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Fool for Love
Through searing truth and dark humor, Fool for Love shows the story of two people who just can't live without each other whether they like it or not. May is hiding out at an old motel in the Mojave Desert. Eddie, an old flame and childhood friend, finds her there and threatens to drag her back into the life from which she had fled. Reality and dream; truth and lies; past and present mingle in an explosive, emotional experience.
72 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1983
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1430 people want to read
About the author
Sam Shepard
227 books665 followersSam Shepard was an American artist who worked as an award-winning playwright, writer and actor. His many written works are known for being frank and often absurd, as well as for having an authentic sense of the style and sensibility of the gritty modern American west. He was an actor of the stage and motion pictures; a director of stage and film; author of several books of short stories, essays, and memoirs; and a musician.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 117 reviews
July 2, 2025
Fool for Love, pieza de enorme tensión dramática, le dice adiós al viejo Oeste al mismo tiempo que niega cualquier remembranza teñida por la nostalgia con los colores de la imaginación.
Sin embargo, su pareja de protagonistas aparecen tan plenos de humanidad que es virtualmente imposible resistirse a calarlos en todos los matices de su interioridad, sin considerar sentimientos y juicios tan contradictorios como el rechazo moral y la más pura simpatía --algo que llega a incluir al (¿terrible? ¿entrañable?) anciano que, como un fantasma de los pecados heredados, se sienta en su mecedora y persigue a ambos antihéroes hasta la confrontación misma de la subjetividad.
Ilusiones perdidas, esperanza, derrotas, impotencia y nuestra ardua relación con la vida son algunos de los rasgos que envuelven esta exitosa exploración en la intimidad y los secretos de ese mundo de los cowboys modernos descrito por Arthur Miller en su guión original de The Misfits o por Annie Proulx en su cuento "Brokeback Mountain". Precisamente la decadencia y mezquindad que informan aquel paisaje conflictivo, desgarrado entre la represión de lo cotidiano y el deseo liberador, entre el pasado y el presente, puede observarse en Fool for Love en su máxima intensidad, destilado en un cuadro que busca la realidad y huye de la convención del realismo, un único escenario desvaído que se va extinguiendo ante los ojos sin perder su poder de acompañarnos hasta mucho después de la oscuridad. Un momento breve pero inmenso, unos amantes prohibidos que en su pequeñez y torpeza contienen los sueños y las intuiciones de la experiencia.
Estrenada en el Magic Theatre de San Francisco, California, en 1983, Fool for Love tuvo como actores protagónicos a Ed Harris en el rol de Eddie y a Kathy Baker en el de May. El propio autor dirigió la obra.
RIP Sam Shepard
Sin embargo, su pareja de protagonistas aparecen tan plenos de humanidad que es virtualmente imposible resistirse a calarlos en todos los matices de su interioridad, sin considerar sentimientos y juicios tan contradictorios como el rechazo moral y la más pura simpatía --algo que llega a incluir al (¿terrible? ¿entrañable?) anciano que, como un fantasma de los pecados heredados, se sienta en su mecedora y persigue a ambos antihéroes hasta la confrontación misma de la subjetividad.
Ilusiones perdidas, esperanza, derrotas, impotencia y nuestra ardua relación con la vida son algunos de los rasgos que envuelven esta exitosa exploración en la intimidad y los secretos de ese mundo de los cowboys modernos descrito por Arthur Miller en su guión original de The Misfits o por Annie Proulx en su cuento "Brokeback Mountain". Precisamente la decadencia y mezquindad que informan aquel paisaje conflictivo, desgarrado entre la represión de lo cotidiano y el deseo liberador, entre el pasado y el presente, puede observarse en Fool for Love en su máxima intensidad, destilado en un cuadro que busca la realidad y huye de la convención del realismo, un único escenario desvaído que se va extinguiendo ante los ojos sin perder su poder de acompañarnos hasta mucho después de la oscuridad. Un momento breve pero inmenso, unos amantes prohibidos que en su pequeñez y torpeza contienen los sueños y las intuiciones de la experiencia.
