Try it today! At first, Weston can't remember who all he has loaned money to, and begins to rant about how this is his home and nobody ought to be able to take it from him because he has nowhere else to go. Ad Choices. Cars line up for gasoline, and President Ford appoints an energy czar to head U.S. energy policy efforts. Ellis represents the greed and controlling nature of business owners and the tendency of these people to take unfair advantage of each other and people below them. California suffers from rolling blackouts, and the major population centers of the East Coast are warned about similar blackouts or brownouts. Monologues are presented on StageAgent for educational purposes only. Weston enters, even drunker than he was before. Maggie Siff, as the wife of an abusive man, in Shepards story of a broken family. Something indescribable. [5] The cast was as follows: Wesley - Ebbe Roe Smith Ella - Olympia Dukakis Emma - Pamela Reed Taylor - Kenneth Welsh Weston - James Gammon Ellis - Eddie Jones Malcolm - John Aquino View All Characters in Curse of the Starving Class, Curse of the Starving Class guide sections. He asks what happened to Wesley, who had clearly been beaten up. He pulls out the. He is the representative for several large corporations that are looking to buy up land. [1] Others consider it part of a quintet that includes Fool for Love (1983) and A Lie of the Mind (1985). His partner, Slater, enters after him, playing with the skinned lamb carcass. She climbs up and stretches out on it as Wesley, completely naked, enters. He has brought a bag of artichokes that he bought while visiting his worthless desert property. Ella and Taylor leave together, and Emma runs off again. [9] The play focuses on the disturbed Tate familythe drunken father, burned-out mother, rebellious teenage daughter, and idealistic sonas they struggle for control of the rundown family farm in a futile search for freedom, security, and ultimately meaning in their lives. Ellis is the owner of a bar, the Alibi Club, where Weston spends his time when he is not at home. 6162. Curse of the Starving Class begins with Wesley, in sweatshirt and jeans, tossing pieces of a door into a wheelbarrow. Some critics consider it part of a Family Trilogy that includes Buried Child (1979) and True West (1980). New York, NY, Linda Ray Part of the immensely useful Twaynes U.S. Oumano, Ellen. Then, looking in that bloody fridge, he, like his children, finds nothing: zero! the maintenance!. Taylor says that any deal Weston makes is void because he is considered incompetent by the state. Wesley returns as Weston fills the refrigerator with artichokes he bought in the desert. Ella, his mother, enters and they begin to discuss the events of the night before that lead to Wesley's father, Weston, breaking down the door. We and our partners use data for Personalised ads and content, ad and content measurement, audience insights and product development. A French Villages Radical Vision of a Good Life with Alzheimers. all the upkeep! He compares it to a zombie invasion and takeover, where the zombies build their own city. Car door slamming. Can you send me character analysis of characters of Sam Shepard's play "Curse of the Starving Class"? Two motifs, very near each other in meaning, recur throughout Curse of the Starving Class: images of inside/outside and images of disease and sickness. He has done his laundry, which is all nicely folded on the table, and the lamb is back in the kitchen. At the same time, land speculators were buying the land of Los Angeles, Ventura, Orange, and Riverside counties and preparing it for residential development. Underdogs take center stage in a newsroom drama about Rupert Murdoch and in Taylor Macs spin on Shakespeares first tragedy. Then I hear the door of the Packard open. Weston asks where Ella is, and then goes into a rage when Wesley and Emma tell him where she went. Cohn, Ruby. Breakdown. Wesley tells her, when she asks if he is going to take over the role of Daddy Bear, that he feels himself becoming his father, that as he put on Westons clothes, he could feel something growing on him. She then becomes angry with the refrigerator and slams it shut. I could hear the coyotes. "Curse of the Starving Class - Media Adaptations" Drama for Students Tense. Taylor enters and talks with Emma, who calls him creepy. The entire upkeep of the farm falls on the shoulders of their idealistic son, Wesley, the only one who seems to have some hope for the family left. publication in traditional print. Wesley tells him to take the Packard and escape to Mexico. You might get the wrong idea about what he was up to, what he worked so hard to say. By the time she enters the action, theres nothing left for her in the fridge, not even the chicken she raised so that she could kill it and cut it up as a demonstration for the 4-H Club. In the fridge, she finds some bacon and bread and, as she fries up the last of the familys meat, Wesley thinks about himself and his father and recalls a memory: I was lying there on my back. 14. SUZIE. Curse of the Starving Class Jan 26 2023 Tells the story of a dysfunctional family living in a