What I Did Last Summer is a play written by A.R. Gurney from 1981. The play is about a fourteen year old boy named Charlie and his family and friends, and takes place during the summer of 1945 on the Canadian shore of Lake Erie, near Buffalo. The play is written as a memory play, in which the characters talk to the audience about things that have happened in the past, and retell their version and feelings about the events.
Charlie is staying with his mother Grace and his sister Elsie while his father is off at war. Because Charlie is an upper middle class child, his summer (he tells us) is going to consist of sitting around the house, studying the Latin that he failed in June, sailing or practicing driving, and playing with his friends. However, when his friend Ted makes fun of him for not having a job, he decides to go work for Anna Trumbull, the “Pig Woman” in order to impress his friends, especially his friend Bonny. His mother is against him taking this job, but Charlie defies his mother and goes to work for her anyway. But working for Anna consists of more than just typical household jobs; Anna decides to give Charlie art lessons to find out what is talent is, and life lessons to help him discover who he really is. Anna has bohemian ideas on life and love that Charlie never knew about, and he becomes fascinated by her ideology. He begins to realize that there is more to life than what his mother wants for him. He wants to be free of the obligations that his part of society considers necessary. After Charlie rebels and decides to run away to Anna’s, his mother goes to Anna to persuade her to leave Charlie alone. We learn that Grace was once one of Anna’s students too, and that she was talented, but decided to do what society told her to do (marry and have children). Anna decides to let Charlie work on her car, something he has been begging her to do all summer, even though he is underage. Driving represents freedom to Charlie and he uses his new freedom to get Bonny to go out driving with him. They get into an accident, and end up in the hospital. The end of the war is announced and Labor Day comes, which means everyone goes back home or back to school. As Charlie and his family are leaving, he forces his sister to stop at Anna’s so he can say goodbye. Anna tells Charlie that she is also leaving. She gives him a box of the artwork he made, and he tells her to not give up. As Charlie and his family drive away, we discover that Charlie as an adult has written this play to tell us about that summer: he has finally found his talent.
What I Did Last Summer was not a very deep play. I don’t find Gurney’s plays to be powerful pieces of art, but the play does have that angst and need for freedom that adolescents crave. I thought that Anna was a good catalyst for Charlie’s transformation, but I think her character could have been even stronger and had more depth. I feel like her scenes with Charlie, although meaningful, were too short and didn’t resonate as much as they could have. The most interesting part of the play was reading my husband’s acting notes in the script! (he played the part of Charlie a few years ago, and I was reading his copy). I’ve just seen and read too many coming-of-age plays and novels at this point, so this play didn’t really affect me as much as it intended to. Perhaps seeing it onstage would make it more meaningful.
