By William Wolf

FOOL FOR LOVE  Send This Review to a Friend

Nina Arianda is an extraordinary actress, made abundantly clear when she appeared in “Venus in Fur.” Now, in a revival of Sam Shepard’s “Fool for Love,” presented by the Manhattan Theatre Club in association with the Williamstown Theatre Festival, she is even more impressive. This time she displays strong physicality as part of her acting. At one point she races across the room and leaps onto her bed in one swift movement with breathtaking grace. Arianda is a force to be reckoned with in the role of May by co-star Sam Rockwell as Eddie, both in a romantic tug of war as they unleash the emotional fireworks that Shepard dictates in his explosive drama set in a motel room on the edge of the Mojave Desert.

When the play opens we see May slumped over the edge of the bed with her head down, and Eddie seated at the rear, a tilted cowboy hat covering most of his face. At the side of the stage, apart from the action, sits The Old Man (Gordon Joseph Weiss), whose identity becomes clear as the play progresses and whose Greek chorus-like comments and discourse illuminate a complex relationship.

Once Eddie and May make contact the dramatic flow reveals that they have had a turbulent history. Eddie has been gone, and May is angry, accusing him of having had an affair with another woman. One gets a sharp sense of the back and forth in their relationship when she embraces him and then knees him in the groin. Shepard creates a portrait of love persisting, with the ever-present threat of separation. Eddie tells May that he has come back to get her and take her to Wyoming for a new life together. She expects more of the same and says there is no way that she will go.

May also says that she has a date, and sure enough, Martin, played by Tom Pelphrey materializes, soon indicating bafflement at the dynamics into which he has stumbled.

Rockwell is extremely appealing, and at one point he twirls a rope to lasso furniture, and then, as we might expect, May. One can see why May would be attracted to him, and he to her, and we learn of what happened between them way back and the existence of a major problem.

The pleasure lies not only in enjoying Shepard’s writing and character creation, but in watching Arianda and Rockwell dominate the stage as a flamboyant duo. Whether or not May and Eddie split, one senses that the relationship will never end as a result of who they are and the emotions driving them. Special plaudits are also due Weiss for the effectiveness in how he handles his important and meaningful Old Man role. At the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre, 261 West 47th Street. Phone: 212-239-6200. Reviewed October 11, 2015

  

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