Seeing only what is shown
Twelve-year-old boy questions religious doctrine in MTC’s latest production
Jared Story

“In God we trust” — the Congress of the United States declared that statement the national motto of America in 1956.

In Tom Didzuck’s Over the Tavern, 12-year-old Rudy Pazinski questions his country’s slogan, which doesn’t fly well in the squeaky-clean year 1959, a time when following God was even more popular than the Hula-Hoop.

“This is Eisenhower’s America, after the war, where Americans were expected to live a certain way and dream a certain dream, and everyone bought into prosperity, picket fences, two kids, appliances, ladies in skirts and jewelry,” says director Robb Paterson.

“Two years after our play, JFK makes his inaugural address, saying, ‘Ask not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country,’” Paterson says.

“Rudy, who is a Catholic student, starts questioning and asking why these are the rules we have to live by. Of course it sends everyone into fits because no one has ever asked these questions before.”

Like any normal adolescent, Rudy is realizing that the world has its priorities all screwed up. Instead of falling in line, he’s more than happy to release his rebel yell.

“One of the first questions in the catechism that’s he’s asked to memorize is, ‘Why did God make us?’ ‘Well, God made us to have fun’ — that’s his answer. That makes sense to him, but everybody else has problems with that,” Paterson says.

One of Rudy’s opponents is the oppressive Sister Clarissa. The ruler-cracking nun has had more than enough of the little wiseass and wonders why Rudy can’t be a Bible-thumping robot like everyone else.

“The students are asked to memorize, not learn, not think — certainly not think,” Paterson says. “Sister Clarissa says, ‘Thinking is what gets you in trouble. Just memorize what’s in the rules of the Baltimore Catechism and you’ll be all right, you’ll get into heaven, and you’ll be a soldier for Christ.’”

Paterson, who was raised Anglican, can easily relate to Rudy. He also found himself rather disengaged from religion and stopped going to church once he had the choice. He recalls a funny story that might have had some influence on his decision to sleep in on Sundays.

“I remember my dad asking me when I was 14, ‘Robb do you have a relationship with God?’” Patterson says. “I said no. He said, ‘I think it’s important you do.’ Flash forward four years later: Dad says, ‘The important thing about church is the coffee hour. That’s when you meet people you haven’t seen in a week and you reconnect.’”

“I asked him, ‘What about relationships with God?’ like he told me when I was 14. He said, ‘Oh yeah, that’s a good age to tell you something like that.’

“I was a bit confused with how important it all was.”

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