In “Structure and Meaning” Robert McKee talks about 3 kinds of Controlling Ideas. Please discuss what you believe to be the Controling Idea in Who’s Afraid Of Virginia Woolf? and whether it’s idealist, pessimistic or ironic.
55 thoughts on “In “Structure and Meaning” Robert McKee talks about 3 kinds of Controlling Ideas. Please discuss what you believe to be the Controling Idea in Who’s Afraid Of Virginia Woolf? and whether it’s idealist, pessimistic or ironic.”
The theme, or controlling idea, is a conjunction of value and cause. Value in this sense is the the relationship between positive and negative actions that occur in the world of a story. I think of it as binary oppositions that make up a story’s plot, and in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf there is a lot of that (opposition). The majority of this play consists of one argument after another between the two couples. George and Martha argue over George not being “man enough” or successful enough, Nick and Honey disagree about Nick putting their private affairs out in the open (such as the real reason why they got married), and George and Martha even argue about how funny certain jokes are (Martha thinks her jokes are hilarious, while George thinks that they’re average). At several moments in the play, things blew over and have a clamactic feel (i.e when Martha gave the story about George writing an ineffective novel, and George got so upset that he grabbed her and threw her down to the ground). But the story didn’t stop there, and they continued to argue over other things after that. However, the opposition surrounding G & M’s “son” is the most profound and adds to the story’s value the most, because it is not until the end of the story when George reveals the truth about him that the arguing finally subsides and the parties disperse. Things finally shift from one mood (argumentative) to another (settled/relaxed). And this shift only occurs and solidifies itself when the truth about their made up son comes out (cause). Therefore, I would say that the controlling idea of the play is “life’s problems can be resolved when we are honest with ourselves and others.”
I think that from Edward Albee’s point of view, the play has an idealistic controlling idea. I believe that he would want society to turn out like George and Martha did — honest as opposed to phony or delusional. In the world of the play, and perhaps to the audience, I think that the controlling idea is more pessimistic. After all, G & M are not happy about their lives, they’ve just decided to admit the truth. The fact that they cannot/don’t have children is a very disappointing thing for them and I think it’s safe to say that most of society would agree with that sentiment — even Nick and Honey agree. Overall then, I think that the controlling idea of the play is Ironic. In retrospect, both sentiments (Albee’s and society’s/George & Martha’s) can be felt and understood from the events that take place in the story, and how it ends.
That is an idealist Controlling Idea, but I would ask, Do you think George and Martha’s problems are resolved at the end? Is this a happy ending? Your Controlling Idea assumes a positive outcome, and you might be able to make that argument, but Albee’s ending could also be construed as very dark.
Though it seems far better than realty, illusions lead to havoc in a relationship. The illusion of George and Martha’s son seem to be the string that held their marriage together. Martha was as happy as any real mother who had a child. She felt fulfilled. The moment Martha mentioned to her Guests about her son, she made that illusion a reality which infuriates George and destroys Martha. I feel that my controlling idea is a bit idealistic but somewhat ironic. Idealistic because George fed Martha’s illusion, maybe to help their empty marriage. The only condition to it is that they speak of the son to no one.the illusion turned out to be a trajedy.
Robert Mckee defines the Controlling Idea as Value plus Cause. Value is basically how much positivity or negativity there is in the life of the character. Cause is why the life of the character ended in the positive or negative way. There was a lot of emotional baggage involved in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf, and a lot of deceit. There was so much tension between George and Martha and the audience could tell that there was definitely an underlying cause. When their son was brought up, we got a clearer view of why there is so much pain in their marriage and that there was something dark that we needed to find out. For these reasons, I believe that the controlling idea is something like When there is nothing left to do, the truth will set you free. At the end when we discovered the truth about George and Martha’s son and how miserable their marriage is, there was a sense of relief and defeat. I think that the controlling idea is a bit ironic because while we can clearly see there is serious dysfunction between George and Martha, we do not necessarily expect Martha to be defeated so easily. She goes from a strong and stubborn woman to a fragile childlike person. It has a pessimistic sense to it as well, but I think that it is more ironic than anything else.
“When there is nothing left to do, the truth will set you free.” Are George and Martha really free at the end of the story? If so, than the controlling idea would be idealist not ironic.
Controlling idea’s is the true theme of the story is not just one word or sentence. It what the story or novel is completely all about. It tells why the story goes in the direction it goes in, it also gives the reader the reasons why change occurs within the story and the condition in why it changes for the characters life. Controlling ideas also contains Value and cause, which identifies positive or negative acts within the story. In “Who afraid of Virginia Wolf” The negative part and true theme of the story, a middle age, couple play a cruel game with one another to hurt one another feeling and in front of new couple that has just came to town and started working for the university. George who works for the university, which is, ran by his wife Martha Father. Martha his wife invites the young new couple over for night cape. Which turns into explosion of drunken frenzy in front of the new couple after the faulty party. They reveal some disappointments through out their marriage for one another. They engage in mental abuse, which leaves the other couple to start to expose their true nature of their own rocky relationship as well. Its negative value they argue continuously throughout the night. Their game here who can hurt the other the best. Its brings you think is their to line they wont cross. It reveals that the person you love the most can hurt you the most. The true climax of the story in the end they have love for one another.
Did I find “Who’s afraid of Virginia Wolf” to be idealist, Pessimistic, or Ironic.
I would have to say ironic the why story starts and ends leave me a little besides my self. I would have never thought George and Martha would stay with one another I kept thinking this is that big argument that couple as right before they leave and want a divorce and shocking part through all verbal abuse and years of disappointments they truly do love one another and was no baby.
