Durang/Durang

Durang/Durang
Author: Christopher Durang
Publisher: Dramatists Play Service, Inc.
Total Pages: 148
Release: 1996
Genre: Theater
ISBN: 9780822214601

...eloquently dramatizes questions of responsibility, guilt and pathology...the complex moral issues are translated into challenging story theater, like a cubist portrait of grief...Homage must be paid, this grieving mother cries to the stars, and Medoff answe The mysteries of life, death and survival in the city, of friendships among women and relationships between the sexes are explored...in Jacquelyn Reingold's GIRL GONE...the playwright display[s] admirable talent and generate[s] plenty of interest, tension an

John Durang

John Durang
Author:
Publisher: Cambria Press
Total Pages: 385
Release:
Genre:
ISBN: 1621968936

Laughing Wild

Laughing Wild
Author: Christopher Durang
Publisher: Dramatists Play Service Inc
Total Pages: 92
Release: 1996
Genre: Drama
ISBN: 9780822215288

THE STORY: In the first section of the play, a Woman enters and embarks on an increasingly frenetic (and funny) recital of the perils and frustrations of daily life in urban America--waiting in line, rude taxi drivers, inane talk shows and the selfi

The Theatre of Christopher Durang

The Theatre of Christopher Durang
Author: Miriam Chirico
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Total Pages: 248
Release: 2020-05-14
Genre: Performing Arts
ISBN: 147428891X

The Theatre of Christopher Durang considers the works of one of the foremost comedic writers for the American stage. From Durang's early success with the controversial Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All for You (1974) to his recent Tony Award-winning play, Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike (2012), he has been an original theatrical voice in American theatre. Edith Oliver, long-time theatre critic for The New Yorker, described Durang as “one of the funniest men in the world.” Durang challenges traditional dramatic idioms with his irreverent comedies that are as shocking as they are prescient and compassionate. This volume provides the first comprehensive examination of Durang's works and incorporates comedic theory to examine how laughter in performance subverts social conventions and hierarchies. Through a clear, detailed discussion of the plays, Miriam Chirico considers Durang's use of black comedy, satire, and parody to explode such topics as: western literature, religion, dysfunctional families, and American social malaise. Robert Combs and Jay Malarcher provide additional critical perspectives about Durang's works, detailing his use of alienation techniques and locating his place within the American parodic tradition. The book also includes a warm introduction by Durang's former student, Pulitzer Prize-winner, David Lindsay-Abaire. The Theatre of Christopher Durang, in demonstrating how Durang has shaped contemporary theatrical possibilities, offers a valuable guide for students of American drama and comedy.

Baby with the Bathwater

Baby with the Bathwater
Author: Christopher Durang
Publisher: Dramatists Play Service Inc
Total Pages: 68
Release: 1984
Genre: American drama
ISBN: 9780822200840

THE STORY: As the play begins Helen and John gaze proudly at their new offspring, a bit disappointed that it doesn't speak English and too polite to check its sex. So they decide that the child is a girl and name it Daisy--which leads to all manner

The Nature and Purpose of the Universe ; Death Comes to Us All, Mary Agnes ; Dentity Crisis

The Nature and Purpose of the Universe ; Death Comes to Us All, Mary Agnes ; Dentity Crisis
Author: Christopher Durang
Publisher:
Total Pages: 92
Release: 1979
Genre: American drama
ISBN:

