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SAM SHEPARD
gets personal with American Theatre once again-20 years later
"SO, WHAT ARE WE UP TO HERE?"
It doesn't take long for Sam Shepard to get to the heart of the matter-casually, directly, existentially. Here we are, in a restaurant in downtown St. Paul, Minn., on a cold and gray November afternoon. What we're up to is an interview, obviously, though the occasion is a little murkier than usual. A playwright of Shepard's stature ordinarily sits down for a major interview only when there's a new project to promote. As it happens, Shepard does have a new play, but he's not quite finished writing it, and it won't be produced until the fall of 2004 at the earliest. The occasion for our meeting has more to do with the history of this magazine. Shepard appeared on the cover of the very first issue, and going back to him seemed like a felicitous way to mark the 20th anniversary of American Theatre.
What is Shepard up to these days? Plenty. The guy who first made his mark on American drama in the late 1960s with a torrent of wildly poetic one-acts bursting with rock-and-roll energy turned 60 in November. He remains steadily productive as an artist, just not necessarily in the theatre. Since New York's Signature Theatre Company devoted its entire 1996-97 season to his work (on the heels of Steppenwolf Theatre Company's acclaimed Broadway revival of his Pulitzer-winning Buried Child), Shepard has produced only two new plays-Eyes for Consuela (adapted from an Octavio Paz story) at Manhattan Theatre Club, and The Late Henry Moss, staged at San Francisco's Magic Theatre in 2000 and the following year at Signature in New York.
Still, revivals of older works keep him in the public eye. The Broadway production of True West in 2000 starred the hot young film actors Philip Seymour Hoffman and John C. Reilly, who alternated in the leading roles. That show was directed by Matthew Warchus, who made a film of Shepard's Simpatico (released in 2000 and now available on DVD) and who will most likely direct his new play, a farce entitled The God of Hell, next season on Broadway. In addition, the Roundabout Theatre Company is considering a revival of Fool...