An improvement in writing. However, McKee does say you can put the controlling idea into a sentence, and that’s exactly what I wanted you to do. He gives several examples throughout the essay. We discussed one in class, his version of the controlling idea in Dangerous Liaisons: hatred destroys when we fear the opposite sex. Given your analysis, you could formulate a controlling idea like, people in love can hurt each other when they allow disappointment and bitterness to control them.
The controlling idea for Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? would follow McKee’s concept of irony. From the beginning it drags you into a dark tunnel of drunken emotions gone out of control with the light fading quickly. As the night progresses they two couples flaws are bringing dragged out either by their own doing or by George and Martha’s seemingly twisted anger towards each other.
Albee wrote most of the play following the pessimistic idea. Each character only brought their own type of darkness to the audience. It some ways it seemed like it was the new replacing the old. A young, handsome, up and coming professor who possible looking for ways to bring down an old foppish man from not only his career but even sleep with the old man’s wife. George is aware of all of this and uses his own methods of shining light on Nick’s deeds. Possibly the most pitiful character in the whole play would have to be Honey. Throughout the whole time she’s the most inebriated and never says a nasty thing to anyone but the most damage is done to her. Her dark past is told to George by her own husband and later used to hurt her and Nick. Nick even tries to cheat on her while she’s passed out on the bathroom floor in the same house oblivious to what is currently going on.
Only at the very end can we say it does have that ironic idea when the light finally emerges. When the truth about Martha’s imaginary child is revealed we get a sense that this horrible night was in some ways to help her. It was an extreme case of tough love. As they sober up you can see that he does care about her even though they put each other through a night of hell.
You make a good argument for irony, but have left out the actual controlling idea. That’s the hard part.
Honey *is* the most benign character, but remember, she agrees with George about the telegram and the death of the son. You could say she’s just afraid to contradict him, or so out of it she doesn’t know what’s truth or illusion, but there might be something menacing behind it. She chooses to back him up for some reason.
Robert McKee explains the controlling idea as a combination of value and cause. He explains value as how much positivity or negativity there is in the characters life, he mentions cause is why the characters life ended in a positive of negative way.
I think the controlling idea is ” love can make you do crazy things” throughout the play and movie Martha and George have a very odd relationship, they verbally abuse and even physically abuse each other. The most important part of the movie was when Martha decides to tell a couple they just met about there “son”. It led the audience believe this was the reason for the couple always fighting with each other. I find it ironic At the end when the truth about their son is revealed and the couple goes from being abusive to each other to being calm and relaxed. It clearly shows how much they love each other and when George comes clean about how they made up their son Martha is defeated, you would think a stubborn woman like Martha would fight George about this but no, she feels defeated.
According to Mckee, the controlling idea can be described in one sentence rather than a single word. To agree with him, I think the controlling idea of “Who’s Afraid Of Virginia Wolf” will be something like this: Desire create sufferings and suffering causes violence and mental instability. Mckee also said the controlling idea has two components: Value plus Cause. In “Who’s afraid of Virginia Wolf” the leading role Martha values success and a child in their married life. If we look at the cause that why she said George is a big, fat flop then we see that Martha wanted George to be successful in his career. The time-frame of this movie was during 60’s/70’s when women were less often in the job compare to our modern times where women holding management positions or a woman leading a country is not a big surprise anymore. Martha wanted to live her life through George since she couldn’t have any job for herself. She thinks George has lack of ambitions as well. Another cause was having no child in their married life. Martha thinks her married life is empty and incomplete without a child. Thus, she creates a mental illusion for her peace of mind. Her illusion was that they have a son who lives away from home and he’s coming back home on his birthday. And she said that to the newly married young couple who was their neighbor which is also a kind of a reflection of our society where those couples who are not happy in their conjugal life but they pretend to be happy in front of others.
Thus, I would say the controlling idea of this movie is ironic. Because, it doesn’t portray that life is always positive and happy ending so it can’t be idealistic. It can’t be pessimistic as well
because it doesn’t show only about sufferings and complexions of married life. It’s got to be ironic because George shows us through that game at the end of the movie how to make peace with sufferings. We learned from the movie that once we get to snap out of your imaginary world and learn to embrace the reality then we get to overcome the sorrow and sufferings.
Good analysis. So much depends on the time of when this story was set. A women in the 21st C or even the 1980s might not feel her life was so empty without a child or a successful husband.
As far as your controlling idea: desire creates suffering and suffering causes violence and mental instability, well, desire always creates suffering. (This is Buddhism 101.) You could say that about almost any story. But in this particular story, is it Martha’s desire for a child, etc. that creates their suffering or something else? And what of George’s desire? If we can identify his desire, is it really a cause of suffering and mental instability?
According to McKee’s formula of the value, or emotional circumstance to which the character has changed throughout the script, plus the cause, or the reason the character has had to go through this change, the controlling idea has to do with the way George and Martha feel towards each other both at the beginning of the script, and at the end.
At the beginning of the story we have George and Martha, walking blissfully through their town, seemingly happy. Ten minutes alone with them in their home shows the audience that things are not what they seem. And yet it comes off as the norm for them. The two constantly play this cat and mouse game of teasing each other and goading one another to get a rise. Everything that happens between George and Martha seems to be a game, including the lies they tell about their son, a fabrication of both their imaginations, a way to distract one another. Knowing at the end what we know about the son, it makes certain things clear that happened throughout the film, like when George asks Martha not to bring up their son when the guests come over, it becomes clear that he was asking her to give the game a rest for the night, and when George tells Nick that Martha has never had any pregnancies, that confusing exchange becomes very clear.