Estrenada en el Magic Theatre de San Francisco, California, en 1983, Fool for Love tuvo como actores protagónicos a Ed Harris en el rol de Eddie y a Kathy Baker en el de May. El propio autor dirigió la obra.
RIP Sam Shepard
November 13, 2015
Sobe o pano...
Cenário
Um quarto de motel barato, à beira de uma estrada, no Deserto Mojave.
Personagens
Um homem, uma mulher e um velho; e, mais tarde, outro homem.
Acção
O velho está sentado. O casal move-se, olha-se, zanga-se, odeia-se, ama-se,...
Desce o pano.
Cenário
Um quarto de motel barato, à beira de uma estrada, no Deserto Mojave.
Personagens
Um homem, uma mulher e um velho; e, mais tarde, outro homem.
Acção
O velho está sentado. O casal move-se, olha-se, zanga-se, odeia-se, ama-se,...
Desce o pano.
April 20, 2025
Theater. A single act, a single location: a room in a seedy motel. A man, a woman, and the ghost of their father. The economy of means but no emotion. A concentration of America against a backdrop of incest. Love, violence, alcohol, and the smell of rodeo. The Cowboys are still there—a mind-blowing photo of the flayed American dream. Robert Cordier's afterword is as intelligent as brilliant; he provides many answers. I'm missing one: when will Sam Shepard be recognized as a major author of 20th-century America?
December 28, 2016
I don't think I will ever not love Sam Shepard's work. I was first introduced to this one act by the way of a scene in one of my acting classes. The beginning scene was one used to really challenge more timid actresses into digging deep down to those guttural emotions. And I was fascinated by that concept and where the play went after that. Luckily I was not disappointed when I read the play in full. Shepard is able to so easily show how complicated human life is and the human desire for love and affection. How it can push us to our limits and make us do things that society would deem completely unacceptable. This was a play that showed the harsher side to our base instinct of love and desire. I was enthralled by it. Give it a read if you enjoy complex and nuanced work that gets raw and uncomfortable.
March 30, 2011
Equal parts tragic, grim, terrifying, and funny, Fool for Love is the story of two angry and thwarted lovers with a horrible secret. I love the stage directions, which call for over the top dramatics, banging and echoing walls, lights that pierce the audience, and gasoline fires. Probably not coming soon to the community theater near you, but kind of fascinating.
October 20, 2012
I love Shepard. He is the quintessential American playwright. He writes about America in gorgeous poetic language equal to Tennesse Williams.
May and Eddie are lovers. Passionate, angry, fighting lovers. They can't live without one another. The play begins with Eddie returning from a long time gone. May is staying in a seedy western desert hotel. The language between them is raunchy, real and sadly true.
There is much symbolism in the play including a large black Mercedez Benz. May "just knows" that Eddie cheated on her with the "countess" because the car is so big.
There are gorgeous passages in this play, including a scene where cows are in a field. America. Another beautiful passage is the recollection of May's mother, dying from love.
"And it turns out, there we were, standin' smack in the middle of a goddamn herd of cattle. Well, you never heard a baby pipe down so fast in your life." ~ this foreshadows the relationship between the old man and May, and that she may calm down for awhile about her tempestuous relationship with Eddie.
The old man is not understood usually from the beginning, but as the play progresses you realize he knows these two lovers and he represents fantasy-realism. He lives in a fantasy as they do; yet he knows their truth. He thinks he is married to Barbara Mandrell, because he says so. Yet, he is the voice of reason.
These lovers are locked into a sickness. I will not spoil it.
May and Eddie are lovers. Passionate, angry, fighting lovers. They can't live without one another. The play begins with Eddie returning from a long time gone. May is staying in a seedy western desert hotel. The language between them is raunchy, real and sadly true.
There is much symbolism in the play including a large black Mercedez Benz. May "just knows" that Eddie cheated on her with the "countess" because the car is so big.
There are gorgeous passages in this play, including a scene where cows are in a field. America. Another beautiful passage is the recollection of May's mother, dying from love.
