1964 ~ 2011
Mary Scruggs, the head of writing and education programs for The Second City Training Center, died at her home in Chicago late Tuesday night, said Kelly Leonard, the executive vice president of Second City. She was 46.
"She was a wonderful writer and a terrific performer," said Anne Libera, Second City's director of comedy studies and Scruggs' close friend. "But in her heart she was simply an astonishing teacher. There were so many students to whom she gave her best."
Leonard said that Scruggs was taken ill suddenly at home. The cause of her death, he said, is not yet known.
Scruggs was a major figure in the world of comedy writing. She is the co-author, with Michael J. Gellman, of "Process: An Improviser’s Journey" and with her sister Katherine S. McKnight of "The Second City Guide to Improvisation in the Classroom." Her many other writing credits include "Karma" and "Camp Nimrod for Girls" for the Live Bait Theater ("Camp Nimrod" was billed as "a cross between 'Grease' and 'Equus' "); "Off the Grid," "War Stories" and "Baby Makes Three" at Boxer Rebellion Theater; and "The Fairy Trials," a series of children’s plays created for the Circuit Court of Cook County and in continuous production since 1986.
"As sisters, we loved each other deeply, made each other laugh, performed our first sketches for each other and were fortunate to have written a book together," McKnight said. "To say that I am devastated is simplistic. Mary was always far better than I at getting the words just right."
Perhaps most memorably of all, Scruggs collaborated with the performer-writer Susan Messing on the dramatic adaptation of the works of Judy Blume for "What Every Girl Should Know: An Ode to Judy Blume," an hilarious 1998 show at the Annoyance Theatre that attracted national attention and packed the theater to the rafters with women in their 20s and 30s, all enjoying the laughter of shared adolescent memory.
Scruggs also wrote and performed a solo show, "Missing Man," at Live Bait Theater in Chicago, the New York Fringe Festival, the Los Angeles Women’s Theater Festival, and the Sherry Theater in Los Angeles.
In 2010, Scruggs was instrumental in launching “The Second City Comedy Desk,” a feature that appears periodically in the Tribune’s Talk pages. “Mary’s humor had a natural warmth that rang true with readers," said Rob Manker, her editor at the Tribune. "She had a knack for writing in a way that people could really relate to.”
Along with her sister McKnight and a brother, Greg Siewert, survivors include Scruggs' husband, Richard, and a son, William. Funeral services are 10 a.m. Monday at Drake and Sons, 5303 N. Western Ave.