Westmoreland Performing Arts troupe shoulders weighty Sam Shepard drama

The Westmoreland Performing Arts professional company will make its debut with Sam Shepard’s Pulitzer Prize finalist drama, “True West,” playing March 17-19 at the Greensburg Garden and Civic Center.

“True West” examines the fraught relationship between screenwriter Austin and his older brother Lee, with the action unfolding in the kitchen of their mother’s Southern California home.

The show features Anthony Marino Jr. as Austin and Kevin O’Leary as Lee. It’s the brothers’ first meeting in five years and the two are not on good terms.

“Austin is house-sitting while their mother is in Alaska, and there he is confronted by his brother, who proceeds to bully his way into staying at the house and using Austin’s car,” said director and WPA co-founder Tony Marino. “In addition, the screenplay which Austin is pitching to his connection in Hollywood somehow gets taken over by the pushy con-man tactics of Lee, and the brothers find themselves forced to cooperate in the creation of a story that will make or break both their lives.”

In the process, successful family man Austin and drifter/grifter Lee also come to admit they’ve each wanted, at times, to be in each other’s shoes.

Marino Jr. and O’Leary, both veterans of area theater companies, are friends off-stage — which has been helpful as they rehearse.

“We have history and are friends, which makes it a safe place to take the risks you need to make as an actor,” Marino Jr. said.

For his part, O’Leary said, “Anthony has been like a little brother to me for years, so it’s a really interesting dynamic to take this tense, estranged relationship and explore it with someone I know so well. There’s a darkness to these characters — a frustration, a failure to become what each of us want to be — that colors the action of the show. And it’s both incredibly fun and terrifying to tackle this kind of material.”

“True West” has a background of the two main actors having personal relationships, Tony Marino said, including productions pairing Gary Sinise with John Malkovich and the late Philip Seymour Hoffman with John C. Reilly.

“The brother relationship it explores is very complex and there’s a lot of physicality in the show,” he said. “There’s a big fight scene, so you have to feel safe with the other actor on the stage. I’m not saying it’s a prerequisite, but it’s one of those things that helps in the process.”

Challenging actors and audiences with weighty dramas was part of the mission when Marino founded WPA with his wife, Renata.

“All actors want to do these kinds of things,” Marino said. “Straight drama isn’t always the most commercial thing, although for an actor it’s probably one of the most rewarding.

“Because our slate is new and the world is our oyster as far as what we want to become, we were like, let’s do this and see if there’s an audience in this area for it,” he said. “We have two great actors doing one of the best pieces of theater ever created, so at the very least, it’s good for our artistic souls.

“We’ll see if it’s good at the box office.”

The cast includes Renata Marino as Mom and Ryan Jordan as Saul, a film producer interested in Austin’s script. The scenic design is by Mark Kissner.

“True West” will be performed at 8 p.m. March 17 through 19 at the Greensburg Garden and Civic Center, 951 Old Salem Road.

General admission tickets, at $20 or $15 for seniors and students, are available by calling 724-462-9771 or online at dancestudio-pro.com/tickets/wpa. Tickets also will be available at the door starting 30 minutes before each show.

For more information, visit westmorelandperformingarts.com.