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American Buffalo by David Mamet

Oleanna By David Mamet

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A Life in the Theatre : A Play by David Mamet

The Cryptogram by David Mamet

Sexual Perversity in Chicago and the Duck Variations : Two Plays by David Mamet

Speed-The-Plow by David Mamet

Five Television Plays by David Mamet

Reunion and Dark Pony : Two Plays by David Mamet

On Directing Film by David Mamet

True and False : Heresy and Common Sense for the Actor by David Mamet

Writing in Restaurants by David Mamet

House of Games: A Screenplay by David Mamet

In the morning, Don asks Bob if he is eating properly. The night before Don lost a lot of money to a friend named Fletch in a poker game. Teach comes into Don's shop very upset because some woman looked at him funny. He forgot to eat breakfast. Don sends Bob out to get breakfast for them all.

While Bob is gone, Don tells Teach how a man came in the store and paid ninety dollars for a buffalo head nickel. When Bob comes back he says he saw the man he and Don were talking about with a suitcase like he was going out of town.

Teach puts two and two together and figures out that the man with the suitcase was the man who bought the nickel and Don and Bob are planning to rob him while he's away. Teach convinces Don that Bob isn't smart enough to do the job by himself and he should bring him in on it instead. Don decides that's maybe not such a bad idea but he wants Fletch there too.

When Bob returns, Don tells him that the robbery is off. Bob seems to take it OK but he really needs fifty dollars. Don gives him thirty instead. Don and Teach plan to meet again at 11:00 PM.

That night Don waits for Teach but Bob shows up instead. He has a buffalo head nickel he wants to sell Don for fifty dollars. Don tries to get him to go away because Teach is coming. When Teach does arrive he and Don give Bob enough money to go away.

Don argues with Teach for being late. Teach says his watch is broken. Fletch is also late. Teach questions why they need Fletch in the first place. He argues that he can pull off the job himself without Fletch. When Don doesn't agree, Teach suggests that Fletch cheated at cards and that's why Don lost to him and that he wasn't really a friend to Don. Don agrees that they can go ahead without Fletch. Teach starts to leave and takes a pistol with him. Don doesn't think this is a good idea.

Bob comes back unexpectedly. He has a message that Fletch was mugged and is in the hospital with a broken jaw. Teach thinks that Bob and Fletch are trying to pull the burglary off without them and that the hospital story was just to get them off the scent. Don doesn't know who to believe so he calls the hospital where Bob said Fletch was.

Fletch isn't in that hospital. Teach goes into a rage and hits Bob in the ear so hard he bleeds. Don calls another hospital and Fletch is there. His jaw is broken. Teach continues in his rage and Bob begins to sob and admit that he bought the nickel from a coin dealer earlier that day. This brings Teach out of his rage and they take Bob to the hospital.

Don tells Teach about how he sold the nickel for $90

Teach convinces Don to let him go on the robbery instead of Bob

Bob tries to sell Don the nickel he "found"

Teach convinces Bob that Fletch lied to them

Bob forgets which hospital Fletch is in and Teach hits him

This is the play that gave Mamet his reputation as a great writer and also for using very strong language. It's not the great American play but it's very interesting in its own right.

The drama and conflict among the characters is intense in a very disturbing way. This is a play that makes you very uncomfortable about the way that people relate to each other and challenges your hopes that values like friendship and honor are greater than the drive to get a bit ahead no matter who you step on in the process.

The better role is Teach which is why Dustin Hoffman plays him in the movie. Bob and Don are also challenging roles.

Typical of Mamet, words are king in this play and he uses them with the skill of a juggler. He wrote much of the play in iambic pentameter which is interesting and shows his control of the craft but in the end I wondered if it was worth the odd construction he had to use to accomplish it at points by adding or subtracting single syllable words.

Like many of Mamet's plays American Buffalo is easily produced on a budget with few technical requirements. There is a prop though, something to do with pork butchering, that would be a real pain to locate.