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Popular Culture

In the Tony Award-winning musical Urinetown, the character of Penelope Pennywise is roughly based on Mother Courage.

The rock band My Chemical Romance created the character "Mother War" for their third album The Black Parade. The song a highly conceptual work on the nature of modern life. Mother War's song, "Mama" is influenced by themes from Mother Courage and Her Children, including the effect of war on personal morals.

Mother Courage also has similarities to the popular musical, Fiddler on the Roof; in both stories, a parent has three children he/she sees taken from him/her by outside forces; in both stories the central character ends by dragging his/her cart on as the final curtain falls. And both productions made use of a massive revolving stage. As Matthew Gurewitsch wrote in The New York Sun, "Deep down, Mother Courage has a lot in common with Tevye the Milkman in Fiddler on the Roof. Like him, she's a mother hen helpless to protect the brood."^[12]