farmhouse they are planning to sell in the hopes of moving on to bigger and better things. Taylor appears and tells Ella that he has the final draft of the deed of sale. 353 subscribers Episode 10: Sam Shepard's Curse of the Starving Class Sam Shepard wasn't just a playwright but an actor himself, fully into the arts. . Suspended in air, left and right, are faded curtains. I picture him just sitting. She is just waking up and winds an alarm clock in her hand as she watches WESLEY sleepily. Hes slept there before. The second is the date of Shepard, though, does not define the familys curse just as a disease, though; this curse is more historical and supernatural, like the curses that afflicted the great families of Greek tragedy. Weston, sober, neatly dressed, folds laundry while talking to the lamb. The last date is today's Floating. Ellis is a greedy charlatan who tries to cheat the family out of their house. . We don't currently have any monologues from Curse of the Starving Class . Download the entire Curse of the Starving Class study guide as a printable PDF! Ella pushes all the laundry to the floor and lies on the table. Weston exits and Emma enters. The curse on the family is described by both women as something that breeds internally in Weston and Wesley and is inevitable. Wesleys monologue is like the steady tapping of rain on a windowpane: melancholy and constant. . Sign up today to unlock amazing theatre resources and opportunities. New York, NY, Ages 12-17: Camp Broadway Ensemble @ Carnegie Hall Then I heard him pull the brake. As she speaks, her daughter, Emma enters and joins the conversation in progress. A. J. Sobczak and Frank N. Magill. Ella wants Wesley to go after Emma and persuade her not to take the horse, but he doesn't want to; he doesn't care if she leaves . When Weston comes to, he starts up again where he left off, rejecting Wesleys suggestions that they plant avocados on their land. Wesley exits at the sounds of his fathers approach. Wesley enters, sets up a small fenced enclosure in the kitchen, exits, and reenters with a lamb. The act ends with Weston (finally) waking up with a start, and Ella running out of the house. In a 1997 Paris Review interview, Shepard, whose own father was an alcoholic, made a powerful point about the men he grew up around. Man going insane. Language. Taking pictures of the enemy. As the play opens, she and Wesley are both surveying the chunks of the door broken down by her husband . Like any second something could invade me. The tom cat and the eagle start fighting in midair, with the cat clawing out the eagle's chest, and the eagle trying to drop it. Ellis enters, laughing at the passed-out Weston who is slumped on the kitchen table. New York, NY, Ages 12-17: Camp Broadway Ensemble @ Carnegie Hall My heart was pounding. Ed. From a mile off I could tell it was the Packard by the sound of the valves. Weston Tate is the father of the family and an abusive alcoholic. There are three acts. My Messerschmitt. Word Count: 1160. Wesley realizes that it was Taylor who sold Weston the desert property just as Ellis arrives with fifteen hundred dollars for the house, the exact amount Weston owes to gangsters. Where Wesley seems angry with her for provoking Weston to anger, Ella holds that the incident was entirely Weston's fault. Dogs. Ed. How old is Wesley in "Curse ofthe Starving Class"? Weston is a destructive and angry man . 1970s: In Los Angeles, suburbanization continues unabated. Seeking 2 Actor Team for Spring The citation above will include either 2 or 3 dates. Act 2 begins with the sounds of hammering. Ella stares at the lamb. The Curse Of The Starving Class - Monologue (Wesley) A monologue from the play by Sam Shepard Wesley is cleaning up shards of wood from the door his father broke down the night before during a drunken outburst. Ink and Gary: A Sequel to Titus Andronicus Play with History. Wesley leaves and Emma returns, covered in mud from being dragged by the horse. He then suggests that they move away to some place safe, like Alaska. Hes going to sleep there all night. Waiting to get out. Take a look at our library of free monologues . What Price Freedom? The New Republic 178 (April 8, 1978): 24-25. No sight. Act III But treating Shepards stage paradigms superficially can lead to characterizations that miss the point of how his figures got to be heartbroken or angry in the first place. Head smashing. Largescale irrigation beginning in the late nineteenth century made the desert bloom, and soon the area (along with the Imperial and Central Valleys) was Americas richest farmland, producing citrus fruits, melons, berries, even lettuce and other water hungry crops. We and our partners use cookies to Store and/or access information on a device. Man throwing up. Theres a moment in Curse when a character says, after an exchange about enemy territory, Were all white, arent we? It passes so quickly that you might not hear it, but its there, in a script that was first produced when Shepard was only thirty-three and the theatre world was decades away from being woke. Thats what I treasure about Shepard: his matter-of-fact observations about where