Curse of the Starving Class

I need to sit with this one for a while. I’d never read this nor seen it before tonight and it was, well I don’t even know. It’s a very odd play that I don’t know if I “got” right off the bat. I want to read some analyses of it and do a deeper dive.

Fair! lol

sm33 said: "This just extended into my trip window.I am interested in seeing it, but was hoping for some more reactions/reviews!"

Well for one thing, this is a three act play and they jammed two of the acts together to allow for only one brief intermission over its nearly three hour running time.

Vulture

Feb. 25, 2025

This Curse of the Starving Class Doesn’t Have Much in Its Fridge

https://www.vulture.com/article/theater-review-curse-of-the-starving-class.html

He is still revered in a lot of theater programs at universities... but I think it's definitely the case that his work has not aged well. Or maybe it's just not the right time for his work.

He's so often imitated, often unintentionally, that his actual work feels derivative or obvious. People are more familiar with the imitations and copies.

Also, I think a lot of the takes on gender and relationships feel gross or maybe even misogynistic when they used to feel "dangerous." We have a production of Fool For Love here in Chicago and the sexual politics just feel "off." The flaws in the production don't help... but I think you would be hard pressed to put over any production of Fool For Love that registers in the same way it did in the 80s.

Finally, I think his work resists re-interpretation. It seems abstract in such a way that it seems like you could radically re-interpret it... cast it creatively... take a director-focused approach... but it's actually very specific. I don't think that's a good thing... but I think it's a reason he has and will fade. I've seen several productions that try to incorporate race or a different cultural perspective but it never quite comes through. I think he was speaking to a specific moment and a specific cultural milieu... and his work is not as universal as it first appears.

KJisgroovy said: "He is still revered in a lot of theater programs at universities... but I think it's definitely the case that his work has not aged well. Or maybe it's just not the right time for his work.

He's so often imitated, often unintentionally, that his actual work feels derivative or obvious. People are more familiar with the imitations and copies.

Also, I think a lot of the takes on gender and relationships feel gross or maybe even misogynistic when they used to feel "dangerous." We have a production of Fool For Love here in Chicago and the sexual politics just feel "off." The flaws in the production don't help... but I think you would be hard pressed to put over any production of Fool For Love that registers in the same way it did in the 80s.

Finally, I think his work resists re-interpretation. It seems abstract in such a way that it seems like you could radically re-interpret it... cast it creatively... take a director-focused approach... but it's actually very specific. I don't think that's a good thing... but I think it's a reason he has and will fade. I've seen several productions that try to incorporate race or a different cultural perspective but it never quite comes through. I think he was speaking to a specific moment and a specific cultural milieu... and his work is not as universal as itfirst appears."

Yes, different times and different audiences.

Shepherd was basically "poet's theatre". It was about language and actors performing it. At least that's what I remember about the few Robert Woodruff productions that I saw. Woodruff was basically Shepherd's collaborator.

Also, Shepherd was still doing the modernist revolt against what they still saw as "the well made play" and that usually ended up producing rather static plays about existence. And that is strained through a rather druggy post-Beat poetics enlivened by what audiences then saw as a heartland voice. And of course there was also the physical beauty of the playwright himself...

I don't think Scott Ellis is a great fit for Shepherd. I have very much admired his productions of Mike Leigh and David Rabe in the past.

I would have to read the text again to form an opinion on the play's enduring worth.

Updated On: 2/26/25 at 01:11 PM

I always get this one mentally confused with The Tooth of Crime from the same period. But that one is more abstract, a little but Burroughs in its leaning into genre.

Agreed. I think it just confirms that the writing is there but this production was just meh. The poetic elements should come through — instead they felt like narration.