The Tooth of Crime by Sam Shepard

First published: 1974

First produced: 1972, at the Open Space, London

Type of plot: Musical; allegory

Time of work: The future

Locale: United States

Principal Characters:

• Hoss, a Star Marker (Solo Killer)
• Becky Lou, a groupie/moll in Hoss’s entourage
• Star-Man, Hoss’s astrologist
• Galactic Jack, a disc jockey
• Referee, an umpire who monitors play in the game
• Cheyenne, Hoss’s driver
• Doc, Hoss’s trainer
• Crow, a Gypsy Marker (Renegade Killer)

The Play

The Tooth of Crime begins with Hoss, a Star Marker, singing a rock song, “The Way Things Are.” Images of self-doubt, numbing deadness, betrayal, and the loss of heroes are introduced in the song as “dark, heavy lurking Rock and Roll” reinforces the ominous threat of graphic violence which looms constantly throughout the play. Hoss’s song introduces his troubled quest and establishes his hope of becoming firmly established at the peak of the American mythos of stardom. “Sometimes in the blackest night I can see a little light,” he sings. “That’s the only thing that keeps me rockin’—keeps me rockin’.”

His groupie, Becky Lou, enters and discusses their preparations for Hoss’s next move in the cross-country “game” that he and other “killers” are playing. Although this game is never fully explained, it appears to be a futuristic combination of the rock and roll music industry and gang warfare. The array of guns she displays and the talk of fast cars attest the thirst for power and speed felt so strongly by the killers. They are all maneuvering for strategic moves which will propel them into the top position of the game, providing them with the tenuous status of a star. Hoss summons his astrologist, Star-Man, who, like Tiresias in Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex, is asked for advice to rid Hoss of his malaise. Star-Man offers him some sage advice, but Hoss can barely contain his desire for the number-one position and the gold record that comes with it. Hoss wants to go against the rules of the game, but Star-Man cautions him that doing so will risk voiding his play. As Becky Lou reminds him, “You can’t go against the code, Hoss.” Star-Man elaborates on this risk as he cautions Hoss to restrain his desire and maintain his status as a solo player or risk losing his chance for achieving “something durable, something lasting.” He says, “How’re you gonna cop an immortal shot if you give up soloing and go into a gang war. They’ll rip you up in a night. Sure you’ll have a few moments of global glow, maybe even an interplanetary flash. But it won’t last, Hoss, it won’t last.”

Becky Lou attempts to assuage Hoss’s doubts once Star-Man leaves, but it is clear while they discuss his position as a “true genius killer” that he is sensing a significant challenge to this position. His next song, “Cold Killer,” reaffirms his belief in his ability to attain the rank of top killer as he launches into a rock-patter which displays his expertise in the game.

Hoss’s confidence is weakened when his disc jockey, Galactic Jack, enters and assesses Hoss’s position in the game. Solo players have taken over and “Gang war is takin’ a back seat,” he says, which would be good news for Hoss except that another player, Mojo Root Force, has overstepped the boundaries of acceptable play and taken one of Hoss’s duly appointed properties. The concept of Gypsy Killers is introduced here as Galactic Jack mentions that they have been altering the game by refusing to play entirely by the rules. This news throws Hoss into turmoil because he begins to feel his age, recognizing that young players are entering the game and could soon depose him. “I got a feeling,” he says. “I know they’re on their way in and we’re going out. We’re gettin’ old, Jack.”

The session with Galactic Jack so disturbs Hoss that he decides to take control of the rapidly deteriorating situation. He summons Cheyenne and tells him “We been suckers to the code for too long now. Now we move outside.” Before Hoss can act on his newfound confidence, however, he receives crushing news that Little Willard, a marker of status similar to his own, has been found with a fatal, self-inflicted head wound. As things fall apart all around him, Hoss finds that his reliance on the code has made him vulnerable to new systems of power functioning outside the code—a recognition which challenges everything he believes in (including the game). “Without a code,” he laments, “it’s just crime.”

