Fresh Horses

The setting is an abandoned railroad maintenance station in the rural South, which Larkin, a temporary college drop-out, has moved into both in order to think over his future and to spend more time with his nubile young girlfriend, Jewel

Larkin believes Jewel to be nineteen and a virgin but, as subsequent events reveal, she is actually sixteen, and married, and on the run from her lecherous stepfather. As Larkin dreams up toys and board games (which he sends off to Parker Brothers in the hope of making his fortune) he is visited by his college pals Tipton and Sproles

They try to lure him away from Jewel with promises of wild parties and compliant coeds. Tipton is a font of miscellaneous (and often hilarious) information; while Sproles, a "fifth year senior," is a sardonic schemer and incipient troublemaker

In the second act a party does take place with the arrival of three high-spirited college girls who, after deftly putting down every boy of their acquaintance, draw their hosts into a wildly comic marshmallow fight - during which Jewel unexpectedly returns

She confronts the now uncertain Larkin with an ultimatum which both dampens the festive mood of the others and impels the play toward its affecting, bittersweet conclusion

"[Fresh Horses] captures its youthful characters at that precise moment when their adolescent fantasies begin to fade into the morning-after realities of adulthood." ~ The NY Times

"This study of a group of young Southerners backing into maturity has fresh observation, sharp characterization and robust humor" ~ Variety