Sam Shepard's dark comedy focuses on two brothers, an ambitious writer and a shady alcoholic transient, who become unexpectedly entangled in a twisted duel of screenplay writing at their mother's home while she seeks escape in Alaska.

"It's (Shepard's) dream of what the West once was and no longer is," said Flordelino Lagundino, the director of the Thunder Mountain Theatre Project production. "In a lot of ways it's the American dream, you know? The mother's dream was to go to the West. These days she's everybody - living in suburbia and living the same life."

Lagundino said he and Enrique Bravo, a former college roommate and longtime friend, were looking for a character-driven, "meat-and-potatoes" project to co-star in. When they latched onto "True West," they approached Juneau actor-director Ryan Conarro about directing.

Instead, Conarro ended up taking on the role of the ambitious brother, Austin, while Lagundino took on directing duties. The change in roles worked out well, Bravo said, as he and Conarro discovered many similarities in their acting.

"Austin, at the beginning of the play, is the younger brother who is driven and wants to be successful," he said. "He (later on) breaks out of the mold. I can relate (because) I don't feel limited by social structures."

Bravo said he wanted to play the roguish brother, Lee, after just completing a role in Perseverance Theatre's rock-comedy "Yeast Nation," in which Earth's first life-forms go through many struggles that will be repeated by more advanced species throughout history.

"It's a complete contrast to what I was doing in 'Yeast Nation," Bravo said of his new role. "(Lee is) rough around the edges, but it's all justified; he just wants a better life."

"True West," which premiered in 1980 in San Francisco, finds Shepard putting his twists on American myths and icons into a more traditional narrative than his usual work. The play takes place mostly in a kitchen where Austin is trying to write a potential million-dollar screenplay while his mother is on her trip. Lee, who has been living in the desert, shows up unexpectedly with booze and the intention of stealing from his mother's neighbors before moving on.

Lee decides to hang around, however, when he meets a film producer, played by Jerry Demmert. The producer likes Lee's pitch for a Western and wants Austin to scrap his screenplay and help Lee write his movie. But when Austin refuses, Lee tells his brother that writing can't be as hard as his own life as a thief. He even bets that Austin couldn't steal a toaster.

So Austin ends up trying to prove himself a better thief, while his brother struggles writing his screenplay. Their sibling rivalry reaches the height of tension just as their mother, played by Anni Stokes, unexpectedly returns home.

Over the years, major actors such as Tommy Lee Jones and John Malkovich have played lead roles during various runs, and a modern update of the production saw a laptop computer and 20 toasters on the set (along with three empty front rows and an acrylic glass shield to protect the audience from flying debris).

Conarro said his goal is "a pretty straightforward interpretation of the script," but the set designers constructed "a fairly elaborate set" to capture the naturalistic atmosphere Shepard envisioned.

Bravo said the dialogue is somewhat more contemporary than the original, but the typewriters remain (a "stunt typewriter" gets smashed, he said) and a somewhat less absurd number of toasters.

"By the end there's eight toasters," he said. "There might be more."

Trying to make that much toast, type, get drunk and still have the intensity of character necessary for what's mostly a two-person play is one of the challenging aspects of the play, Bravo said. But it's bringing that feeling of simmering - and ultimately volcanic - sibling tension to the audience without overacting that intrigues the main participants.

"'True West' is one of those show actors want to do," Lagundino said. "It challenges you in a lot of ways. Emotionally it challenges you, and you have to go to the limits of your emotions."