"And it turns out, there we were, standin' smack in the middle of a goddamn herd of cattle. Well, you never heard a baby pipe down so fast in your life." ~ this foreshadows the relationship between the old man and May, and that she may calm down for awhile about her tempestuous relationship with Eddie.
The old man is not understood usually from the beginning, but as the play progresses you realize he knows these two lovers and he represents fantasy-realism. He lives in a fantasy as they do; yet he knows their truth. He thinks he is married to Barbara Mandrell, because he says so. Yet, he is the voice of reason.
These lovers are locked into a sickness. I will not spoil it.
December 24, 2014
This is another Theater of the Absurd play, so what is real is not necessarily the characters on the stage, or their words and actions, but perhaps the underlying feelings...or perhaps not even those. The emotionally tortured relationship between the two young lovers reminded me of the story in Plato’s Symposium of the divided beings, desperately longing to be reunited with their other halves. Humor mixes with desperation, and blatant lies mix with truth, as these characters struggle in deft and poignant paragraphs of dialogue.
December 18, 2025
i was not prepared to read such a disturbing play. i'm sure there's a lot i just don't understand so i can't appreciate yet, but this play is not something i really enjoyed. engaging but scary and confusing and it feels incomplete? (but then again, maybe it's just that my understanding is incomplete?)
July 25, 2016
A very fine--superb, even--modern stageplay dealing with torrid midwestern honky-tonk romance and family ghosts. It's wild and rollicking; volatile and rambunctious. Earthy and edgy and comical. American theater like this --and hey, let's be frank here--romance itself, really--are just two more things strangled to death and exterminated by the arrival of the cellphone. Two of the most important things we've lost, that's all. Yep.
There was a point not too long ago when theater like this actually resonated with people; gripped them, even shook them up a little. Served as a touchstone. Because there really were passionate romances like this. No longer so. Try to catch the PBS 'American Playhouse' production starring Harry Dean Stanton and (I think some actor such as) Tom Berenger.
No one in the play possesses a cellphone. A phone call does not interrupt any of the dialog or emotionalizing of the actors. The story takes place in a trailer park. Phones --even 'landlines' are simply not a part of the story. They're not necessary and the playwright wouldn't have wanted them around even if there had been some ostensible reason for their presence.
But everyone in the audience attending a run of the play would certainly bring their own phones in with them every night, wouldn't they? They can't comprehend being without them for any reason, right? That's how it is these days. So how do you think that affects the audience's ability to transpose themselves into characters up there on the stage?
The writing is intended to evoke feelings of loneliness, need, hunger. The story deals with vast family miscommunication; with family members yearning--straining--for recognition and acknowledgement by their parents; and from their other siblings. 'Fool for Love' is a story of people in a life-shambles and communication-breakdown.
But I guarantee audience members would sit there mutely, dumbly, not fathoming this at all. They'd gaze blankly at the scenes of trauma passing before their eyes; unconsciously fondle or stroke their iPhones and Blackberry's and Samsung Galaxies nestled down there along their thighs, reassuringly close-to-hand.
The real message of this superb work of modern American theater is ---guess what? Completely lost. Everyone out there today wants to remain comfortably swaddled in this absurd delusion that they are 'keeping in better touch'. That they're somehow 'better connected'; more efficiently communing than even face-to-face. Yeah, r-i-i-i-ght.
I'm just pointing all this out to remind anyone who reads this, what the point of anything we do should be: and that is, emotion. Not 'information'. Stop the information-addiction. I've seen adults in theaters checking their phones every few minutes, sometimes every few seconds. Why bother to pay for a ticket to attend a show if you're not going to immerse yourself in it?
'Fool for Love' has blistering, excruciating scenes of face-to-face acting. When was the last time you looked another human straight in the eye without twitching your eyes down at your phone during whatever you had to say to each other? You call that paying attention to someone?
This kind of thing is what rolls through my mind when I try to give my reason for recommending this book/this play. This great writing is now ...extinct.
