Word: durang
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Having escaped Dunster for the Yale Drama School, Durang began a prolific career in satire, farce and parody. Despite the vitriolic nature of some of his pieces, Durang claims they arise not out of opposition to any of these institutions but from disappointment in them, especially with Catholicism. The Catholic church "set up this whole system of how the world works, which had a real comfort to it, even though the rules were kind of strict," says Durang. "And once you leave those strict rules I think there was a sort of feeling of disappointment and being unmoored...
Surprisingly, his Catholic upbringing is responsible for the sexually explicit subject matter of much of his work, according to Durang. "Given my Catholic training, as well as my family... there is a tendency not to want to talk about anything controversial or psychologically upsetting," says Durang. "I think there must have been some psychological glee in going to the other side of that...
Despite this acknowledgment of the shock value of some of his plays, Durang was initially surprised by the negative reaction of some groups to his work. "When my plays would offend people I was sort of surprised. It started out being people in my parents' generation, so I would say, oh, well, that's grown ups. And now I am a grown up. And some people are still bothered by my plays. And I guess is just a question of different tastes...
...Durang's one act play, "Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All for You," was nearly prevented from running in Boston and St. Louis. Catholic groups were offended by Durang's satirization of parochial school education and Catholic attitudes in the central character, the murderous and manipulative Sister Mary. "What I didn't realize in writing the play," says Durang, "is that religion is just a really strong thing and if people feel that you're attacking their beliefs or making fun of those beliefs it's very enraging." Durang was aggravated, however, by the adhominem tactics of these groups, which...
Problems with his plays arise, Durang says, because "there are some people who don't understand humor is about things that are serious. They think, its either serious or its funny but it can't be both. And I'm always trying to combine the two. Someone who doesn't like to combine or feels they can't be combined is often made very surprised by my plays...