Remove open and close tags - the tags themselves only - using
    a non-greedy angle bracket pattern match

def remove_tag(tag_name, string):
    """
    Remove open and close tags - the tags themselves only - using
    a non-greedy angle bracket pattern match
    """
    if not string:
        return string
    pattern = re.compile('</?' + tag_name + '.*?>')
    string = pattern.sub('', string)
    return string