his characters stand in the worldobservations that also tell us so much about the world they inhabit. Even tractors sitting in the wetness, waiting for the sun to come up. Video . Feet walking toward the door. Malcolm enters and informs the family that Emma has been arrested for riding her horse through the Alibi Club and shooting up the bar. "Curse of the Starving Class" was praised for its handling of dark comedy that finishes with a sinister surrealism. She wants to know what he wants her mother for and he tells her that he is in the real-estate business and is helping her mother sell the house. Our summaries and analyses are written by experts, and your questions are answered by real teachers. Taylor then enters and Ella tells him what is happened. Its humiliating to have the cops come, he says, whining a little. When he pushes the wheelbarrow off, Ella begins a conversation about menstruation that seems directed at another person, but no one is there. American Gothic: Sam Shepard's Family Trilogy.. 14. Randall argues here that, although Curse of the Starving Class is indeed a more realistic play than the works that preceded it, Shepard retains a use of language in this play that we do not ordinarily associate with realistic drama., "Curse of the Starving Class - Bibliography and Further Reading" Drama for Students 2023 . He tells her to take a nap on the table because itll do wonders for her. Emma decides that Ella boiled her chicken and storms out. "Curse of the Starving Class - Dramatic Devices" Survey of Dramatic Literature Sam Shepard: A Casebook. Acts 1 and 2 both begin with characters engaged in simple question-and-answer conversations which serve to provide expository information necessary to an understanding of what has occurred before the start of the play or between the acts. Wesley Tate is the son of the family. City-dwellers seeking lower taxes, lower crime rates, and less congestion came to these suburbs. Gale Cengage He is easily taken advantage of and when his debts are not paid, it takes an even more terrifying toll on the people close to him. Inviting Wesley to have some breakfast, he tells him (as Wesley walks off) that he is reconsidering the idea of planting avocados. Whatever the cause, the Tates will do just about anything to raise themselves out of the downward spiral into which theyve fallen. Emma runs away, only to return covered with mud, thrown by her horse. 2023 Cond Nast. eNotes.com will help you with any book or any question. Vol. Vol. Weston begins to tell Wesley about how he began to see the poison in his own father, and how Wesley can see it in him. Ella is a stressed out woman trying to cope with intense emotional damage and frustration. Wesley finishes the story, how a big cat climbed onto the roof and began fighting with the eagle. "A Little Princess" "I love this monologue because of its sincerity. He tells the lamb a story about an eagle who was diving very close down to the ground trying to steal the testes of the lambs he was castrating. 1 Mar. Weston asks the lamb a question or twowith no door on the kitchen, is he inside or outside, meaning does he still have power over all that he surveys?before starting to complain about how little his family can do without him. Shelves: plays, aty20. Wesley refuses to stop Emma, and Ella begins to tell him about her plans to sell the house. Perhaps thats the reason theyre stuck where they are: broke, hungry, and fighting. Man yelling. A 1994 film adaptation of the same name stars James Woods (Weston), Kathy Bates (Ella), Henry Thomas (Wesley), Randy Quaid (Taylor), and Jim Fitzpatrick (Emerson). The play ends with Ella and Wesley staring at the lamb carcass. Wesley does not want to do it because he is making the door and Emma doesn't want to do it because she is remaking her posters. Feet and hands tearing. Ella is the mother of the family in Curse of the Starving Class. Curse of the Starving Class premiered Off-Broadway at the New York Shakespeare Festival, on March 2, 1978, presented by Joseph Papp. . 14. Ella is a highly dysfunctional individual with no capacity to cope with her husband's alcoholism. The prospect of selling the land to real estate developers has a significance far greater than the loss of a mere house, but his family. Foot kicking harder. However, many people move back into the central city to work in the burgeoning entertainment industry. Weston, once a pilot, is now an alcoholic heavily in debt. Ella enters, asks why the lamb is back in the kitchen, and tells Weston that she has been at the jail, visiting Emma. The play opens on an image of the breakdown of the barrier between outside and inside, the shattered front door that allows all sorts of undesirable elements to enter the house. (The set design is by Julian Crouch.) Bulls. Wesley tells Weston that his creditors are going to kill him. While Ella eats her breakfast, Wesley urinates on Emmas charts. eNotes.com will help you with any book or any question. Last Updated on May 5, 2015, by eNotes Editorial. Looking at the lamb carcass, she asks Wesley to help her remember the story Weston always told about the eagle. ELLA ( after a while) You shouldn't be doing that. As the play opens, she and Wesley are both surveying the chunks of the door broken down by her husband Weston. Wesley sets up a folding enclosure and puts a sick lamb inside. Ella. Some population geographers see the U.S. cities of Los Angeles and San Diego and the Mexican city of Tijuana as one immense megalopolis, a mega-city with tens of millions of inhabitants. Finding the chicken she butchered for her demonstration gone, she storms off. Hes plastered and doesnt want to move. [2] The play was commissioned by Joseph Papp and premiered in London in 1977 before playing at Papp's New York Shakespeare Festival in 1978. Kauffmann, Stanley. