The Mammary Plays: Two Plays
Vogel's inspired, witty, structurally daringBaltimore Waltz(1992) put her on the map and had regional theaters clamoring to produce her, butHow I Learned to Drivewon her the Pulitzer Prize. Much darker and richer thanWaltz, it deals with charged issues of sexuality and sexual abuse with remarkable grace. In a series of flashbacks and flash-forwards,Howchronicles an uncle-and-niece relationship as it progresses, during the course of a number of driving lessons, from friendship to unhealthy closeness to a kind of sexual abuse that, no less wounding for its subtlety, constitutes a betrayal that is all the more damaging because Uncle Peck has become such an important confidant for Li'l Bit. A runaway success when it opened in 1997, the play is as moving on the page as it was on the stage. It is paired here with a campy satire of gender roles in the '50s, '60s, and '80s that also deals with sexuality, power, and the infantile American obsession with breast size--hence the book's title.Jack Helbig