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tilden bradley vince The American Heartland or at least a Twilight Zone version of it was what I saw on the stage tonight. I knew next to nothing about the Sam Shepard play Buried Child so what I saw was a complete surprise to me. The first act was normal enough with some great dialogue between an old married couple, but a hint of strangeness happened at the end of it. Then with the second and third acts everything became dark and twisted. I had suspected that it wouldn't be a happy play, but I didn't see the point of it either. Whatever message it was trying to send was lost on me. I couldn't ask Ann what she thought of the play, since she didn't go. A coworker had wondered why I had even asked her to go because he was positive that she would bail on me. Oh, well, I guess that I should have called my sister at the last minute. Having the empty seat next to me didn't really bother me. More often than not I go to see a play by myself. When I went last month with Her, I don't think that she realized that she was the first person besides my sister that I had ever taken with me to see a play. As confused as I might have been by the play I know that the two fifty something women behind me were even more lost, because they were quite free with their commentary. The first one said this is really strange. Then the other replied that the man crawling on the floor bothered her. This exchange became more animated with the second and third acts and I could tell that both of them hoped that there would be some answers at the end. One of them didn't seem to want to wait any more and put her coat on in the third act. They didn't leave though. I have to wonder if the cast knew that what they were doing would come across as unorthodox or they were just hoping for the best. For me the only voice of reason in the play was the girlfriend Shelly, which was nicely done by Deborah Staples. In the past she has been given the dumb blonde roles so this was a nice change for her. Then again she was Anna in a production of Anna Karenina last season.
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