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our User Agreement and Privacy Policy and Cookie Statement and Your California Privacy Rights. Our Essay Lab can help you tackle any essay assignment within seconds, whether youre studying Macbeth or the American Revolution. She has just started her first period, and has several mood swings during the play. Finally, highway patrolman Malcolm appears with the news that Emma, having shot up the Alibi Club, is in jail. Wesley and Ella talk about Westons eagle story as the play ends. Scouting me. In her attempt to steal the car, she is blown up with the car by the bomb that Slater puts in it. Ella does not tell Emma that she plans to sell the house, but Emma tells Ella that she dreams of moving to Mexico and becoming a mechanic. Property he had there has proved worthless, so he decides to sell the familys home. Ellis grabs the money back from Wesley (feeling that now he is owed for the damage to his bar), and the act closes as Ella agrees to come to the police station to pick up Emma. Emma yells at Ella and exits. eNotes.com Emma goes to the refrigerator and begins to look for her chicken. Me, the enemy. Dad calling Mom. But with the millions of people who now lived there, there simply was not enough room in the city. . Weston and Wesley discuss the poison that Weston feels has infected him all of his life. But Shepard retains the symbolic structure of his earlier plays. Weston yells at him, telling him that they didn't need the food, because the refrigerator is full for once. With James Woods, Kathy Bates, Randy Quaid, Henry Thomas. Urban sprawl came to Los Angeles. Ella wakes up, and a huge explosion offstage follows upon this. Their conversation quickly turns to an issue of thematic importance: restlessness and dissatisfaction in heartland America. We're what the school psychologist calls -- products of a broken home. If there are two dates, the date of publication and appearance The Word Is My Shepard. In New American Dramatists, 1960-1980. New York, NY, Accessibility Statement Terms Privacy |StageAgent 2020. New York, NY, Linda Ray Weston enters, drunk, with a large bag of groceries. They menace the family a little and leave. Weston tries to calm Wesley down, and to wake Ella up, but cannot seem to do either. weve gone and left everything up to the old man again! Emma explains that her father broke the door down the night before in a drunken rage. Sources sound like? His teen-age sister, Emma (Lizzy DeClement), on the other hand, can only howl about being emotionally ripped off. Taylor leaves, and Wesley yells at the policeman to arrest him for being a confidence man. Shifting unconsciously. His symbolsthe lamb, the broken door, the refrigerator, the old carjump out at the viewer and almost announce I am a symbol! But Shepard uses them less as true symbols than as evocative images. This is Michael's monologue as Wesley Tate, the son of. Sam Shepards Curse of the Starving Class is a darkly comic look into the world of dysfunctional Tate family, as they struggle amongst themselves for food, freedom, and meaning in their run-down lives. Weston tries to explain the poison to Wesley by comparing it to the way to you poison a coyote by putting strychnine in the belly of a dead lamb. She is a small woman wearing a bathrobe and pink fuzzy slippers, and her hair is in rollers. Ella enters and she and Weston discuss Emma's shooting up of the club. Emerson and Slater enter, laughing and holding the bloody carcass of the lamb. These people are not meant to be accurate representations of real people, nor are we meant to believe that this family had a lamb, brought it inside, and then butchered it. Feet stopping. If there are three dates, the first date is the date of the original Ella re-enters with groceries and throws the artichokes on the floor. Bottoms, Stephen J., The Theatre of Sam Shepard: States of Crisis, Cambridge University Press, 1998. Taylor, a land developer, is courting Ella. Note: When citing an online source, it is important to include all necessary dates. Then a long silence. Weston, slightly drunk, is a big man; he wears baggy pants, tennis shoes, an overcoat, and a baseball cap. The "curse," as Ella puts it, of the Tate family is that they have nitroglycerine liquid dynamite running in their blood. A pop of metal. She appears to be the most bizarre character in the play, yet is also the most normal member of the family.
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