The revival of 'Curse of the Starving Class' at the New Group follows the financially struggling Tate family, who repeatedly open a refrigerator as a symbol of their hopes and desperation. The play, originally written by Sam Shepard in 1977, is marked by its erratic tone and disjointed storytelling, mixing humor and dark themes. This production, directed by Scott Elliott, attempts to place the story in a contemporary context, but struggles to establish a cohesive connection to modern challenges, thus leaving the audience questioning its narrative and motifs.
The play is full of tumbling monologues, abrupt shifts between comedy and menace, onstage urination and onstage livestock, and a car bomb.
If you let the audience stop too long to think about any of it, they might start to pick at the logic, scratching away at its stitches and seams.
Elliott's production advertises a "contemporary biting lens," it lacks the overarching sense of purpose that would sync up the vision.
There’s something in Shepard's vision of corporate lawyers who entangle the Tates in loan debt and bad land deals that rhymes with the HGTV aesthetic.
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