Wow, the title sure is a mouthful, and if it gets chosen for the 2020 season at my civic theater, what would the poster look like?! A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Gynecologic Oncology Unit at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center of New York City by Halley Feiffer is off its leash. It’s wild. It’s raunchy. It requires four actors, two of them on their deathbed.
Karla, a young woman in her 20s, goes to the gynecologic oncology unit to visit her mother, who is almost always sleeping. It’s there that Karla practices her stand-up routine — she’s an aspiring comedian — that is filled with rape jokes. One joke ends:
“I just have visions of like, my vibrator standing in the archway, backlit by silvery moonlight, sometimes wear a fedora (sometimes not), and lovingly fucking me ’til sunrise.”
This is a weird first 4 pages to read because A) it’s the beginning of the play, so where can it go from here? and B) this is the era of #MeToo for crying out loud! Karla and her mother are on the left side of a hospital curtain (when you’re looking at the stage), and on the right side is another woman in a hospital bed, asleep. Then enters her son, Don, a man in his 40s, disheveled, a terribly sloppy dresser but kind of handsome. He overhears Karla’s jokes and gets into an argument with her.
Keep in mind the curtain is still separating the individuals and their dying mothers, so Don doesn’t realize how young and innocent-looking Karla is compared to her dirty mouth. As the arguing dies down, Karla and Don continue to poke at each other, but we also learn that Don’s son doesn’t want to see him and that Karla’s sister committed suicide some time ago. You’re not supposed to laugh, but you can’t stop.
While the first 4 pages are very “ew” and there is a scene during which Don is supposed to go down on Karla (how are theaters doing this??), it is terribly fun to read, and I found myself giggling at odd moments. When Don tells Karla to keep it down while practicing her comedy routine, she continues her dirty jokes quietly. He repeats himself, but Karla doesn’t understand that when Don says keep it down, he doesn’t mean talk softly, but to act appropriately in the setting. Karla challenges him, noting how funny it is that someone you love can suddenly die, pointing to the absurdity of death. Like corpse-puppets, the dying mothers occasionally deliver lines with their eyes closed, which proves they are mostly playing possum so they can avoid their children and still interfere in their lives.
Definitely a rom-com, but also rough around the edges, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Gynecologic Oncology Unit at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center of New York City may ostracize a number of viewers, but it would have everyone else in stitches for a good 90 minutes.
Grab the Lapels 
It sounds very edgy, and I don’t necessarily mean that as a bad thing. There are parts of it, just from what you’ve mentioned here, that I’m fairly sure would put me off. But sometimes stories like that can have their funny moments.
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There was something about the way the characters are supposed to talk over each other a bit that made me laugh. You don’t get that a lot in theater (at least not the stuff I’ve seen).
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I can’t tell if I would love or hate this, but your review certainly has me intrigued!
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Which parts have you intrigued?
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I think it’s the way you describe the banter, it sounds like the dialogue is witty and entertaining even if it is raunchy. Also, this comment— “You’re not supposed to laugh, but you can’t stop.”
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Yeah! It’s really funny, actually, the way they talk over top of each other and banter about things that just kind of don’t make sense.
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That’s definitely up there amongst the most unusual titles I’ve come across! 😂
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It’s a mouthful. I like how this play comes full circle. I don’t always see that in theater. I think people are afraid of seeming too much like they’re putting a bow on things.
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That’s true; it can be a tricky balance to strike.
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Haha – nothing would persuade me to either read or watch this, not even free chocolate! Cancer victims and rape jokes? Good grief – is this what you young things call entertainment? 😉
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I’m completely put off by the rape jokes, but another person on the script committee says they’re okay because they come from a woman. I’m still not comfortable with them. The cancer part I didn’t mind. One of the mothers is near the end of her time and sleeps almost the whole play, but the other is early in treatment and a crotchety, unforgiving woman. I think the show implies that just because she has cancer doesn’t mean she was ever a good person.
