The people of America's rust belt, a vast area of deprivation, formally the home of now depleted heavy industry, have been much in our minds recently. Their disillusionment with and establishment politics are seen as a major contributing factor in the election of President-elect Donald Trump.A programme note to this production proposes that the last time the US demonstrated such a crisis of confidence was during Jimmy Carters administration. It was at this time that Sam Shepherd wrote BURIED CHILD, a play for the theatre-going elite which portrays a poor, uneducated American family as freaks, or "dysfunctional" as the programme puts it.
In a similar scenario to Harold Pinter's THE HOMECOMING a young man-made-good brings his attractive female partner to meet the family he hasn't seen in a long time. The first of three acts establishes quite how weird they are.
Mum and alcoholic dad are relatively normal, he sits on the sofa all day and they bicker from different rooms. The siblings however are decidedly odd, both show signs of mental trauma, one keeps digging things up from the back yard, vegetables at first but the title gives you a clue as to what he'll eventually excavate. The other has a prosthetic leg and a psychotic temper.
No one remembers the would be prodigal grand son when he turns up, eventually driving him crazy with frustration. His girlfriend fares better. Once she stops being terrified her open heartedness provokes a slight thawing in filial relations - enough, at least, to drag some dark secrets out into the open.
The main atttaction of this revival is the chance to see Hollywood star Ed Harris (currently dripping evil as the baddie in Sky TVs West World and his wife, Amy Madigan as the older couple. Both give charismatic performances, a master class in how simplicity in acting can be so powerful. Harris barely moves from the sofa yet his every twitch conveys a plethora of despair, fear and neurosis.
Sam Shepherd is an actor himself and writes the kind of complex, damaged characters that others love to play no matter the size of their role. The whole cast seize the opportunity to play these grotesque, emotionally and intellectually stunted people under Scott Elliott's assured direction.
The play feels a little dated, unsettling ambiguity, has been done better since but the evening is still a fulfilling encounter with great actors and a twisted and twisting vision of America's underclass.
25 years since its premiere, Bryony Lavery’s HER ACHING HEART, a pastiche take on the Mills & Boons styled romance stories has been revived at The Hope Theatre. Directed by the artistic director of the venue Matthew Parker the show provides plenty of fun for this festive season.