Come
Back to the Five and Dime Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean
by Ed Graczyk
April 1985
Directed by Lyn Adams
Inside
a rundown Woolworth's department store in McCarthy, Texas, a reunion is planned
for the members of a local 1950s James Dean Fan Club.
Mona
is a high-strung asthmatic who has spent the past twenty years clerking in the
dime store. Former president of The Disciples Of James Dean, she still carries
an obsessive torch for her idol. Sissy, the wise-cracking waitress at the local
truck stop, loves to boast about her large bosoms as well as her sexual
escapades. Only three other Disciples appear for the reunion, including a
mystery guest named Joanne, an old acquaintance who has returned to settle
several old scores.
The
play shifts between 1975 and 1955, flashbacks show the Disciples frenzied over
Dean's arrival in a nearby town to shoot the film GIANT. It is revealed that
Mona got a job as an extra on the GIANT shoot and nine months later gave birth
to a son, who she claims is James Dean's child.
By
the end of the stormy evening, Joanne has exposed the secrets and
self-deceptions with which her friends have been living.
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