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Westwego Performing Arts Theatre
177 Sala Ave, Westwego, LA
Written by Sam Shepard
Directed by Bennett Kirschner
True West by Sam Shepard is a gripping exploration of sibling rivalry, identity, and the clash between the civilized and the wild.
Set in the sweltering California desert, the play follows two estranged brothers—Austin, a buttoned-up screenwriter, and Lee, a volatile drifter—whose lives collide in a battle of wills. As their roles blur and ambitions spiral out of control, the line between creation and destruction fades, unraveling a darkly comic and raw portrait of the American dream.
Filled with tension, wit, and explosive energy, True West is a modern classic that keeps audiences on the edge of their seats.
CAST:
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Click headshot for bio
Bennett Kirschner is a New Orleans-based playwright and director. He primarily works with Intramural Theater, which he founded with A.S. Wilson in 2015. He has directed and produced multiple site-specific and original plays throughout the city. Recent credits include The Bermuda Can Company by Intramural Theater (2024), The Trees by Agnes Borinsky (2024), CAVE by Intramural Theater (2023), The Canopic Jar of My Sins by Justin Maxwell (2022), The Cuck by Sam Mayer (2022), and Apostles of Everest by Intramural Theater (2021).
His original devising methodology, which has generated five of Intramural’s works, integrates free-writing exercises and improvised physical composition into nonhierarchical ensemble settings. As a playwright, his work tends towards dark comedy, touching on themes of the ills of consumerism, environmental politics, and the emotional price of compassion. He received his MFA in Playwriting from the University of New Orleans in 2019.
DIRECTOR
Topher Johnson is a New Orleans-based actor and improvisor. Topher finds themselves most at home performing on the stage with friends, and does most of their work with Intramural Theater and Two Friends Improv. Recent credits include Moonsprung by Intramural Theater (2024), Art Church (2024), The Fools Ensemble with the Tulane Shakespeare Festival (2024), and The Bermuda Can Company by Intramural Theater (2024). Topher also performs long form improvised storytelling a few times a month with Two Friends Improv. They received their BA in Acting from the University of Southern California in 2016.
AUSTIN
Philip Yiannopoulos has enjoyed performing on stage for most of his life. Favorite roles include Kabe in One Flea Spare (Reed College) and Lucentio in a locally touring production of Taming of the Shrew (Tulane Shakespeare / Cripple Creek). He was a proud company member of Cripple Creek Theatre Company for many years.
LEE
Deb Margolin is a playwright, actor, and founding member of Split Britches Theater Company. She is the author of numerous plays, including Imagining Madoff, This is Not a Time of Peace, That Old Perplexity, Turquoise, Critical Mass, Bringing the Fishermen Home, as well as 11 solo performance plays which she has toured throughout the US. Deb was honored with an OBIE award for Sustained Excellence of Performance, the Kesselring Prize for Playwriting, Helen Merrill Distinguished Playwright award, and the Richard H. Broadhead Prize for teaching excellence at Yale University, where she is Professor in the Practice in the undergraduate Theater, Dance, and Performance Studies Program
MOM
Joshua Tierney spawned some years ago in Lakeside Hospital on the Day of the Dead and has, surprisingly, managed to keep himself alive ever since. But whether in a day or a decade, the piper will surely come to collect, as he does for us all, and all traces of his intervening acts and notions, triumphs and failures will be duly wiped from the face of the Earth in relatively short order, though he takes equal parts solace and despair in the fact that all of these things will also be written into the firmament of reality eternally. He likes movies. ig- @caverncinema
SAUL