And yet Martha doesn’t know when to quit. Whether it’s boredom, or whatever virulent hatred she may have for George, she persists in pushing his buttons, bringing up their fake son, flirting with the new biology professor, emasculating George in front of their guests, questioning his manhood, his intelligence, even his value as a professor. At a certain point, the back and forth becomes a series of retaliations, and the escalation plays out much like a military engagement. When she challenges him as a writer, making fun of the book he never published, he explodes and physically hurts Martha. George retaliates by including Honey in this game of humiliation George and Martha play. As Nick attempts to take revenge on George by sleeping with Martha, George does the only thing that could truly hurt Martha, ‘killing’ their son. By bringing his imaginary existence to a final close, George ends the game and deprives Martha of the only relief she had from the guilt of not being able to have a child; he tells her that he’s not going to play the game anymore.
And so in the end, with Nick and Honey slipping out, both George and Martha are tired and dejected, the sun rises, the game over. They had taken things too far, and neither one of them knew when to stop taking the other persons’ feelings for granted. That is what destroyed them.
A very thoughtful and compelling analysis. I would say your controlling idea is on the right track but a bit vague. This is more specific: Ridicule damages when husbands and wives blame each other for life’s disappointments.
The controlling idea of a story deals with the overall change from the beginning to the climax. In Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolf? the controlling idea is living in fantasy is not permanent, eventually reality will take over. From the first few moments George warns Martha to not talk about their “son”, which is the largest “living” piece in their fantasy. Martha breaks the rules and as punishment George destroys the fantasy of their son leaving the reality that they could not and never actually had any children, it was always and will always be just them. The fact the George kills their son in front of others suggests that there is no turning back because real people know the truth as well. I believe this controlling idea is ironic. Throughout the whole story/film Martha is the one who spins fantasy around the guests, the real people. She continually berates George and makes him out to be weak. Even though George plays along and contributes with his own games Martha is still the leader of the fantasy world. She is the one who decides to break the rules and speak about their son even after being warned, forgetting that fantasy can be changed and taken away just as quickly as it can be developed. So it’s suitable that Martha gets destroyed by her own fantasy. This also makes the story an “up-ending” one for George, who after being ridiculed all night finally gains control over Martha proving that he is not weak but the strength in the relationship.
I think you’ve given a good description of the dynamics of their relationship, but have left out formulating an actual controlling idea.
George comes out the victor in their war, but you wouldn’t say the overall ending is an up-ending, would you? Clearly, both their lives will be emptier without their illusion.
While reading McKee’s Structure and Meaning the idea of value plus cause jumped out at me. I think the overall theme is charades turn to truth. It appears to the outside world, the life of Martha and George was nothing more than a galant show to fit the model they felt they should be. They created characters that in turn made those characters real, the more they played them the more the character took over themselves. I think underneath it all there was real love, real hurt and real lives. I believe we create characters to overcome the inadequacies of our real lives. Martha created the lie of having her golden haired son to overcome the fact that she felt stuck, not necessarily unhappy but definitly not the life her expectations led her to believe she was entitled to. Maybe that stemmed from having a father of power, there is a princess syndrome, that somehow through lineage she was entitled to a life of power and prestige as well, meanwhile she finds herself in a marriage that may have begun as loving but it never blossomed into the union that would have her in the high ranks of the University. George wasn’t the type to lead the department, only to be a part of the system. Perhaps that acknowledgement stemmed the imaginary world in which to dwell, to create the persona that would draw others to her, to make her liked and recognized. The son fantasy may have begun from mutual need, neither George nor Martha really had what they dreamed of. George wanting to be an author and recognized by his peers for his contributions, not just the Presidents wife. They may have created this fantasy together to create a happier existence. The last climax of the movie exposes all thier lies, all thier creations and the movie moves from chaotic frenzy to sadness and loss. They loose the fantasy and have to face the real situations that confront them. The loss of the fantasy is shared as others have witnessed it, so there is no easy way to hide now from the truth, they must confront it head on and for once face reality. When Charades turn to Truth, lives and characters are shattered and the real truth must put back together the pieces….
Very interesting idea about Martha’s entitlement and her princess syndrome. Your controlling idea as expressed is missing a cause: “When Charades turn to Truth, lives and characters are shattered and the real truth must put back together the pieces.” You could reformulate this by saying: Lives are shattered when charades turns to truth, which makes truth the cause of the shattered lives. However, the real problem for George and Martha isn’t truth, but illusion.
Robert Mckee talks about controling ideas in “structure and Meaning” he states that a complete controlling idea is value plus cause and he further explains with examples what each mean. Mckee also states in his writing that a theme is not given in one word but in a sentence. The theme in “Who’s Afraid of Virgina Woolf?” To me is lie’s can heal but also hurt. Mid movie the audience are introduced to a character not seen which is Martha and George’s son. The audience finds out towards the end of this roller coaster ride of emotions that the characters “son” is a made up character made up to please Martha and also used to hurt her. George does as he pleases with this character and uses him to evoke different emotions to Martha.
I feel that this movie is an ironic movie. All the bickering and fighting between all four characters and the ups and downs of emotions make this movie and play very itonic and eratic.
Your controlling idea is missing a cause: lies can heal but also hurt, is a good start, but what is the cause? Lies can heal but also hurt, when people don’t recognize the truth, might be a possible cause.
Also, don’t conflate erratic with ironic. All the ups and downs and arguments are defiantly erratic but not necessarily ironic. Irony is when words or images are used to express the opposite of what they normally mean. Or, when there is an incongruity between the actual result of a sequence of events and the expected result. George exorcising/killing an imaginary child is ironic on a basic level because one can’t kill what doesn’t exist.
