Birth Control

When Calm Down Mother was written and first produced in the 1960s, birth control devices, other than prophylactics, were just beginning to be mass-produced. A hormonal birth control pill had been introduced in the 1950s, but it was used as a regulator of the menstrual cycle, not as a way of preventing birth. Such was the social, political, and religious environment at the time of the original staging of the play. Thus, in choosing to develop a theme of birth control in her play, Terry was stepping on very controversial territory.

Although there is a reference in the scene between the three prostitutes when Felicia tells Momo that she will "stick holes in your diaphragm," Terry elaborates on birth control fully only at the end of her play and brings it up mainly in relationship to the opposition of the religious beliefs of her family. In the...