By Carol Davis
CARLSBAD, California –When doing what you do best means bringing Sam Shepard back to your stages again and again, then Sam Shepard it is. Buried Child premiered at the Magic Theatre in San Francisco in 1978 and was directed by Robert Woodruff. It premiered in New York of that same year and in 1979 became the first Off-Broadway play to win the Pulitzer Prize.
Now in a solid production at New Village Arts Theatre in Carlsbad and under the firm hand of Lisa Berger, (she also directed Simpatico) this Buried Child is another addition to the Sam Shepard collection that NVA does so well. In 2011 the theatre mounted Simpatico to rave reviews.
Over the years at NVA we have seen True West, The Curse Of The Starving Class, A Lie of the Mind. another Shepard play that belongs to his series of ‘family plays”, and I say that with tongue in cheek,, and Fool For Love.
Buried Child stretches the limits of the imagination as Shepard zeroes in on the extreme poles of society’s ailments as he saw them in the 1970’s. In this bizarre, off-the-wall comical and ghoulish tale, he sets the stage for what some call the beginning of the demise of the nuclear family. He “throws the baby away with the bathwater” (as the expression goes), tosses caution to the wind while making his point in this eerie narrative.
Dodge (Jack Missett), the one-time patriarch of what we are led to believe was a comfortable and self-sufficient family, is hunkered in a run-down-almost-to-the-point-of-not-being-livable, old farm house (Tim Wallace designed the sets and sound). He sits all day in the ‘living room’ on a worn out, filthy couch. He looks ill, almost emaciated with a hacking cough enough to make anyone see a doctor pronto. He has a ball cap on his head and a blanket covering his lap. This is his permanent space. (“I’m an invisible man!”) He stares absentmindedly at a TV monitor on the floor in front of him with no sound coming from it. Hidden in one of the pillows on the couch is a bottle of whisky.
The prattle coming from another room upstairs is the voice of his wife Halie (Dana Chase) who has found salvation in religion. She goes on and on about being the good Christian while criticizing Dodge at every turn. “You sit here all day and night, festering away! Decomposing! Smelling up the house with your putrid body! Hacking your head off ‘til all hours of the morning! Thinking up mean, evil, stupid things to say about yourown flesh and blood!”
Halie is on her way out to meet Father Dewis (John DeCarlo) the clergyman with whom she is having an affair and doesn’t find the need to hide. Tilden, (Manny Fernandes) is Halie and Dodge’s eldest son. He is back home from a stint in a New Mexico jail.
We first see Tilden soaked from the incessant rain that is coming down in torrents. He is also caked in mud from his ankles to his knees from being out in the back yard. He is holding a dozen or so ear of corn in his arms like one would cradle a baby. When Dodge asks where he got the corn he tells him from the back yard to which Dodge replies there is nothing out there.
It seems that a bumper crop of veggies has sprouted where we think a child is buried. The symbolism is reeling. The whys and wherefores of any of this we will learn over the course of the evening. In the meantime those unanswered questions are what have this family tied up in knots and unrecognizable especially to the returning son/grandson Vince (Adam Brick), who pops in for a surprise visit, after a six-year absence, with his girlfriend Shelly (Kelly Iversen).
Tilden was destined to go on to be ‘something’. He is a hulking man who was once a star football star player. Now overcome with guilt and grief from his past indiscretions, he is reduced to a child in a man’s body; locked into a world no one can enter. Another son, Ansel, the one Halie has turned into a saint, died of suspicious causes in a hotel room years ago.
Bradley, (Samuel Sherman) is the youngest and was the next in line to care for the farm and family but a terrible accident caused him to lose his left leg and left him emasculated. He too has his demons and they show up when he is left alone with Shelly one long night when Vince disappeared after promising to get Dodge another bottle of whiskey.
Every family has its share of secrets but this one takes the cake as they are of epic proportion. The secret they all share is about rape, incest and murder. And while it happened more than a dozen years ago and no one talks about it, it still sits close to the surface and has paralyzed them and locked them all into their own private hell.
Shepard’s play is in good hands with Berger who has assembled a cast well acquainted with the playwright and who have been together in this, the year of NVA’s Ensemble Project. She manages the right balance of the macabre and the comical so needed in this play.
Manny Fernandes, who won the Best Actor Award (San Diego Theatre Critics Circle) for his role as Lenny in Of Mice And Men last year at New Village Arts, is equally as effective as the tortured Tilden in Buried Child. Fernandes who has such a large presence, gives the impression that he could crush someone with one blow yet is both gentle and beautiful as the absent son who knows more than he lets on.
Jack Missett looks and acts the part of the smug and vengeful Dodge. Costume designers Kristianne Kurner and Allyson Francis have done a number on his looks and clothing. His decaying body (think sunken face and rotting teeth with spots on his face and head) has you either staring incredulously or looking away so as not to see.
His mocking voice is enough to make anyone cringe. It seems from the outset he does not like Vince’s girlfriend. “You look like chalk and cheese,” he says disgustedly. But Iversen’s Shelly goes toe to toe with him in later scenes that give way to the secret no one wants to hear, as she gives her best performance yet.
Dana Case is perfect as the not-so-ditsy, ditsy Halie. Perfectly positioned as the ache in Dodge’s gut, she knows no bounds showing her contempt for everyone in the family save her dead son Ansel. However she does lavish all of her praises on Father Dewis. John DeCarlos’ character squirms, mutters and stutters in the midst of it all while making a fast exit so as not to get too enmeshed in this family drama. He too is well suited as the ineffectual spiritual guide.
Adam Brick comes on like gangbusters as the prodigal returning son, Vince. His turn about comes on fast and furious, but when he spirals out of control and morphs into Dodge, it’s a spine tingling moment. Samuel Sherman is also a large presence as Bradley the son who will take his place as the bully by the sheer strength he built up by using is upper body to drag himself around when his prosthetic limb is otherwise engaged. Unfortunately his diction is mumbled and not easily understood making his moves on Shelly (when they are left alone) a bit less effective.
Whether one likes Sam Shepard or not, it can’t be denied that his style pops off the charts and his characters are outside the main stream. That said yours truly seems to be drawn to his plays like bees to honey just because of that. Playwrights who challenge your thinking and conjure up lots of discussion after a performance, make theatre exciting. The efforts of New Village Arts Theatre in putting on this Pulitzer Prize play are worthy of a ticket but do be cautioned that Buried Child will not be everyone’s cup o’ tea.
See you at the theatre.
Dates: through April 22nd
Organization: New Village Arts Theatre
Phone: 760-433-3245
Production Type: Drama
Where: 2787 State Street, Carlsbad Village, Carlsbad, CA
Ticket Prices: $22.00-$36.00
Web: newvillagearts.org
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Davis is a San Diego-based theatre critic. She may be contacted at carol.davis@sdjewishworld.com