So. Detroit. I also really like this one. I like that D'Amour gives the actor and the director choices in her stage directions. I also like that she's such a casual writer.
So why is the play called Detroit? I think that she's trying to emphasize the increasing anonymity between people living in communities. Detroit is a place that's kind of known for having a huge economic center and a bunch of surrounding suburbs because of the car industry. Recently, this city has undergone quite a transformation because of the economic recession and the state of industry in general. This really fits with Ben's character who's been laid off from his job. With this recession, people in the United States are increasingly concerned with their own lives and not with connecting with others. Community isn't something that exists anymore. So, I don't think that D'Amour cares if the play is set in Detroit, but I think she named it that to emphasize that she wanted the suburb to crumbling money wise and community wise.
I instantly thought of how she would use Detroit as the title because of its economic hardship, but the idea involving community never came into my head. It makes sense now once I think about what Sharon said in the play involving neighbors and how they are not as welcoming as they should be. That would definitely be so if the people in a city were going through hard times, they wouldn't be as compassionate to strangers.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you 100% about the way D'Amour writes; it's so contemporary, fresh, easy to understand, and most importantly, really hilarious most of the time. I also wrote about in my post how it really doesn't matter what the play is called, but since Detroit was the closest model to her desired setting, then that's probably why she named the play that in the first place. As long as the setting is something like Detroit, such as a suburbian neighborhood where all of the houses are being built the same and most of the residents don't talk to each other. I felt like for this prompt, a lot of people among both sections of this class thought the same way for the most part.
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