'DENTITY CRISIS
By: Christopher Durang
PREMIERE: Yale Repertory Theatre, New Haven, 1978
SETTING: A living room decorated by a fairly insane person. Jane recently tried to kill
herself by slashing her thighs with a razor blade. She lives with her mother, Edith
Fromage, who claims she "invented cheese in France in the early part of the century,"
and someone named Robert who can't decide if he's her brother, her father, or her
grandfather. Jane's psychologist, Mr. Summers, makes a house call. He asks Jane what
led to her suicide attempt. Jane answers, "Well, a few days ago I woke up and I heard
this voice saying, 'It wasn't enough.'"
JANE: When I was eight years old, someone brought me to a theatre with lots of other
children. We had come to see a production of Peter Pan. And I remember something
seemed wrong with the whole production, odd things kept happening. Like when the
children would fly, the ropes would keep breaking and the actors would come thumping
to the ground and they'd have to be carried off by the stage hands. There seemed to be an
unlimited supply of understudies to take the children's places, and then they'd fall to the
ground. And then the crocodile that chases Captain Hook seemed to be a real crocodile,
it wasn't an actor, and at one point it fell off the stage, crushing several children in the
front row.
[SUMMERS: What happened to the children?]
Several understudies came and took their places in the audience. And from scene to
scene Wendy seemed to get fatter and fatter until finally by the second act she was
immobile and had to be moved with a cart.
[SUMMERS: Where does the voice fit in?
JANE: The voice belonged to the actress playing Peter Pan.]
You remember how in the second act Tinkerbell drinks some poison that Peter's about to
drink, in order to save him? And then Peter turns to the audience and he says that
Tinkerbell's going to die because not enough people believe in fairies, but that if
everybody in the audience claps real hard to show that they do believe in fairies, then
maybe Tinkerbell won't die. And so then all the children started to clap. We clapped
very hard and very long. My palms hurt and even start to bleed I clapped so hard. Then
suddenly the actress playing Peter Pan turned to the audience and she said, "That wasn't
enough. You didn't clap hard enough. Tinkerbell's dead." Uh…well, and…and then
everyone started to cry. The actress stalked offstage and refused to continue with the
play, and they finally had to bring down the curtain. No one could see anything through
all the tears, and the ushers had to come help the children up the aisles and out onto the
street. I don't think any of us were ever the same after that experience.