According to McKee “Structure and Mining”, controlling idea is when author begins with unavoidable conflict and “may be expressed in a single sentence describing how and why life undergoes change from one condition of existence at the beginning to another at the end”. In “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolf?” we see that controlling idea from beginning to the end. How the story begins from existence presented to the reader or viewer of the movie to the end through all new details added to the picture and the direction of the novel itself we can see this Controlling Idea described by Robert McKee. From the beginning of the novel we see Martha and George coming home from the party and everything looks pretty calm and nice, but already few minutes later we can see that this couple is far away from idealistic family. The way how Martha talks to her husband and that she made a decision to invite guests at so late hours on her own represents her dominant and more powerful part of the family in comparison to George. Later on when guests arrived and all the drunkenness begins all characters changes their faces. We all know that when people are drunk the speak more than expected to be heard by others. Martha and George tries to hurt each other more and more through the night and all this happens in front of other couple who are newly came to the town. Martha brings up the story about hers and George’s “son” to Nick and Honey which make conflict between her and George even worse. At the end of the demented night, when all terrible things was said, when all dirty underwear being shown to the audience (in front of other couple) and there are nothing else to lose the only way out is TRUTH. We discovered that George and Martha didn’t have any son, and this abhorrence between them turns out as love and care about each other. For Many years of George and Martha’s marriage they not just played but lived through the story about their son. It shows their respect for each other and lots of love.
This novel and play may look like pessimistic but to me it contains a lot of Irony. We never know what happens when you open a closed door of each family or couple, and family can only look idealistic but in reality it can be a disaster or all the way around, when it looks like a disaster (like in “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolf?”) at the end we see that it is a loving family, not ideal but caring about each other.
I think you’ve misunderstood what a Controlling Idea is: a single sentence that states a value plus a cause. As we discussed in class about Dangerous Liaisons: hatred destroys when fear the opposite sex. Please look above for other examples.
In “Structure and Meaning” Robert McKee talks about 3 kinds of Controlling Ideas. . The Controlling ideal that I believe in the film “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolf” would be the Idealistic Controlling idea. according to McKee Idealistic controlling idea can be define as”Up-ending,” stories expressing the optimism, hopes, and dreams of mankind, a positively charged vision of the human spirit; life as we wish it to be. “I interpreted the idealistic controlling in the story to be shown from the beginning of the story to the end of the story. The beginning of the story starts off with Martha and George arriving home from and night out. Martha tells George that’s company is coming over. The young couple was Honey and Nick. During their visit they were quite amused by the brutal argument and vulgar threats that Martha and George portrays in front if of them. In the film there was scene were George choked Martha out for revealing a story that George had come up with some year’s back which Martha was patheic. Martha seems to constantly reticule George for not leading up to the same level of success that her father had reach as being president for the history department. A positive aspect of George and Martha can be shown when George told a story about mousey hysterical pregnancy they led mousey to get upset at her husband Nick. During that moment Martha commended George for being so evil. After leaving the bar George and Martha got into another altercation leading Martha to drive home with the car. George found his way home alone. George suspect that Martha was sleeping with Nick. When George arrived back home they both ganged up on Nick calling him a “House Boy, “this was another time that George and Martha collaborate together even if it was in a negative way. The story end with Nick revealing that Martha and George son didn’t really exist. They were both in denial throughout the whole movie. The story they told to Nick and Honey at a son that was only a glimpse of their imagination. In the end Martha and George was left alone in a more calming scene of them talking about the son who didn’t exist.
You haven’t formulated a controlling idea. But to your point about this being an up-ending; I think the up-ending argument could be made, though showing that George and Martha came together to ridicule their guests, or that Martha commended George on his ridicule isn’t convincing for an up-ending.
Mckee defines the controlling idea as a partnership between value and cause. It isn’t so easy for me to explain what I feel to be the controlling idea. Mainly because I am still conflicted with myself to what it might be. But when it comes down to it I would say the controlling idea in “Who’s afraid of Virginia Woolf” is a sense of regret and realization.George and Martha use “games” to fulfill their lack luster, disappointment of a life. They play these games so often that it actually blends into their reality and sometimes forget what is actually real.I believe these games are more or less a coping mechanism the couple had developed to get though their days as an unhappy married couple. They created this false reality with changing rules to help fulfill their lives, whether it be by Martha creating an imaginary son whom was only supposed to be discussed in private or George creating elaborate stories to make up for his failed writing career. But their is another couple in this story, Nick and Honey. Nick and Honey are a young couple in their mid to late twenties with some secrets of their own. George is able to find out many of these secrets while playing these manipulating games, finding out much of both Nick and Honey’s somewhat dark pasts. I find this story more ironic than anything for lack of a better option. The very games that George and Martha play to both manipulate Nick and honey and to escape their reality are the very same thing that brings them back to reality. When George “kills” their son Martha comes to the realization that her son is not real and that compounds to the failures of her and her husbands lives. Nick is able to figure out the ruse by the end of the night and begins to make sense of it all.
Some really good points. “When George “kills” their son, Martha comes to the realization that her son is not real and that compounds to the failures of her and her husbands lives.” From this, I would assume that you would say this is a pessimistic ending. A controlling idea for your analysis might be: Our failures are compounded when we foster illusions.
In Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? We see a controlling idea of avoiding reality and making illusions. The illusions in the story are seen in how George and Martha create games with their guest and each other. Seen the two guests arrive, George was already trying to make Nick look and feel dumb. Nick was already uncomfortable with how George was acting with him, “…what do you want me to say? Do you want me to say it’s funny, so you can contradict me and say it’s sad? Or do you want me to say it’s sad so you can turn around and say no, it’s funny…” George was impressed in this scene of the movie. I personally feel that Martha loves George but doesn’t mention it to him. She demonstrates her love towards him by creating games and pushing his buttons. George and Martha want to avoid reality by telling their guest they have a child. However, in the end of the story the truth was revealed. They both are very disappointed to not be able to have a child. Nick and Honey can relate to their disappointment because they have gone through it to. In the end of the story we see how ironic the story turns out.