Becky Lou tries to bolster Hoss’s ego, which has been simultaneously strengthened and weakened by news that a Gypsy Marker is rumored to be pursuing him. He recognizes the status associated with being targeted for the fight, since that implies that he might now be ranked as number one in the game; at the same time, however, he senses that his victory against the Gypsy Marker will by no means be easy—or certain. As he evaluates the rapidly changing contours of the game, he develops a growing sense of foreboding. He tries to sharpen his skills at knife fighting, but despite his apparent expertise at bloodying a practice dummy, he senses a change in his abilities. “Something’s lacking,” he says. “I can’t seem to get it up like the other kills. My heart’s not in it.” Act 1 concludes with Hoss attempting to generate a renewed enthusiasm, but it is clear through his efforts to do so that the upcoming fight is going to bear much significance upon his future as a Star Marker.

Crow, the Gypsy Marker, enters the scene at the beginning of act 2 and immediately creates a threatening impression as a rock and roll punk which produces a strong sense of uneasiness in Hoss. As they assess each other, it is clear that Hoss has fallen behind the game and that new rebel players such as Crow are going to be the next stars. Crow quickly analyzes the distinctive features of Hoss’s killer persona, drawing upon rock and roll paradigms to categorize him and thereby identify his weaknesses. As they appraise each other, it is immediately apparent that Hoss is no longer attuned to the newest features of the game. This realization places him at a great disadvantage, which Crow adeptly turns to his favor through calculated verbal jabs at Hoss.

These spoken assaults are preparations for the verbal sparring that constitutes the major action of the second act. Hoss calls for the referee to enter, and the jousting begins. Their form of play involves blows delivered through verbal insults designed to penetrate the field of impersonality they use to protect themselves. From the beginning, Hoss is placed at a disadvantage and even though he manages to catch Crow off-balance at one point, the referee rules that the newcomer has won.

Realizing the need to break free from the old code, Hoss kills the referee and then effaces himself by asking Crow to teach him to be a Gypsy—“Just like you.” Crow recognizes Hoss’s pathetic condition and humiliates him by giving him some Gypsy lessons which serve only to accentuate Hoss’s defeat. In the same manner of suicide employed by Little Willard, Hoss shoots himself in the mouth rather than further degrade himself. In the requiem, the characters discuss Hoss’s failure to adjust to the changing game, and the play ends with Crow’s song, which expresses his desire to keep “rollin’ down” to avoid the stagnation and self-defeat experienced by Hoss.

Dramatic Devices

A central issue of The Tooth of Crime is relayed through the Western-like showdown between Hoss and Crow that is framed in rock and roll imagery. Hoss embodies values of the older, established code of the game. He has prospered by following that code only to find at this point in his life that the rules of the game have changed—and, more important, the game has bypassed him. The game provided the superstructure of his value system; without it, he is set adrift with no remaining ground of assurance. Crow, on the other hand, is the young challenger who typifies the newest manifestation of an ever-changing game. He has adapted to its changes and uses them to his advantage against Hoss, whose role has been diminished, ironically, by the very tradition that the game fostered—the very tradition, moreover, that has helped him to achieve his position as a Star Marker. Crow challenges Hoss’s belief in the game, thereby presenting a stronger example of frontier individuality than the rule-bound trappings promoted by the traditional game that has so successfully shackled Hoss.

Sam Shepard uses the duel to illustrate this clash between outdated and updated rules as Hoss quickly founders against his better-equipped opponent. The rock and roll framework for this fight illustrates a characteristic component of Shepard’s drama by drawing upon a young and lawless American tradition which has nevertheless changed in a similar fashion. Thus, Hoss is associated with early rock and roll while Crow represents its more current forms.

