In the essay below, Loomis extols the anti-sexist message of The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds and points out the correlation between Zindel's play and Dante's Divine Comedy.

Kerr is an American essayist, playwright, and Pulitzer Prize-winning drama critic. Throughout his career, he has written theater reviews for such publications as Commonweal, the New York Herald Tribune , and the New York Times. Below, he recounts the memorable aspects of The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds and probes the desperate lives of the characters.

In the following excerpt, Adler notes flaws in The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds and comments on the themes of the play.

Oliver began her career as an actress and television writer and producer. She joined the New Yorker in 1948, becoming its off-Broadway theater critic in 1961. Here, she regards Beatrice as the central figure in The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds.

The effect of a tragic home environment on three tormented souls—a widow and her two teen-age daughters—is tautly dramatized in … [The Effect of Gamma Rays On Man-In-The-Moon Marigolds. Paul Zindel] has drawn upon his fond recollections of his mother's preposterous schemes for getting rich quick to tell a sad and sometimes funny story. The characters in the play, like the marigolds in the scientific experiment, undergo mutations, some good, some bad. The mother is embittered by a...