Robert McKee introduces three controlling ideas In “Structure and Meaning”: idealist, pessimistic or ironic. According to McKee, the controlling Idea has two components: Value plus Cause. The controlling idea, says McKee, identifies the positive or negative charge of the story’s critical value at the last act’s climax, and identifies the chief reason that this value has changed to its final state. Value according to McKee means the primary value in its positive or negative charge that comes into the world of your character as a result of the final action of the story. Cause, in turn, according to McKee means the primary reason that the life of the protagonist has turned to its positive or negative value.
I believe the controlling idea in Who’s Afraid Virginia Woolf is ironic. We see an unhappy couple, Martha and George, fighting with each other throughout the play. Both of them are full of illusions. Their illusions are actually a way to cope with the reality, unhappy marriage and disappointments in life. Martha tells Honey about her son. That makes Martha seem a happy and fulfilled person. The couple makes the audience believe that that their son is the reason of their destroyed marriage throughout the play. However, ironically at the end of the play we find out that their son does not exist, Martha and George made it all up. The reason I believe, once again, they did was to help them to cope with the reality, unhappiness in their marriage and disappointment in life. At the end of the play we see that in spite of hatred and tiredness toward each other, the do love each other, and care about each other.
“The couple makes the audience believe that their son is the reason of their destroyed marriage throughout the play.” This is an interesting point. And the irony, as you point out, is that George and Martha are making themselves unhappy.
Who’s afraid of virgina wolf? is a great example of a character driving plot. There is very little change of setting and the whole story is over the course of one evening. Robert Mckee’s ideas of controling ideas are highly evident in the film. Mckee’s writes about knowing your charcters and allowing them to be portrayed in the correct way. I liked his example from Dirty Harry were you see how a characters mood and temperment is the largest contributing factor when writing dialog. Whos’s afraid of Virgina wolf is so great because George and Martha are such strongheaded characters with very back and forth dialog. The use of certain words used at the right time make the interactions between george and martha so profound. Mckee says a controlling idea can be expressed in a sentence and describe a change from one condition to another. We see in Who’s afraid of Virgina wolf? that the night begins finge and even George and Martha are getting along. but as the night continues things begin to unravel. With each glass of booze the energy in the room changes and goes from good to worse as time passes. Im unsure if it was intended or not but I noticed that as the night got later and later the ice in Martha’s glass in perticular made more noise the later it got. I think this is a small clue that shows this growing temperment inside of her that we see her let out in the last few scenes.
Robert McKee describes the controlling idea as having a value, and a cause, which will establish a positive or negative effect on the story. Value expresses the main meaning of the story, and cause, tells you how and why it happens. In the play, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolf, George and Martha had a dysfunctional relationship that was fueled by the illusion that they had a son. They used this factor to the fullest to pretend to themselves that they were like other fulfilled families with children. Their interaction was filled with sarcasms and harsh insults towards each other, yet ironically they used terms of endearment in the midst of their cruelty. Each one tried to outdo the other in this illusion. By inviting a new couple to their home for a night cap
their game took another turn. In Martha’s eyes George was not the leader she thought him to be and George blamed Martha for keeping their son away from home. George and Martha could not refrain from living out their illusion before their guest Nick and Honey, and in no time had them exposing their own dark secrets, proving that they were not the perfect couple either. They too were living an illusion. When George realizes their illusion can no longer be sustained, he kills off the son.
I believe, although the play is replete with ironies, ultimately it is pessimistic.I believe that Albee’s controlling idea is that no matter how much our illusions make life bearable, we must ultimately live without them.
Good work. “no matter how much our illusions make life bearable, we must ultimately live without them.” This works as a theme, but to put this in McKee’s vocabulary, value + cause, it might read something like this: Illusions must be forsaken, when we use them to bolster our empty lives. Stated this way it almost sounds idealist.
McKee describes a controlling theme as both value and cause. In Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolf? is an ironic one. The controlling theme is that living in fantasy can destroy reality. Throughout the story the couple fight and argue. Martha clearly upset with who her husband turned out to be. The two of them live in a fantasy, acting different around company and of course their made up son. Martha is the one in control of the fantasy, until George, the weaker one in their relationship, decides to publicly end it, making them both have to confront the fact that they can’t and haven’t had any children. Fantasies are supposed to be an escape for people, but in this story it ended up destroying them. Only when it was ended was the couple able to appreciate each other.
Robert McKee defines why the life of the character ended in a positive or negative way in the reading Structure and Meaning as controlling ideas as value plus cause. There is such an emotional pain involved in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf with the married couple George and Martha who invited guests over and ended up exposing their personal secrets by playing an intense game. Even though it was not mentioned in the story this game seemed to have been played before with the rules of not to mention their “son” and as soon a Martha did do this that’s where the game changed and became very exposing. With Martha and George saying hurtful and degrating things to each other leaving the invited couple in shock and in fear.
I found this to be Ironic that George and Martha’s marriage is built on hurtfulness even when the audience thought that they were going to end their marriage but instead ended up staying together you can see they still have a strong love for each other even through the turmoil.