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Fascinating. Earlier this year we saw in the theatre a British play called A Pacifist’s Guide to Living with Cancer, which included in the cast a cancer patient. It’s very different to this but was very funny in parts.
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I think it’s a theme that people want to laugh when things are grim because you can only go so sad; that well is only so deep. Eventually, something has to give or people crack up.
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I agree – it’s always good to laugh – as long as you know what you are laughing at. If that makes sense.
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This sounds like it is definitely not for me, but I really enjoyed your review – you gave a really good sense of the play. (Also, I love the title).
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Thanks, Lou! I was worried the review didn’t say much about the play at all because I gave the script to someone else before I wrote the review and thus didn’t have much to quote or reference.
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I can imagine the graphic designers tasked with creating the advertising posters etc, going nuts because of the length of that title…….. Its a play that is going to divide opinions for sure.
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So far, I’m getting a lot of negative opinions. Another person on the committee was arguing that the rape jokes are not offencive because they’re told by a woman, and largely in connection to her vibrator. I get what he’s saying, and it’s an interesting argument, but I still felt really kind of icky when I was reading the first part of the play.
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That line of argument wouldn’t wash with me either. It sends out a message that rape is something you can joke about
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I love plays like this. Where absurd things happen in totally regular settings. And while this is a bit extreme, it’s still something which *could* happen! I want to know the background of this play. Did it happen in real life on some level? Probably.
And yes. That title is a mouthful! Having never seen A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, I cannot speak to potential parallels to this classic musical. Are you familiar with it? If so, can you see parallels?
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I’ve never seen or read a Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, but every time I tried to type in the name of this play on Goodreads, that name would pop up instead. I would think they had to have something in common. In the play that I read nothing really happened on the way to anything, so it’s kind of an odd title. This further makes me think that they must have some kind of parallels. I don’t know the backstory of this play; I would have to Google it.
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Yeah. I bet they have a ton of parallels. IF you learn anything, let me know! I know there is a film of A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, for what it’s worth…Buster Keaton is in it! XD
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Whooooo Boy!
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Hi, Laila! 😂
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screw political correctness, this sounds fun!!!! I would totally see this play 🙂
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You’re the first one to write that, lol! I wish the play didn’t START with rape jokes so audience members could get a feel for what the character is so her jokes fit the story better.
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Hmm yes that’s definitely a difficult thing to start off-yikes!
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Hm, I’d be uncomfortable with the rape jokes, too, unless they were done reallllyy well and I’m not sure how you’d do them well. I love you reading the script and wondering how they, um, achieve certain scenes!
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No one has yet to convince me that rape jokes are funny, though lots of people try to say that if we restrict certain topics, claiming it isn’t funny or shouldn’t be joked about, that we’re on a slippery slope to getting rid of free speech. It’s not that people like me are saying comedians can’t make rape jokes, it’s that we’re saying we’re not going to support someone’s comedy career if they’re making rape jokes. It’s one of the ways that capitalism does, indeed, work. We voice our opinions with our wallets. I don’t have to fatten the wallet of a comedian I don’t find funny, and who can’t figure out how to be funny without making fun of rape.
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Good points. BTW the book review that might appeal to you will be tomorrow now, too tired to review Kingsolver last night. But I have a positive fat representation book, I do believe!
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Oh, Liz, really?? How exciting!
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I definitely want to see this one – yes, you’re going to have to frame the rape jokes so that they are not totally offensive – but I hope your group performs it, that you film it, and we get to see it on youtube.
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Ha! Sorry, Bill but IF the committee chose this play, we could not film it. It’s a copyright violation. Guess you’re just going to have to get involved with a civic theater in Australia and convince them to do it!
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Well, this play would be a conversations starter!
Are you hoping your theater will choose it, or stay away from it? (You probably already know, because I am so far behind! But I feel like I need to start where I left off rather than work backwards…)
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It’s definitely off the table.
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