DVD and Book Review: August: Osage County by Tracy Letts

August: Osage County
(DVD August / 812 Let)

This 2013 film is adapted by Tracy Letts from his own 2007 Broadway stage play, which won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, and both the Tony Award and Drama Desk Award for Best Play of the year.

 

August: Osage County is a powerful, painful drama, with tinges of dark humor around the edges. At its core, it is a family reunion story. The far-flung members of the Weston family all return to the 3-story family farmhouse outside of Pawhuska, Oklahoma, first after patriarch and award-winning poet Beverley Weston (Sam Shepard) disappears, and then to mourn his passing when his body is found after his presumed suicide by drowning. His widow, Violet (Meryl Streep), suffering from mouth cancer and addicted to a outrageous pharmacy of narcotics, is a bitter, angry woman, with unsatisfying relationships with her three grown daughters. Barbara (Julia Roberts), her eldest, is a college professor in a broken marriage (though her estranged husband and 14-year old daughter (Ewan McGregor and Abigail Breslin) come with her back to Oklahoma. Ivy (Julianne Nicholson), the middle daughter, is the only one who stayed near her parents, and has grown cynical and as she nears fifty is finally looking for some happiness in her own life (though what she chooses may cause further family stresses). And flighty Karen (Juliette Lewis) is the youngest, unable to maintain any relationship, although she is currently engaged to a man who she believes is “perfect” but everyone else realizes is a sleaze (Dermot Mulroney). Violet’s blustery sister Mattie Fae (Margo Martindale) and her husband and son (Chris Cooper, Benedict Cumberbatch), and a newly hired in-home caregiver (Misty Upham) make up the rest of the cast.

 

Long-simmering family issues burst to the surface — repeatedly — in this tense, highly-emotional film, with outstanding performances from every single cast member — stand-outs for me were Streep, Roberts and Cooper. I ended up reading the original stage play, pretty much simultaneous to viewing the film — it’s interesting to see what changes the playwright Letts made to fit this into a 2-hour film running time. Several excellent subplots and explanatory scenes end up getting cut, without affecting the overall plot. I actually enjoyed the play script more than the movie — I’m giving the film a “9” and the play script a “10”.

 

TRIGGER WARNING — this film (and play) may trigger anyone with deep-seated issues with their parents/siblings, suicide, drug abuse, or swearing. The heightened emotional state of everyone in the entire production can be draining. Don’t watch this one if you’re already feeling depressed. (As one friend commented…“So much yelling!”). But if you want to watch a group of excellent actors at the top of their game, performing an iconic and award-winning work of the American theater — this is definitely worth your time!

[If you enjoy this, you may also wish to try reading the original Pulitzer Prize-winning play August: Osage County, or Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller.]

[ Internet Movie Database entry for this film ] | [ Wikipedia page for playwright Tracy Letts ]

 

Recommended by Scott C.
Bennett Martin Public Library — Public Service

 

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