Baby with the Bathwater

Director - Kelly Collum
Where - Webb Theatre at St. Norbert College, DePere
Advance Tickets - $10 General Public; $7 Senior Ciitizens and Faculty/Staff; $5 Students
Tickets at the door - $12 General Public; $9 Senior Ciitizens and Faculty/Staff; $7 Students
Contact - 403-3950 or 1-800-SNC-BOXX (1-800-762-2699)

Performance dates: April 11 through April 20, 2002

Bitingly satiric black comedy by one of our theatre's most provocative and inventive writers, which enjoyed widespread critical and popular acceptance in its long run at Off-Broadway's Playwrights Horizons. This time the author's target is parenthood, which he skewers with savagely gleeful wit and characteristically outrageous humor. "...a typical example of his dangerous wit and anarchic sense of humor." --NY Post. "...one of the funniest dramatists alive, and one of the most sharply satiric." --New Yorker. "Durang's outrageously satiric view of society should never be checked" --NY Daily News. "...he conquers bitterness and finds a way to turn rage into comedy that is redemptive as well as funny." --NY Times. 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 of future emotional and personality problems when it turns out that Daisy is actually a boy. Thereafter, in a series of brilliantly theatrical and wildly hilarious scenes, the saga of Daisy's struggle to establish his identity continues, despite his parents' growing obliviousness. At the outset there is a zany nanny who gives him a lethal toy to play with; then the small problem of Daisy's penchant, as a toddler, for throwing himself in front of buses; then his bizarre problems in school; and, finally, the sessions with his analyst which enable him, at last, to accept his maleness and stop wearing dresses. In the end the play comes full circles as the former Daisy and his young bride fondly regard their own baby -- forgiving of the past but determined not to repeat its calamitous mistakes.