The following review of Sam Shepard’s new play The Ages of the Moon appeared in the Irish Independent, March 5:
Shepard's Charm Shines Through
The Ages Of The Moon
Peacock Theatre, Dublin
The last Sam Shepard play commissioned by the Abbey featured Stephen Rea in a hole with a dead horse.
In this one, he's still in a hole, but he has Sean McGinley for company.
Byron (McGinley) has crossed several western states by Greyhound bus to be with his old friend Ames (Rea), who's having an emotional crisis brought on after busting up with his woman. They sit on Ames' porch, drink bourbon and wait for a total eclipse of the moon, due at 5am.
The great charm of Shepard's writing is its allusiveness and delicacy in spare, man-eat-man situations.
Byron and Ames work through their problems with each other with crude language, explosions of temper, physical violence and a shotgun; providing some comic moments. But it's the more reflective talk in between that gradually builds up the play's poetic weight . . .
http://www.independent.ie/entertainment/arts/shepards-charm-shines-through-1661682.html