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True West by Sam Shepard

There was clearly felt the presence of a force not bound to be kind to man. It was a place for heathenism and superstitious rites, --to be inhabited by men nearer of kin to the rocks and to wild animals than we. We walked over it with a certain awe, stopping, from time to time, to pick the blueberries which grew there, and had a smart and spicy taste. Perchance where our wild pines stand, and leaves lie on their forest floor...there were once reapers, and husbandmen planted grain; but here not even the surface had been scarred by man, but it was a specimen of what God saw fit to make this world. What is it to be admitted to a museum, to see a myriad of particular things, compared with being shown some star's surface, some hard matter in its home! I stand in awe of my body, this matter to which I am bound has become so strange to me. I fear not spirits, ghosts, of which I am one,--that my body might,--but I fear bodies, I tremble to meet them. What is this Titan that has possession of me? Talk of mysteries! Think of our life in nature,--daily to be shown matter, to come in contact with it,--rocks, trees, wind on our cheeks! the solid earth! the actual world! the common sense! Contact! Contact! Who are we? where are we?

Henry David Thoreau, Ktaadn

ABOUT

Sam Shepard wrote plays about America. It’s almost that simple. True West is no exception. It’s surreal, but naturalistic. It’s fantastical, but grounded. It’s absurd, but also unnervingly accurate.

Williston Scholars: True West

19 Payson Avenue, Williston Northampton School

Easthampton, MA, 01027

February 22, 2019 at 7:00 P.M.

Cast

Austin......................................................................................................Trix Willems Lee.............................................................................................................Caleb Stern Saul Kimmer.......................................................................................Oscar DeFrancis Mom.......................................................................................................Maddie Elsea

Crew

Stage Manager...................................................................................Margaret Strange Costume Design..............................................................................Hannah Cannizzo Set, Lighting, and Sound Design.......................................................Charles Raffetto

Special thanks to Catherine King, Daniel Kramer, Emily Ditkovski, Charles Raffetto, Ashley Tyler, Jill and Dave Stern, Williston Physical Plant, and everyone who donated a toaster.

Biographies

Hannah Cannizzo

Hannah Cannizzo is a sophomore at Williston and this is her second year in costume shop. She has worked on productions such as last year’s musical, Into the Woods, as well as Crazy for You, this year's spring production, plus the Williston Scholars projects of True West and Eurydice. She is very excited to part of such a wonderful cast and crew here at Williston, and especially in the student run projects. Hannah hopes the audience will enjoy the hard work and effort put into making this show become a reality.

Oscar DeFrancis

Oscar Defrancis was born in Boston and has been raised for most his life in Northampton. A local, he's been attending the Williston Northampton School as a day student for the last five years. He's taken theatre classes in both middle and high school here at Williston, but because of his dedication to cross country and track has yet to be part of a fall or spring production. This play is a great opportunity for him to take part in something he loves and at the same time try new things.

Maddie Elsea

Maddie’s time with the Williston theater dates back to her seventh grade performance as “Lady 2” in Cinderella. After her debut, Maddie continued to both perform in and assistant direct shows including Romeo and Juliet, The Comedy of Errors, Peter and the Starcatcher, Our Town, Into the Woods, and The Laramie Project. A six-year senior, Maddie has loved working with other student artists in the Williston Scholars class, and she can't wait for the audience to experience the incredible work that Caleb has done on this production of True West.

Caleb Stern

Caleb Stern began his entanglement with the theater in 5th grade, with a production of Twelfth Night. Since then, he has gone on to star in such shows as Romeo and Juliet, In The Heights, Peter and the Starcatcher, Our Town, and Into The Woods. A six-year senior, Caleb is thrilled to share his vision of Sam Shepard's surrealist family drama with the audience.

Margaret Strange

Margaret is in her fifth year at Williston and has been working backstage since 8th grade. She has built the sets for numerous shows and in the past few years has stage managed several including Our Town and The Laramie Project. Margaret is very lucky to be able to stage manage this show as a part of her Williston Scholars project and has loved working with everyone. She hopes the audience enjoys True West!

Trix Willems

Trix is a senior who has acted in several plays at Williston, including The Laramie Project, A Comedy of Errors, and Trojan Women. In True West, he is excited to be playing the role of Austin. This is also Trix's last play at Williston. He knows it will be a great one and hopes you will enjoy the show!

Director's NOte

From Tom Wolfe’s “Las Vegas”, 1964:

Bugsy pulled into Las Vegas in 1945 with several million dollars that, after his assassination, was traced back in the general direction of gangster-financiers. Siegel put up a hotel-casino such as Las Vegas had never seen and called it the Flamingo—all Miami Modern, and the hell with piano players with garters and whatever that was all about. Everybody drove out Route 91 just to gape. Such shapes! Boomerang Modern supports, Palette Curvilinear bars, Hot Shoppe Cantilever roofs and a scalloped swimming pool. Such colors! All the new electrochemical pastels of the Florida littoral: tangerine, broiling magenta, livid pink, incarnadine, fuchsia demure, Congo ruby, methyl green, viridine, aquamarine, phenosafranine, incandescent orange, scarlet-fever purple, cyanic blue, tessellated bronze, hospital-fruit-basket orange. And such signs! Two cylinders rose at either end of the Flamingo—eight stories high and covered from top to bottom with neon rings in the shape of bubbles that fizzed all eight stories up into the desert sky all night long like an illuminated whisky-soda tumbler filled to the brim with pink champagne.

And with that, the East infiltrated the West, and the Frontier was gone. The "true west" of America exists and does not exist. The old west is an undiscovered paradise, unlimited in its potential. The new is fully known, conquered. The real west, the west in which Austin and his brother Lee conduct themselves, is somewhere between the two. But one thing is certain: the Frontier, the idea of some great, unexplored territory within our own country, is gone. And with nowhere left to explore, one question remains: Where do we go now? That's what Sam Shepard asks us to consider with this bold, surreal piece. True West forces the audience to confront the values of America they live in, and whether they include family, integrity in art, and convention. Or, perhaps, the truth is somewhere in between.

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