Mckee defines the controlling idea as a blend of value and cause. He explains that a value represents how much positivity or negativity there is within the characters life while the cause represents why there life is that way. Based on the values and causes of the story, the controlling idea can be idealistic, pessimistic, or ironic. In the case of “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?”, I believe that the author demonstrates an ironic controlling idea. From the very beginning of the story the audience and the readers sense a very unhappy couple that share a relationship that seems like it is ready to crumble down any second. The audience witnesses how Martha and George are always constantly bicker and fight. Their conversations consist of them barking at one another with their opposing views and arguments. The two live such an unhappy life as a married couple that the only way they seem to get through everyday is by playing games to fill the void in their lives. The rules to these games can be changed anytime whenever Martha chooses to change them. This seems to anger George. At one point in the story George becomes so angry, he begins to physically abuse Martha. The last climax is when Martha starts to talk about an imaginary son in front of Nick and Honey. This really sets George off because that story about their imaginary boy was meant to be a secret hidden between only Martha and George themselves. At the end, George reveals the truth about their son to Nick and Honey and how he never existed in the first place. It was just something they made up as a part of one of their games to distract themselves from the reality of their unhappy lives. It is after this moment Martha becomes weak and allows George to comfort her. The audience finally realizes the truth about their relationship. They recognize that Martha and George truly love and care for one another but they are unhappy with where they stand in life.
When Martha firsts talks about their son, it’s in the first act. This is what angers George. When she talks about him in the third act it is at George’s request. The climax of the play is when George announces that their son is dead.
The controlling idea in who’s afraid of Virginia wolf is Controlling idea’s. This is because Virginia and her husband George start off by playing a little game. This game is one where they create a fantasy world and the rules are established pre game. Virginia breaks the rules by mentioning their son and her husband gets mad. And later in the movie, Virginia mentions a book about a boy who had murdered his mother and caused the death of his father. She states in front of Honey and Nick that George was a failure because he didn’t amount to anything. Then she states it is based on a true story. George then tries to choke out Virginia. Virginia runs off into the car drives away with Honey and Nick, leaving George to walk home himself. When George gets home, he sees Virginia and Nicks silhouette from downstairs through the shades. He then proceeds to go in and stops and goes back out. He sees that Virginia has changed the whole game and then starts rearranging the game.
You need to read McKee’s essay. Obviously you haven’t. Also, George’s wife’s name is Martha. Virgina Woolf is a reference to a famous novelist and a play on the song: Who’s Afraid of The Big Bad Wolf.
According to Robert McKee “a controlling idea may be expressed in a single sentence describing how and why life undergoes change from one condition of existence at the beginning to another at the end”. In my opinion the controlling idea of “Who’s afraid of Virginia Woolf” was expressed in the conversation that Martha had with Nick. She said the following:
“George who is out somewhere there in the dark. Who is good to me. Whom I revile. Who can keep learning the games we play as quickly as I can change them. Who can make me happy and I do not wish to be happy. Yes, I do wish to be happy. George and Martha. Sad, sad, sad.” Although all these words are equally important in order to understand the main meaning of them, I would like to highlight the sentence that I believe is a controlling idea of the play: “(George) can keep learning the games we play as quickly as I can change them”. These words show us that all their life consists of games; they want to escape from reality and live in their imaginary world, the world where illusion plays a significant role. It is interesting that the author decided to open the play from the episode where Martha and George were playing a guessing game. For me personally it was not clear why the author would choose such a boring beginning of two crazy people that as it seemed to me, both did not know what they want and what they were talking about. However, by the end of the play I realized it was kind of a key episode that gave meaning to the whole story.
Yes, games play a very important role. “They want to escape from reality and live in their imaginary world.” How would McKee formulate this controlling idea?
Robert McKee talks about three kinds of Controlling ideas: idealistic, pessimistic and ironic. According to his words the Controlling idea has a relationship between the value and the cause.Explaining the Value, he’s saying how positive or negative the characters are. When he speaks about the Cause he means in which way the characters’ life ended(also either positive or negative). In “Who’s afraid of Virginia Wolf” we can see how people are changing throughout the whole movie(or playwright). Alcohol does what its supposed to do: people start bringing all their “family trash” into public, as Martha and George did. Their every word and every phrase is being said with an intention to hurt each other. Their jokes sometimes go over the line. They speak about fictitious things which either never existed or were just their fantasies.
So,to my mind, the Controllimg idea of the movie is ironic, but has some traces of pessimism. Almost the whole story and dialogues are revealing who they are and what’s in their minds. After they say something you don’t even know whether you should smile or take it serious. Let’s take an example of the “Son” story, which Martha created to feel herself more self-confident and successful. She just wanted to have that in her mind and she did. She truly believed in what she was saying. Because we could clearly see how stressful she was and how she was suffering and screaming after George “killed” their “Son”. At that moment I felt the Controlling Idea more pessimistic, because one of the main characters was or become unhappy and very upset. In the very end, here I agree with many comments, we actually saw that George and Martha, in spite of their argues and conflicts,still loved each other. From the first glance their relationship could seem unstable and provocative but in reality they did take care of each other.
Being that the controlling idea is a mixture of value and cause, I personally believe it is somewhat of a mixture of irony and pessimism. From the beginning of the movie, we see Martha and George kind of getting along, but also see this sort of line or boundary that gets crossed multiple times. If Martha crosses this line, I feel like George has to retaliate and get back at her, to show that he is the man of the house and the one in control. When George crosses the line, Martha tells her share of the story and tries to get back at him, only to regain some sort of control.