There was a point not too long ago when theater like this actually resonated with people; gripped them, even shook them up a little. Served as a touchstone. Because there really were passionate romances like this. No longer so. Try to catch the PBS 'American Playhouse' production starring Harry Dean Stanton and (I think some actor such as) Tom Berenger.
No one in the play possesses a cellphone. A phone call does not interrupt any of the dialog or emotionalizing of the actors. The story takes place in a trailer park. Phones --even 'landlines' are simply not a part of the story. They're not necessary and the playwright wouldn't have wanted them around even if there had been some ostensible reason for their presence.
But everyone in the audience attending a run of the play would certainly bring their own phones in with them every night, wouldn't they? They can't comprehend being without them for any reason, right? That's how it is these days. So how do you think that affects the audience's ability to transpose themselves into characters up there on the stage?
The writing is intended to evoke feelings of loneliness, need, hunger. The story deals with vast family miscommunication; with family members yearning--straining--for recognition and acknowledgement by their parents; and from their other siblings. 'Fool for Love' is a story of people in a life-shambles and communication-breakdown.
But I guarantee audience members would sit there mutely, dumbly, not fathoming this at all. They'd gaze blankly at the scenes of trauma passing before their eyes; unconsciously fondle or stroke their iPhones and Blackberry's and Samsung Galaxies nestled down there along their thighs, reassuringly close-to-hand.
The real message of this superb work of modern American theater is ---guess what? Completely lost. Everyone out there today wants to remain comfortably swaddled in this absurd delusion that they are 'keeping in better touch'. That they're somehow 'better connected'; more efficiently communing than even face-to-face. Yeah, r-i-i-i-ght.
I'm just pointing all this out to remind anyone who reads this, what the point of anything we do should be: and that is, emotion. Not 'information'. Stop the information-addiction. I've seen adults in theaters checking their phones every few minutes, sometimes every few seconds. Why bother to pay for a ticket to attend a show if you're not going to immerse yourself in it?
'Fool for Love' has blistering, excruciating scenes of face-to-face acting. When was the last time you looked another human straight in the eye without twitching your eyes down at your phone during whatever you had to say to each other? You call that paying attention to someone?
This kind of thing is what rolls through my mind when I try to give my reason for recommending this book/this play. This great writing is now ...extinct.
May 23, 2013
Sam Shepard tiene algo en sus letras que para algunos puede resultar irritante y para otros es hermoso. Por fortuna yo soy del segundo grupo. La cosa es que Shepard es algo así como Tennessee Williams, pero con un uso poético de las palabras, tanto y tal grado que por momentos se pierde un poco el sentido y la evolución de la trama que está narrando, pero eso importa un carajo cuando tienes pasajes tan intensos, personajes tan rotos y frases tan entrañables.
Todos estamos fragmentados y en cierta forma estamos condenados por nuestro pasado. Por más que deseemos amar como los niños, sin ataduras ni consecuencias, estamos condicionados por nuestros demonios. El guión de esta obra de teatro es una cosa hermosa, imperdible. Pocas veces uno termina un texto sintiéndose tan jodido y tan contento.
Todos estamos fragmentados y en cierta forma estamos condenados por nuestro pasado. Por más que deseemos amar como los niños, sin ataduras ni consecuencias, estamos condicionados por nuestros demonios. El guión de esta obra de teatro es una cosa hermosa, imperdible. Pocas veces uno termina un texto sintiéndose tan jodido y tan contento.
February 27, 2016
Read this in my college theater class, and saw the play. It's a great play, and probably one of Sam Shepard's best.
February 11, 2021
Savršeno!
October 30, 2025
I read this because it's featured in Ann Patchett's Tom Lake. Oh boy, I know stuff like this happens in real life sometimes, but I fail to understand the need to explore it in art.
