Sam Shepard is considered one of America’s most influential and celebrated playwrights of the 20th century and also an accomplished actor, director, screenwriter and musician.
His latest play Ages of the Moon (first produced in 2009) takes place on the front porch of an isolated home, in the middle of nowhere. The home is the current dwelling place of 65-year-old Ames, whose wife threw him out after 25 years of marriage, after she had found out about his fling with a much younger woman. Remorseful and morose, Ames spends most of his time moping, drinking and sitting on his porch, or staring at the stars and contemplating the various phases of the moon as it travels across the sky.
Recently arrived is his lifelong friend Bryon who has come halfway across the country after receiving a desperate phone call from the despairing Ames. Slipping easily into old routines, as if they’ve never been apart, the two relax together, drink, and look back at their lives.
Between the laid-back conversations and attempted storytelling, hidden truths about both men emerge.
The basic premise of the story becomes apparent. Namely, both men feel an oppressive loneliness in their lives. They both need to have someone to tell their troubles to and also to have someone who will listen.