To me, the biggest of the arguments happen over the talk of their 16-year-old child. As the story progresses, we come to find out more about this child of theirs and also about Honey’s pregnancy. The side of me that says the controlling idea is ironic focuses on these points exactly. By the end of the movie, we come to realize that there really isn’t a son. Martha and George, for whatever reason, don’t have a child but are living some sort of sick fantasy that envisions one. As viewers watch the movie, they kind of figure out that something is fishy when George mentions by the swing to Nick that Martha was never pregnant. At this same time, Nick releases information that makes us believe he married Honey when she was pregnant, but didn’t end up having the kid. The twist towards the end of the movie is when Honey is completely drunk, lying outside, and releases information about the kid. George get’s the hint that she killed the kid (abortion) through pills of some sort. Shortly after, George tells Martha that their son is dead. To me, he did this to get back at her for two reasons. The first reason is for even talking about the child, and the second reason would be for having some sort of sexual encounter with Nick. When he kills the child off, I feel this is the twist and the ironic part
The part of me that says there is some sort of pessimism involved in the controlling idea is due to the fact that people were emotionally hurt. Specifically Honey, more so than others. Honey kind of realized the truth about the Nick’s view of her, her father, and her pregnancy. When we first see Nick and Honey, they appear to be a happy couple. But when the movie ends, she is now emotionally scarred because of George and Martha’s fantasy world.
I think the controlling idea in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolfe is that life’s dysfunctions are multi-demensional, and doesn’t always present itself in a staight forward way. I see the controlling idea as being equally pessimistic and ironic. We can identify the beginning of this when we first hear George warn Martha to never mention their son to anyone. Throughout the story we get a up/down, up again escalation of motiom until the very end when we realize that the “son” is figment of their imagination. We finally see why Martha had so much isdain for her husband who couldn’t give her the child she’d aways longed for. It also speaks to the intensity of their love (& clouded sanity); that they could conceieve, birth and raise an imaginary child for 16yrs.
Robert Mckee view on controlling ideas is that they contain value and cause. He states in his work “Structure and Meaning that a theme is not given in one word or in a sentence. The controlling idea in “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” is cruel as a veteran couple wager with one another to bicker in front of the town’s new couple. Lying is cruel. We are introduced to Martha and George’s son in the middle of the movie. The audience finds out towards the end of this roller coaster ride of emotions that the characters son is imagined by Martha. I feel that this movie is an ironic. The characters’ constant quarrelling amongst each other; Martha and George still manage to stay together.
The controlling idea of Edward Albee’s “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” is pessimistic. The story is of two married couples having drinks with one another on a late night after having met at a party for the college both men of the couples work for. As the night progresses the hosts, George and Martha a middle aged couple get progressively drunker, fight, and play games with both one another and their guests, Nick and Honey a younger couple. George especially gets angry and violent as the story unfolds. Martha attempts to seduce George in front of her husband while his wife, Honey is in the bathroom sick. George and Martha eventually turn this into another game, with George telling Martha that their son had died to upset her. I find the whole story to be pessimistic because it assumes the worst in these people. George and Martha play with one another’s emotions and those of other people’s, some practically complete strangers.
I had a hard time with this movie and this question. The movie was so confusing with all the characters and they all seemed to have it out for each other. I think looking at George and Martha they have one of those extremely volatile relationships but they can’t seem to separate. These are the most tragic relationships in my eyes that you love someone so much that no matter how you act towards one another you keep coming back. I can’t really decide which controlling idea would best fit this story. Perhaps pessimism with their outlook on life and towards one another at many points in the story is the main focus. They also seem to strive for this perfect or ideal relationship within the two of them by making up stories and jokes that only they understand. It is perhaps the most ironic out of all the three. The fact that they are so mean to each other throughout that you think this would be the end of them, and it ends with them being in love. It is also ironic that these secrets and fantasies have worked for them for so long but when brought out in the open, it can literally tear them apart. For me, I have a hard time analyzing or wrapping my head around such a relationship and I’m not sure what their relationship was really trying to show us in the end.
In Structure and Meaning, Robert McKee introduces three kinds of controlling ideas. He explains that a controlling idea sums up the whole story in a sentence and is comprised of value and cause. In Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf George and Martha are constantly fighting and arguing about things throughout the movie. It seemed never ending and it didn’t seem like they loved each other. They kept bringing each other down and when Martha started telling everyone about Georges writing and he attacked her, the film seemed like it was going to end there. It isn’t until the end when we learn that their son does not even exist and is made up does everything start to calm down and we realize that they do indeed seem to love one another. I would think that the controlling idea in this film would be ironic “ Living in an illusion does not lead to happiness”. It’s understandable that not being able to have children can be devastating, but it seemed ironic that they were living an illusion, pretending that they did have a son, when that was not bringing them any happiness but instead even more misery. I felt tense throughout the whole movie as they kept bringing each other down and I felt that their marriage was going to end. But finally at the end when they both face the truth that they do not even have a son I felt myself relax even though Martha and George were very upset, they had put the truth out there and might finally be able to move on instead of living a lie which caused more pain and misery.
Film and Literature 
The theme, or controlling idea, is a conjunction of value and cause. Value in this sense is the the relationship between positive and negative actions that occur in the world of a story. I think of it as binary oppositions that make up a story’s plot, and in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf there is a lot of that (opposition). The majority of this play consists of one argument after another between the two couples. George and Martha argue over George not being “man enough” or successful enough, Nick and Honey disagree about Nick putting their private affairs out in the open (such as the real reason why they got married), and George and Martha even argue about how funny certain jokes are (Martha thinks her jokes are hilarious, while George thinks that they’re average). At several moments in the play, things blew over and have a clamactic feel (i.e when Martha gave the story about George writing an ineffective novel, and George got so upset that he grabbed her and threw her down to the ground). But the story didn’t stop there, and they continued to argue over other things after that. However, the opposition surrounding G & M’s “son” is the most profound and adds to the story’s value the most, because it is not until the end of the story when George reveals the truth about him that the arguing finally subsides and the parties disperse. Things finally shift from one mood (argumentative) to another (settled/relaxed). And this shift only occurs and solidifies itself when the truth about their made up son comes out (cause). Therefore, I would say that the controlling idea of the play is “life’s problems can be resolved when we are honest with ourselves and others.”
