Stereotypes In The Philadelphia

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In the play, “The Philadelphia” by David Ives took place in New York at a Restaurant. The main topic of this play was Stereotypes. The type of stereotypes in this play where not the offensive ones, it is the type where there can be a group of friends and they would laugh if it was to come up in their conversations. The three main characters where Al, Mark and the waitress. All three of these characters had a huge roll in the poem. Al was the laid back one from California, he did not realize that he was not in California till the very end. Mark was Al’s friend. Mark was the frazzled that needed guidance and assurance to where he was at. The Waitress was the one that enforced the “Philadelphia” stereotype. In order to make this a successful poem …show more content…

In the beginning of the play Al was nonchalant, he knew that he was in Philadelphia so he knew to how to behavior and act if he wanted to get serviced the way he wanted to. The stereotype was, “if you want something in Philadelphia, ask for the opposite”. Everything that the waitress read off the menu were abnormal food that no one would get. Al knew that if he wanted something normal then he would have to ask for an abnormal food. The waitress told Al that the, “soup of the day you got a choice of Polish duck blood or cream of kidney” (Ives 154) and Al replied, “Beautiful. Beautiful! Kick me in a kidney” (Ives 154). Everyone knows that, in Philadelphia no one gets what they want on the first time asking. To get some time, repetition is key.
In the play, Ives added stereotypes about people from Los Angeles. This stereotype was actually comedy because, it is so true. “I embrace this ozone. Sure, some people are gonna get hurt in the process, meantime everybody else’ll tan a little faster” (Ives157). All people from Los Angles want to do is tan, they do not care about anything else if it is not about tanning. Their world revolves around tanning and making sure their skins is the godliest it can

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