The codes derived from rock and roll music and Westerns further depict this challenge between the old and the new as Hoss represents the decrepit established power while Crow assumes the role of the progressive young gun who is attempting to make his mark by destroying emblems of the establishment. Killing Hoss is a means for Crow to display the vulnerability of the obsolete values that Hoss represents.

The crises Hoss experiences also demonstrate the extent to which his knowledge of the system is outdated. As he surveys the current state of affairs, he encounters one disappointment after another: Some players are no longer following the rules; he is constrained by “handlers” to the extent that he no longer can act according to his own intuition; the trappings of stardom function only to weigh him down. He has become complacent by following the rules which brought him his fame, and now he is faced with the consequences that attend this complacency.

With an iconography rich in American images of despair, loss, and uncertainty, rock and roll music offers an appropriate medium for the expression of Hoss’s feelings as well as those of the other characters who in some way are touched by Hoss’s downfall. The songs, which function as modern-day monologues in the play, assist the development of this imagery by allowing the characters to release their thoughts to the gut-wrenching strains of rock and roll music. The combination of a challenge to a power figure, the Western images, and rock and roll metaphors produces an electric mix designed to explore several characteristically American motifs.

Critical Context

Sam Shepard uses elements of rock and roll and Westerns in many of his plays but nowhere with the skillful intensity that is achieved in The Tooth of Crime. In this respect, the play is the best representative of Shepard’s efforts to fuse and question these characteristics and stands as the epitome of his early attempts in plays of this nature. Because The Tooth of Crime helped to launch Shepard’s career by being the first to generate extensive critical approbation, it stands as an excellent introduction to his work at its early, arguably more raw stage.

Prior to The Tooth of Crime, Shepard had drawn upon an eclectic range of subjects integral to American culture. Thus, the occult and bounty hunters—Back Bog Beast Bait (pr. 1971)—mythic figures and film stars—Mad Dog Blues (pr., pb. 1971)—cowboys and rock and roll—Cowboy Mouth (pr., pb. 1971)—and an alien and a drunk—The Unseen Hand (pr. 1969)—populate his early plays. While this bizarre array of stereotypically American subjects continues to appear in his later plays, Shepard displayed a distinct growth toward more domestic concerns toward the end of the 1970’s.

This shift records simply another direction in Shepard’s attempt to articulate distinctly American concerns, with the family unit being a central issue. The Pulitzer Prize-winning Buried Child (pr. 1978), for example, focuses on a family attempting to keep a sordid element of its past buried out of sight in a macabre manner of numbing denial. True West (pr. 1980), Fool for Love (pr., pb. 1983), and A Lie of the Mind (pr. 1985) have demonstrated Shepard’s concern with the realistic aspects of home life, drawing upon family relations and love in a manner which distinguishes a move away from his early work toward a more refined approach. His work in film (acting, scriptwriting, and directing) have helped to make him an even more visible figure in the America he has helped to reveal and define, drawing attention to the significant impact he has as a major figure in the theater (and later in film) since his first plays were performed in 1964.

Sources for Further Study

Bottoms, Stephen J. The Theatre of Sam Shepard: States of Crisis. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1998.

Cohn, Ruby. “The Word Is My Shepard.” In New American Dramatists, 1960-1980. New York: Grove Press, 1982.

DePose, David J. Sam Shepard. New York: Twayne, 1992.

Hart, Lynda. Sam Shepard’s Metaphorical Stages. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1987.

Marranca, Bonnie, ed. American Dreams: The Imagination of Sam Shepard. New York: Performing Arts Journal, 1981.

Mottram, Ron. Inner Landscapes: The Theater of Sam Shepard. Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1984.

Oumano, Ellen. Sam Shepard: The Life and Work of an American Dreamer. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1986.

Powe, Bruce W. “The Tooth of Crime: Sam Shepard’s Way with Music.” Modern Drama 22 (March, 1981): 39-46.

Wade, Leslie A. Sam Shepard and the American Theatre. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1997.