Presentation to Sam Shepard of the Gold Medal for Drama

"Presentation to Sam Shepard of the Gold Medal for Drama" is an address given at the American Academy of Arts and Letters upon conferring the award to Shepard in May 1992. It was included in the Proceedings of the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, 1992.

Summary

Sam Shepard, 2004

Shepard could not be present for the ceremony, although he had promised to come when he first heard of the award while "on a mule on location" outside of Roswell, New Mexico. Despite once playing Chuck Yeager in The Right Stuff, he is afraid to fly. Since Vonnegut has written this address with that assumption, he asks the assembled to imagine that Shepard has made it, which would have been "the most glamorous thing that happened in this hall since Arthur Miller showed up with Marilyn Monroe". Miller and Edward Albee, whom Vonnegut called "distinguished playwrights like myself", nominated five playwrights other than themselves for this award, voted on by the full membership of the Institute and the Academy, which includes artists of all types, via secret ballot. Vonnegut himself notes that he will take the secret of his own vote to his grave.

If Shepard felt they were mistaken, he would not be first, much as Nelson Algren declined to appear for his Medal of Literature since "he had to speak to a garden club in Waukegan". Shepard's win is a reminder that art now exists west of the Mississippi River. When Paul Engle accepted his medal a few years ago, he pointed out he was the first winner of that award "to have spent his life west of the Mississippi". Shepard has perhaps not had the hits on Broadway of someone like Andrew Lloyd Webber, but when True West was performed by a group from Chicago, including John Malkovitch, it was proved "to be a masterpiece". Shepard's work is part of the birth of excellent theater now coming from the center of North America. Shepard is also an accomplished actor, much like Molière, Shakespeare, Sophocles, and other "good company".