regional casting call for the role
of the brothers' 50s-ish mother.
True West is about two brothers who, on the one hand, could
not be more different from one another, and, on the other,
share an ancestral fate that culminates in their undoing.
Austin is a bookish Ivy League-educated screenwriter who
has returned to his family home in the L.A. suburbs to house-sit
for his mother and to sell his newest script to a Hollywood
producer. His brother Lee, a drunken desert drifter who
specializes in petty theft, is also intent on selling his
screenplay about the American west to the producer.
As Austin and Lee's lives converge, they battle it out in
a comic and violent role-reversal that is stunningly gripping.
Their father, we learn, is a man who could not bear the
reality of life and has abandoned the boys and their mother
for a life lived out at the other end of a whiskey bottle.
The play is viewed by most critics as a study in how we
construct personas only to allow those false identities
to collapse under the identity of extended family. Austin,
for instance, adopts the persona of a successful screenwriter,
while Lee plays the role of the renegade outlaw. In the
end, though, both men are seen as brothers first, the genetic
afterthought of their mother and father, and independent
artists second. It is no surprise, then, that the two embark
on one of the most famous on-stage drunks in all of modern
theater.
Meadors hopes Danvillians interested in contemporary theater
will take advantage of the opening night "Meet the
Stars" Gala on April 15th. The back courtyard of the
North Theatre will be tented-over with food and drinks,
and guests will have a chance to chat with the actors. There
will be eight more shows following opening night, with one
matinee at 3 pm on April 16. |
| |
Reprinted with permission of
visit or Calendar of Evince |
|
