Summary and Analysis: The American Dream

The American Dream:

                This is a play in the Absurd genre written by Edward Albee.  The play begins with a very nondescript set: a love seat and two chairs, facing each other but at an angle facing the audience.  This set is the set consistent throughout the play, though a character does eventually enter the audience.  The disjointed conversations had and the childish language used by the characters serves to show the reader an image of a dysfunctional American family.  Albee uses this image to make his point about American society.

·         Plot:  The play begins with Mommy and Daddy facing opposite one another and having a disjointed conversation about how “they” haven’t arrived yet and how you can’t get satisfaction these days.  Mommy tells Daddy about her consumer woes, describing how she got a beige hat, but the chairman of her woman’s club told her it was wheat, so she threw a fit and got a replacement “beige” hat.  Daddy points out to her that is was the same hat, but Mommy seems to realize this and says she got “satisfaction” anyway.  At this juncture Grandma enters with lots of nicely wrapped boxes.  They have a disjointed conversation, where Grandma speaks in paradoxes and epigrams concerning old people.  Mommy brings up how when she was a little girl Grandma wrapped her lunch very nicely, filled with Grandma’s un-eaten dinner, so she never opened it and instead brought it home for Grandma to eat.  She states they were poor, but there seems to be something wrong with this story.  It appears they lived during the Great Depression, and yet had cake and chicken for lunch every day.  This causes the reader to question Mommy’s version of events.  Nonetheless, Grandma goes on to say that Mommy always planned to marry a rich man, and now she has.  Mommy states that that’s okay, because she used to let Daddy “bump [his] uglies” with her.  This implies she finds him unattractive and they no longer have any semblance of romance in their relationship.  Finally, the doorbell rings.  Grandma goes into a paranoid fit, afraid that the “van people” have come to take her.  After all this anticipation, Daddy is now hesitant to open the door, but Mommy convinces him to answer it.  Mrs. Barker turns out to be the visitor.  It is revealed that Mommy has emasculated Daddy.  Unfortunately, none of the characters can remember why Mrs. Barker is there.  We learn that Mommy and Daddy once adopted a child—a boy they got from Mrs. Barker—but slowly cut it into pieces because it wasn’t “physically perfect.”  Then the Young Man enters and Grandma suggests that he is the solution to Mommy and Daddy’s problem.  He agrees because he is unfeeling and will do anything for money.  It is heavily implied he is the twin of the first child of Mommy and Daddy, and this is why he has lost all feeling in his body.  Grandma packs up her boxes and leaves, saying that the Young Man can just tell her family the “van people” came.  Mommy is initially upset about Grandma’s departure, but when she sees the Young Man, she is temporarily satisfied.  But because of the parallels between the Young Man and the first child, it is implied that this happiness will be temporary.  Grandma goes down into the audience and tells them that we should end the play before this illusion of satisfaction shatters again.

·         Characters: 

o   Mommy: the dominant partner in her relationship; controlling, childish, constantly shutting Daddy down, and sadistic.  She is obsessed with consumer satisfaction and may have married Daddy just for his money.  Mommy symbolizes essentially everything Albee is criticizing about American society.

o   Daddy: the emasculated man of the household, who rarely expresses his own opinions and goes along with everything Mommy says.  Albee is making an anti-feminist critique here.  In a household where everything is wrong, the man is the more subservient one.

o   Grandma: Mommy’s mother.  She initially seems as confused as the other characters, constantly talking about what “old people” do and once falsely thinking that Daddy is her child.  However, her eventual interaction with the audience and relative calmness and sanity sheds a positive light on her values.  Grandma represents the past American values, of happy families and respect for elders.  Her boxes are all of the elements of these “old values.”  Grandma’s departure symbolizes the impending departure of any chance at happiness with these old values.

