Calista Flockhart and Christian Slater Lead New Revival of Sam Shepard’s ‘Curse of the Starving Class’
First produced in 1977, three years before Ronald Reagan was elected president, ‘Curse’ has only gained power as an indictment of late-stage capitalism.
In a new revival of Sam Shepard’s “Curse of the Starving Class,” one cast member gets to provide comic relief and become a tragic figure without uttering a single word. Her name is Lois, and she’s a 4-year-old California Red sheep — last seen on the New York stage, her bio informs us, as a “featured actress” in the live Nativity scene included in Radio City Music Hall’s “Christmas Spectacular.”
Although Lois is fully grown, her character evokes clichés attached to younger members of her species: sacrificial lamb, lamb to the slaughter. Of course, the sheep is hardly the only mammal who proves luckless in the play, one of several eviscerating classics in which Shepard explored family dysfunction on the fringes of the working class.
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