Four-week festival celebrates Sam Shepard as playwright

Sam Shepard left a powerful legacy. Hailed by New York magazine as “the greatest American playwright of his generation,” Shepard (19432017) wrote screenplays, novels and more than 40 plays — including the widely staged “True West” and the Pulitzer Prize-winning “Buried Child.” As an actor, Shepard appeared in more than 50 films, including an Oscar-nominated role in “The Right Stuff.”

Warehouse Theatre Company will honor the Obie-winning playwright with a Sam Shepard Festival, starting Friday at MadLab Theatre. The four-week repertory bill will offer full productions of “Buried Child,” “Cowboy Mouth” and “True West,” plus staged readings of three other Shepard plays.

“A lot of people know him as an actor and don’t realize Shepard was also a major American playwright,” said festival producer Kristofer Green, Warehouse artistic director.

“Shepard wrote from a place of trauma, grief and mystery. … His plays define or redefine the landscape of how people think about their families and America,” Green said. What: Sam Shepard Festival Who: Warehouse Theatre Company Where: MadLab Theatre, 227 N. 3rd St. Contact: 614-984-6974, www.warehousetheatre.org Showtimes: “True West”: 8 p.m. Friday, Saturday and Sept. 7; 3 p.m. Sunday and 7 p.m. Sept. 8-9; “Cowboy Mouth”: 8 p.m. Sept. 6 and 16; and 11 p.m. Sept. 8 and 15; “Buried Child”: 7 p.m. Sept. 13, 15 and 20; 8 p.m. Sept. 14 and 21-22 Staged readings: 7 p.m. Wednesday, “Curse of the Starving Class”; 3 p.m. Sept. 9, “Heartless”; and 3 p.m. Sept. 16, “Fool for Love” Tickets: “True West” and “Buried Child”: $25, or $22 for students and senior citizens; “Cowboy Mouth”: $18; staged readings: $10; festival pass: $68, or $62 for students and senior citizens; flex passes: $40 for four tickets, $80 for eight

“True West,” which will open on Friday under Green’s direction, is a long one-act about sibling rivalry between two brothers, Lee and Austin (Brandon Maldonado and Justin King in alternating roles.) Talk-back sessions are planned after the Friday and Sept. 7 performances.

“The play reflects the two halves of Sam’s brain,” Green said.

“There’s the writer side, about a working family man, and then there’s the wanderer, the drifter who’d rather be alone.”

Austin, a married screenwriter, is staying at his mother’s home in Los Angeles to pitch a script when his unemployed older brother, Lee, shows up after months in the desert.

“We learn that Austin longs for what Lee has, which is freedom to do what he wants to do. Conversely, Lee wants what Austin has, … to feel settled. It’s an interesting dynamic,” Green said.

“Cowboy Mouth,” a semiautobiographical one-act drama, will open on Sept. 6 and will include a post-show discussion.

“It’s wrapped up in this strange world where two drugged-up rock 'n' rollers (played by Joey Gerolmo and Christina Yoho), holed up in a motel room, are hallucinating about a lobster man (Casey May),” Green said.

“‘Cowboy Mouth’ is avant-garde, wacky and out there,” Green said.

“Yet, the dialogue coming out of their mouths is beautiful. … They’re talking about love, the future and what it means to be a good person.”

“Buried Child,” which opens Sept. 13 (with postshow discussions Sept. 13 and Sept. 21), explores the struggles and secrets of a farm family. With murder, incest and infanticide, the three-act play (performed with one intermission) is suggested for mature audiences.

“This play is an exorcism of a single family’s grief, with unresolved trauma,” director James Harper said.

“Shepard has a wonderful American Midwestern voice about family-based trauma. There’s a sense of grief and vetting trauma in all his works.”

Joyce Leahy plays Halie, who has lived with her husband, Dodge (Jim Coe), for more than three decades on an Illinois farm.

“Halie and Dodge have a very contentious relationship,” Leahy said.

“She’s disappointed in her life and not crazy about farm life.”

“Buried Child” revolves around family secrets, including a haunting one signaled by the play’s title.

“The drama exposes and resolves a lot of family issues and allows some family members to finally grieve,” Leahy said.

“Shepard’s plays turned over the rock and exposed the grim underside of a lot of American families.”