o   Mrs. Barker: the visitor Mommy and Daddy have been waiting for.  She is the Chairman of the Woman’s Board, and also the head of the adoption agency.  The fact that she has her finger in so many pies suggests that Mrs. Barker represents the corporate entity of big business.  The frequent parallels drawn between Barker and prostitutes demonstrates Albee’s derision for big businesses, underlining his criticism of those who will do anything for money.

o   Young Man: the twin of Mommy and Daddy’s first adopted child, he is physically perfect in every way but devoid of every emotion and feeling.  He is also essentially prostitute-like.  Mommy’s pleasure with him because of his physical perfection and apparent ability to give her “satisfaction” shows the viewer the sick nature of a looks-oriented, consumer, perfectionist society. 

·         Theme: Today’s consumer-oriented, perfectionist society causes chaos and misery in the American family and turns human beings into idiotic, childish monsters.

·         Why this Theme Works:

o   Albee’s portrayal of the American family supports his criticism of their values.  The only thing Mommy, Daddy, and Mrs. Barker care about it money and physical perfection.  Mommy wants consumer satisfaction in her story of her hat purchase, and probably married Daddy for his money.  When her adopted child cried and didn’t behave like a perfect android baby, she chopped it up and killed it.  At the end of the play, her unhappiness over Grandma’s departure is quickly pushed aside by the satisfaction she sees in the Young Man’s physical perfection.  The Young Man and Mrs. Barker are prostitute-like and will do anything for money.  The relationships between characters is practically devoid of love.  Mommy and Daddy are constantly locked in a passive-aggressive war with one another, and no longer find one another attractive.  Neither loved their adopted child or really love the Young Man.  Albee points to their obsession with money as the reason for the lack of love, because Grandma is the only one not obsessed with money, and is the only one who gives or takes any affection.  She tries to protect Daddy from Mommy, gave up her food for Mommy when Mommy was little, and at the end, Mommy seems genuinely (if briefly) upset about Grandma leaving. 

o   The disjointed conversations all the characters have contribute to the dysfunctional American family.  This is why Albee chose the Absurd genre.  The characters are confused, disconnected, and can’t remember the immediate past.

o   The relationship characters have with the past is the third major theme which supports Albee’s argument.  To begin with, the characters can never remember the past, immediate or distant.  This symbolizes the current generation forgetting their old values.  Grandma represents these old values—the “true” American Dream.  When she and her boxes leave the stage, it symbolizes the threat of these values being gone forever.  Grandma is associated with Uncle Sam (through her Uncle Henry’s Day-Old cake) and the pioneer days, when there was a better American Dream.  This Dream has been warped by the current generation and its obsession with money and physical perfection.

·         Quotes:

o   “You just can’t get satisfaction these days.”  Daddy originally says this when he and Mommy are discussing her beige/wheat hat fiasco, but the theme of consumer and sexual satisfaction is prevalent throughout the work.  Mommy and Daddy are miserable and not attracted to one another anymore (Daddy is actually emasculated).  They are unable to get satisfaction sexually, or just to be satisfied in a happy-everyday way.  They weren’t satisfied with their first child, either.  This is because of their obsession with money and physical perfection.  Since physical perfection is impossible, they’ll never be happy.  Mommy seems temporarily satisfied at the end of the play, but this quote supports the sneaking suspicion that it won’t last—it can’t last.  The use of these days is also important.  It implies that once you could get satisfaction—back in Grandma’s time, in the past, when people had better values and a truer dream.

o   “If I was about 150 years younger I could go for you.”  Grandma says this about the Young Man.  While amusing, this is literal on a symbolic level.  150 years prior to the time in which the play was written—and probably takes place—would be the pioneer times.  Back when America was young, the people hopeful, families loving and elders respected.  If Grandma was 150 years younger, her family would have better values and happier lives.

o   “I’ll do almost anything for money.”  The Young Man says this to Grandma.  This exemplifies Albee’s problem with American society.  His distasteful characters will do literally anything for cash.  This is what Albee sees as the main problem with today’s American values.