Buried Child Sam Shepard

Buried Child premiered at the Magic Theatre in San Francisco on June 27, 1978, directed by Robert Woodruff. Its New York premiere was at Theater for the New City on October 19, 1978.[4] Director Harold Clurman wrote in The Nation: "What strikes the ear and eye is comic, occasionally hilarious behavior and speech at which one laughs while remaining slightly puzzled and dismayed (if not resentful), and perhaps indefinably saddened. Yet there is a swing to it all, a vagrant freedom, a tattered song." The play transferred to Theatre de Lys, now the Lucille Lortel Theatre.

The show was revived for a two-month run on Broadway in 1996, following a production at the Steppenwolf Theatre in Chicago in 1995. The production, directed by Gary Sinise at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre, was nominated for five Tony Awards but did not win any. The script for the production had been reworked by Shepard.[5] Shepard wrote that he had felt certain "aspects of the writing still seemed awkward and unfinished" in 1978, and that he was glad for the opportunity to revisit the script for the Steppenwolf production.[6]

In February 2016, the play began performances Off-Broadway, produced by theatre company The New Group and directed by Scott Elliott.[7][8] It ran for two months (February 2 through April 3, 2016) at The Pershing Square Signature Center.[9][10] A live stream was held on March 30, 2016, on the fee-based service BroadwayHD.[11] The production was nominated for two Lucille Lortel Awards, for Outstanding Lead Actor (Ed Harris) and Outstanding Featured Actor in a Play (Paul Sparks).[12]

The New Group's production of Buried Child transferred to Trafalgar Studios in the West End for a 14-week run, beginning November 12, 2016.[13]

Notable casts