Sam Shepard (born November 5, 1943) is 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 is 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.
Won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1979 for his three-act play "Buried Child."
(1982 - present) Living with Jessica Lange (1982-present). They have two children.
Suffers from fear of flying.
Has a son named Jesse (1970) from his marriage to O-Lan Jones and two children, Hanna Jane (1985) and Samuel Walker (1987), from his longtime relationship with Jessica Lange.
Was the drummer for late 1960s bands "Lothar and the Hand People" and "The Holy Modal Rounders" per a short interview in the August, 1970 issue of Playboy (the former confirmed by the interviewer, who was at the Astor Place Theater in NYC to see a twin-bill of the then-26-year-old Shepard's plays, "The Unseen Hand" and "Forensic and the Navigators") and encountered Shepard drumming away in the lobby with Lothar et al.
He wrote the 1971 play "Cowboy Mouth" with girlfriend Patti Smith and played in the very first production the role of Slim (with Smith in the role of Cavale). It is the only time he has played one of his own characters. Just before the second night's performance, Shepard was so disturbed about the experience of playing Slim, he abandoned the role without a word to anyone and left town. He has always had a fear of live audiences.
(2005) Currently lives with Jessica Lange and their children outside of Stillwater, Minnesota.
Has twice been nominated for Broadway's Tony Award as author of a Best Play nominee: in 1996 for "Buried Child" and in 2000 for "True West."
Born in Illinois and grew up in California.
By the time he was 30, he had already written 30 produced plays in New York.
Collaborated with Bob Dylan in writing the song "Brownsville Girl," which appeared on Dylan's 1986 album "Knocked Out Loaded." The eleven-minute song is considered by many to be a bright spot in what was otherwise a creative drought for Dylan from the late seventies to the early nineties.
He did the rodeo circuit, riding broncs and bulls.
Son of Jane Elaine e Samuel Shepard, both teachers.