June 6, 2010
El escenario es un destartalado y decadente motel de carretera situado en medio de ninguna parte en el oeste más profundo, un oeste plagado de perdedores y anacronismos como cowboys rudos que participan en rodeos intentando que ni se les caiga el sombrero. Los protagonistas son dos animales heridos y orgullosos, un hombre y una mujer. Orgullosos porque prácticamente el orgullo es lo único que les queda, con lo cual sólo dejarán ver sus heridas si esto sirve como arma arrojadiza contra el otro. Parece que algún día se quisieron, pero ahora hay entre ellos demasiados reproches como para que puedan volver a quererse. Les queda el odio y se aferran a él para sentirse menos solos.
Esta obra de Sam Shepard me recuerda a Harold Pinter con un toque de Tennessee Williams y Samuel Beckett, pero con un estilo totalmente personal; una obra primaria y visceral que habla de amor, odio y sexo, y también soledad. Escrita con un ritmo impecable, un ritmo al que bailan los dos protagonistas, porque más que actuar lo que hacen es acercarse y alejarse como si estuvieran ejecutando una coreografía hipnótica. No hay ningún giro innecesario en la trama, pero la revelación final atorga a toda la obra un sentido más profundo aún si cabe y claramente trágico, que parece que nos quiere decir que los humanos estamos condenados a ser víctimas de la pasión y que somos un animal que siempre tropieza con la misma piedra. Totalmente recomendable.
Esta obra de Sam Shepard me recuerda a Harold Pinter con un toque de Tennessee Williams y Samuel Beckett, pero con un estilo totalmente personal; una obra primaria y visceral que habla de amor, odio y sexo, y también soledad. Escrita con un ritmo impecable, un ritmo al que bailan los dos protagonistas, porque más que actuar lo que hacen es acercarse y alejarse como si estuvieran ejecutando una coreografía hipnótica. No hay ningún giro innecesario en la trama, pero la revelación final atorga a toda la obra un sentido más profundo aún si cabe y claramente trágico, que parece que nos quiere decir que los humanos estamos condenados a ser víctimas de la pasión y que somos un animal que siempre tropieza con la misma piedra. Totalmente recomendable.
October 29, 2020
This edition actually came with two plays—Fool for love & The sad lament of Pecos Bill on the eve of killing his Wife. The title play was the better of the two.
Fool for love was first performed in San Francisco in 1983 at the Magic Theater and was directed by Shepard himself. The role of Eddie was played by actor Ed Harris.
The sad lament of Pecos Bill on the eve of killing his Wife—which was written in the form of a comic operetta—first took place: again in San Francisco, at the Bay Area Playwrights' Festival in 1976.
June 13, 2007
یکی ار معروف ترین نمایش نامه های سام شپارد است که تقریبن همه جای جهان به روی صحنه رفته است
”Few American playwrights have exerted as much influence on the contemporary stage as Sam Shepard. His plays are performed on and off Broadway and in all the major regional American theatres. They are also widely performed and studied in Europe, finding both a popular and a scholarly audience”
(short biography of Sam Shepard)
”Few American playwrights have exerted as much influence on the contemporary stage as Sam Shepard. His plays are performed on and off Broadway and in all the major regional American theatres. They are also widely performed and studied in Europe, finding both a popular and a scholarly audience”
(short biography of Sam Shepard)
November 14, 2008
falling in love is a dangerous thing to do... you better get ready for any kind of lose 'cause once you love there is nothing else to do but being confussed between lies and true, reality and fiction, and not knowing who you are really loving...
but, what happens when sister and brother fell in love?
but, what happens when sister and brother fell in love?
May 19, 2013
"This play is to be performed relentlessly without a break," instructs Shepard on page one. So I did myself the favor of reading the play without stopping. It's not long--about 65 pages. Supposedly performances of it last around 90 minutes, while it took about an hour to read. It's almost perfect, close as a perfect piece of writing gets without coming off as over-polished. Just a beautiful work.
August 28, 2017
This play is one of the most heartbreaking of them all. Though on the surface, it seems as though it follows two people in a very strange situation, it is really a play that is relatable to everybody. Not many literary works make me cry, so congratulations Mr. Shepard!
