Playwright Terrence McNally Dies From CCP Virus Complication

Playwright Terrence McNally poses at the Kennedy Center in Washington, on April 1, 2010. (Jacquelyn Martin/AP Photo)

Acclaimed playwright Terrence McNally has died of complications from the CCP virus. He was 81.

McNally died on March 24 at Sarasota Memorial Hospital in Sarasota, Florida, according to representative Matt Polk. McNally was a lung cancer survivor who lived with chronic inflammatory lung disease.

Playwright Terrence McNally at the 73rd annual Tony Awards "Meet the Nominees" press day in New York, on May 1, 2019. (Charles Sykes/Invision/AP)

McNally was born in St. Petersburg, Florida, and grew up in Corpus Christi, Texas, listening to radio broadcasts of “The Green Hornet” and the Metropolitan Opera. He graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Columbia University in 1960 with a degree in English.

McNally’s first Broadway play “And Things That Go Bump in the Night” was released in 1965. His absurdist, symbolic melodrama about good and evil confounded critics. Newsday called it “ugly, perverted, tasteless.” It closed in less than three weeks.

McNally’s controversial play “Corpus Christi,” depicted a modern-day Jesus as a homosexual.

The Epoch Times refers to the novel coronavirus, which causes the disease COVID-19, as the CCP virus because the Chinese Communist Party’s coverup and mismanagement allowed the virus to spread throughout China and create a global pandemic.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.