DURANG 4PLAY, A Reasonable Facsimile Theatre Company, at Theatre Building Chicago. This sampler offers an introduction to prolific American playwright Christopher Durang, showcasing his mischievous, dreamy style and two of his favorite subjects: the devouring mother and theater classics. Alternately demonic and saccharine matriarchs whirl through ‘Dentity Crisis and Death Comes to Us All, Mary Agnes, indulging in incestuous affairs and other manipulations of their offspring. Then there’s Medea, Durang’s abridged twist on the classic (written with Wendy Wasserstein): here the killer mother is contemplating eating her young, with encouragement from a snappy Greek chorus/gay entourage shouting self-help slogans. Tina Haglund as Medea and as the mum in Mary Agnes proves herself the Durangiest of them all, wielding her destructive power with so much relish and so little conscience that the other performances appear forced by comparison.
