August: Osage County

Content Warning: This section of the guide describes and discusses the play’s treatment of death by suicide, alcohol addiction, narcotic addiction, racism, incest, sexual assault of a minor, and child abuse.

Violet is the matriarch of the Weston family. She has a substance abuse disorder and is regularly too intoxicated to care for herself but still sharp enough to observe her family’s supposed secrets and use them as tools of manipulation. Violet and her sister, Mattie Fae, grew up with a brutally violent and abusive mother, and she now sees her cruel verbal abuse toward her three daughters as not truly abuse, or at least far less serious than her own mother’s physical attacks. According to Ivy, Violet has developed a method of blackmailing doctors into prescribing her copious amounts of pain pills, but Violet also has a legitimate reason to take opiates. She is undergoing chemotherapy for mouth cancer, which Beverly notes is ironic given the poisonous acidity of her words when Violet aims to injure. Although the play doesn’t have a single protagonist, as Letts wrote it as an ensemble-driven piece, Violet is certainly at the center of the play’s action.

The house, which is the play’s largest and most significant symbol, aside from Beverly’s study, is primarily Violet’s domain.