"[The Nature and Purpose of the Universe] centers on a week in the beleaguered life of Eleanor Mann, housewife and mother, who lives with her religious fanatic husband and three sons; the oldest a pimp and dope pusher; the middle son a flagrant homosexual; and the youngest the victim of a threshing machine accident which has deprived him of his manhood. The family becomes embroiled in a plot to assassinate the Pope, who is coming to New Jersey to bless the air, and with the help of a radical black nun succeeds in its purpose—with unexpectedly hilarious results. [In Death Comes to Us All, Mary Agnes] the scene is a decaying mansion occupied by a family beset by all manner of problems: conceit, hatred, selfishness, incest and cruelty—all dealt with in an ironic, highly theatrical manner which offers rare acting opportunities for the performers involved. Throughout, and despite the horrors encountered, all exude a kind of bland innocence which, oddly enough, seems to excuse their otherwise inexcusable behavior—and underscores the biting irony of what takes place. [In 'Dentity Crisis] recovering from a nervous breakdown, Jane is nursed and nagged by her relentlessly cheerful mother, and confused by her oversexed brother—who keeps changing into her father, her grandfather and her mother’s French lover. Eventually all (including Jane’s psychiatrist, who undergoes a sex change operation and swaps places with his wife) change characters again and become Jane herself—leaving her with no identity at all and pointing up the near impossibility of self-identification in our uncertain times." -- Publisher's website.

Why Torture Is Wrong, and the People Who Love Them

Why Torture Is Wrong, and the People Who Love Them
Author: Christopher Durang
Publisher: Open Road + Grove/Atlantic
Total Pages: 230
Release: 2012-09-11
Genre: Drama
ISBN: 0802194419

“[A] hilarious and disturbing new comedy about all-American violence” and other whip-smart political satires by the Tony Award-winning playwright (Ben Branley, The New York Times). Christopher Durang, who The New York Observer called “Jonathan Swift’s nicer, younger brother,” became one of America’s most beloved and acclaimed playwrights by marrying gonzo farce with incisive social critique. Now collected in Why Torture Is Wrong, and the People Who Love Them and Other Political Plays are Durang’s most revealing satirical plays. Why Torture Is Wrong, and the People Who Love Them is the story of a young woman in crisis: Is her new husband, whom she married when drunk, a terrorist? Or just crazy? Or both? Is her father’s hobby of butterfly collecting really a cover for his involvement in a shadow government? Does her mother frequent the theater for mental escape, or is she just insane? Add in a minister who directs porno, and a ladylike operative whose underwear just won’t stay up, and this black comedy will make us laugh all the way to the waterboarding room. Also included in this volume are: Excerpts from Sex and Longing Cardinal O’Connor The Book of Leviticus Show Entertaining Mr. Helms The Doctor Will See You Now Under Duress: Words on Fire An Alter Boy Talks to God The Hardy Boys and the Mystery of Where Babies Come From

Naomi in the Living Room & Other Short Plays

Naomi in the Living Room & Other Short Plays
Author: Christopher Durang
Publisher: Dramatists Play Service Inc
Total Pages: 284
Release: 1998
Genre: Drama
ISBN: 9780822214489

THE STORIES: NAOMI IN THE LIVING ROOM. Naomi, when visited by John and Johnna, her son and daughter-in-law, is alternately friendly and insulting. Johnna copes her best, but when John changes his clothes to look like Johnna, things start to unravel

The Marriage of Bette and Boo

The Marriage of Bette and Boo
Author: Christopher Durang
Publisher: Grove Press
Total Pages: 91
Release: 2017-09-12
Genre: Drama
ISBN: 0802188915

A painfully funny, Obie Award-winning play about the tragedy and comedy of family life. Never have marriage and the family been more scathingly or hilariously savaged than in this brilliant black comedy. The Marriage of Bette and Boo brings together two of the maddest families in creation in a portrait album of life’s uncertainties and confusion. Bereaved by miscarriages, undermined by their families, separated by alcoholism, assaulted by disease, and mystified by their priest, Bette and Boo, in their bewildered attempts to provide a semblance of hearth and home, are portrayed with a poignant compassion that enriches and enlarges the play, and makes clear why Christopher Durang has become one of the great names in American theater. “One of the most explosively funny American dramatists.”—Newsweek

Beyond Therapy

Beyond Therapy
Author: Christopher Durang
Publisher: Samuel French , Incorporated
Total Pages: 128
Release: 1983
Genre: Drama
ISBN:

Prudence is a conservative and slightly mixed-up young woman who thinks Bruce is crazy. Bruce is a bi-sexual who lives with his male lover and is crazy about Prudence.