Pirandellian Dark Comedy in Wendy Wasserstein's (The Heidi Chronicles)

        The main aim of this paper is to study Wendy Wasserstein's The Heidi Chronicles (1988) as a dark comedy in the light of Pirandello's definition of dark comedy. Wendy Wasserstein (1950-2006) is one of the contemporary female playwrights who makes use of dark comedy. She is an excellent example of the genre dark comedy in the late twentieth century. This study attempts to explore a brief history of the genre and its predecessors and of expert opinions on the subject. Since all of the theorists in this study agree that Pirandello laid the groundwork for modern tragicomedy, through his plays and from On Humor, Pirandello's key points are identified and used as guidelines for determining the criteria with which to assess Wasserstein's play as a dark comedy. Wasserstein's The Heidi Chronicles (1988) is evaluated using the principles suggested by Pirandello: contradiction, opposition, and skepticism, and the three aspects of character: incongruity, humanness, and pity and sympathy. In conclusion, it turns out that Wasserstein transformed the genre, made it suitable to her time and re-stated its significance as a method for revealing human frailty