December 2, 2023
plato’s symposium allusion????
July 23, 2024
odio la unam
November 28, 2025
omg i can't believe this was the play they were doing in tom lake
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April 8, 2021مارتین: من اصلا داستان بلد نیستم.
ادی: از خودت بساز.
مارتین: این که میشه دروغ، نه؟
ادی: نه، نه. وقتی میشه دروغ که باور کنی راسته. اگه از قبل بدونی دروغه که دیگه دروغ نیست.
ادی: از خودت بساز.
مارتین: این که میشه دروغ، نه؟
ادی: نه، نه. وقتی میشه دروغ که باور کنی راسته. اگه از قبل بدونی دروغه که دیگه دروغ نیست.
April 12, 2023
My favorite Shepard so far.
Great framework and never loses its luster because of how intense and quick it is.
Great framework and never loses its luster because of how intense and quick it is.
July 4, 2025
3.5
Toxic situationship is even worse than you thought
Toxic situationship is even worse than you thought
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November 13, 2013May, Eddie, and the Old Man are on stage when the lights come up—the Old Man separated physically from May and Eddie either on a different platform or another dividing convention of the set. In a low-budget motel room on the outskirts of the Mojave Desert where May has been living, Eddie and May sit without speaking to each other—she with her head between her knees over the side of the bed, and he in a chair. The only sound is that of Eddie fidgeting with his glove and bucking strap. The Old Man sits in rocking chair next to a bottle of whiskey. Though he eventually talks to the actors, the Old Man only exists in May and Eddie's minds.
Eddie tries to get May to speak to him. He talks soothingly to her and offers to get her something soothing to drink. He reassures May that he is staying with her and will not leave her again. May hold on to Eddie's legs desperately but will not speak. He tries to gently push her off of him and she lashes out on him punching his chest with her fists. May is torn between wanting Eddie to leave and to stay. She accuses him of having an affair with a wealthy woman. Eddie denies it. Eddie asks for sympathy from May by telling her how far he drove to see her and that he missed her desperately. May is slightly moved by his feelings but then remembers his affair with the woman she calls "the Countess." Eddie admits taking the Countess out to dinner twice. May accuses Eddie of sleeping with the Countess regularly. Eddie denies this but May does not fall for it, saying she will believe the truth because, "It's less confusing."
Eddie tries to get May to speak to him. He talks soothingly to her and offers to get her something soothing to drink. He reassures May that he is staying with her and will not leave her again. May hold on to Eddie's legs desperately but will not speak. He tries to gently push her off of him and she lashes out on him punching his chest with her fists. May is torn between wanting Eddie to leave and to stay. She accuses him of having an affair with a wealthy woman. Eddie denies it. Eddie asks for sympathy from May by telling her how far he drove to see her and that he missed her desperately. May is slightly moved by his feelings but then remembers his affair with the woman she calls "the Countess." Eddie admits taking the Countess out to dinner twice. May accuses Eddie of sleeping with the Countess regularly. Eddie denies this but May does not fall for it, saying she will believe the truth because, "It's less confusing."
December 24, 2016
I mean the polite (and not unwarranted) thing to say would be that this play deals in archetypes; that's why everyone acts the way they do, why none of it precisely makes sense--why dudes talk a lot, and women sort of complain or vamp. (Well, one woman complains and vamps.) The less charitable thing would be to say that this is everything the "Big Lebowski" narrator sort of anatomizes, dissects, then symbolically murders in about five minutes of screen time. I am myself on the fence: I guess if this is what you're looking for it's a pretty good example? But not immune to its own ridiculousness.
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June 20, 2014Elvis and Eve. Humanity, as well as as all forms of life, is a circuit board of infidelity forever conducting/inbreeding the same currents of that energy stuff called "love" that can't decide on either becoming more disturbed when outside energy is brought in, or kept out.
January 15, 2008
I was the costume designer for this show. I'm pretty sure I didn't know what I was doing at the time. I'm also pretty sure I got the gig because my boss had no idea I was a freshman.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 117 reviews