This play completes Rabe's Vietnam trilogy of plays which deal with an individual destined for death or the living death of conformity and with the effect of policy and politics, the external circumstances acting on the man through exploitation of Vietnam by America. The violence of the American nature and its political and military treatment in Vietnam are stronger themes with family structure, the subversion of family communication, siblings and homecomings as lesser themes. The Orphan uses Oresteia as its framework and makes connections between the Manson violence and that in Vietnam. In this version, Clytemnestra is dichotomized into two characters; one Is sympathetic and the other vengeful. Other characters walk around with microphones to catch glimpses of the psychological and scientific factors effecting the action. From the author of HurlyBurly and In the Boom Boom Room.
The Orphan premiered at The Public Theater in New York City in May 1973 under the direction of Jeff Bleckner.