I think that from Edward Albee’s point of view, the play has an idealistic controlling idea. I believe that he would want society to turn out like George and Martha did — honest as opposed to phony or delusional. In the world of the play, and perhaps to the audience, I think that the controlling idea is more pessimistic. After all, G & M are not happy about their lives, they’ve just decided to admit the truth. The fact that they cannot/don’t have children is a very disappointing thing for them and I think it’s safe to say that most of society would agree with that sentiment — even Nick and Honey agree. Overall then, I think that the controlling idea of the play is Ironic. In retrospect, both sentiments (Albee’s and society’s/George & Martha’s) can be felt and understood from the events that take place in the story, and how it ends.
That is an idealist Controlling Idea, but I would ask, Do you think George and Martha’s problems are resolved at the end? Is this a happy ending? Your Controlling Idea assumes a positive outcome, and you might be able to make that argument, but Albee’s ending could also be construed as very dark.
Though it seems far better than realty, illusions lead to havoc in a relationship. The illusion of George and Martha’s son seem to be the string that held their marriage together. Martha was as happy as any real mother who had a child. She felt fulfilled. The moment Martha mentioned to her Guests about her son, she made that illusion a reality which infuriates George and destroys Martha. I feel that my controlling idea is a bit idealistic but somewhat ironic. Idealistic because George fed Martha’s illusion, maybe to help their empty marriage. The only condition to it is that they speak of the son to no one.the illusion turned out to be a trajedy.
Robert Mckee defines the Controlling Idea as Value plus Cause. Value is basically how much positivity or negativity there is in the life of the character. Cause is why the life of the character ended in the positive or negative way. There was a lot of emotional baggage involved in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf, and a lot of deceit. There was so much tension between George and Martha and the audience could tell that there was definitely an underlying cause. When their son was brought up, we got a clearer view of why there is so much pain in their marriage and that there was something dark that we needed to find out. For these reasons, I believe that the controlling idea is something like When there is nothing left to do, the truth will set you free. At the end when we discovered the truth about George and Martha’s son and how miserable their marriage is, there was a sense of relief and defeat. I think that the controlling idea is a bit ironic because while we can clearly see there is serious dysfunction between George and Martha, we do not necessarily expect Martha to be defeated so easily. She goes from a strong and stubborn woman to a fragile childlike person. It has a pessimistic sense to it as well, but I think that it is more ironic than anything else.
“When there is nothing left to do, the truth will set you free.” Are George and Martha really free at the end of the story? If so, than the controlling idea would be idealist not ironic.
Christina Radcliffe
Controlling idea’s is the true theme of the story is not just one word or sentence. It what the story or novel is completely all about. It tells why the story goes in the direction it goes in, it also gives the reader the reasons why change occurs within the story and the condition in why it changes for the characters life. Controlling ideas also contains Value and cause, which identifies positive or negative acts within the story. In “Who afraid of Virginia Wolf” The negative part and true theme of the story, a middle age, couple play a cruel game with one another to hurt one another feeling and in front of new couple that has just came to town and started working for the university. George who works for the university, which is, ran by his wife Martha Father. Martha his wife invites the young new couple over for night cape. Which turns into explosion of drunken frenzy in front of the new couple after the faulty party. They reveal some disappointments through out their marriage for one another. They engage in mental abuse, which leaves the other couple to start to expose their true nature of their own rocky relationship as well. Its negative value they argue continuously throughout the night. Their game here who can hurt the other the best. Its brings you think is their to line they wont cross. It reveals that the person you love the most can hurt you the most. The true climax of the story in the end they have love for one another.
Did I find “Who’s afraid of Virginia Wolf” to be idealist, Pessimistic, or Ironic.
I would have to say ironic the why story starts and ends leave me a little besides my self. I would have never thought George and Martha would stay with one another I kept thinking this is that big argument that couple as right before they leave and want a divorce and shocking part through all verbal abuse and years of disappointments they truly do love one another and was no baby.
An improvement in writing. However, McKee does say you can put the controlling idea into a sentence, and that’s exactly what I wanted you to do. He gives several examples throughout the essay. We discussed one in class, his version of the controlling idea in Dangerous Liaisons: hatred destroys when we fear the opposite sex. Given your analysis, you could formulate a controlling idea like, people in love can hurt each other when they allow disappointment and bitterness to control them.
The controlling idea for Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? would follow McKee’s concept of irony. From the beginning it drags you into a dark tunnel of drunken emotions gone out of control with the light fading quickly. As the night progresses they two couples flaws are bringing dragged out either by their own doing or by George and Martha’s seemingly twisted anger towards each other.
Albee wrote most of the play following the pessimistic idea. Each character only brought their own type of darkness to the audience. It some ways it seemed like it was the new replacing the old. A young, handsome, up and coming professor who possible looking for ways to bring down an old foppish man from not only his career but even sleep with the old man’s wife. George is aware of all of this and uses his own methods of shining light on Nick’s deeds. Possibly the most pitiful character in the whole play would have to be Honey. Throughout the whole time she’s the most inebriated and never says a nasty thing to anyone but the most damage is done to her. Her dark past is told to George by her own husband and later used to hurt her and Nick. Nick even tries to cheat on her while she’s passed out on the bathroom floor in the same house oblivious to what is currently going on.
Only at the very end can we say it does have that ironic idea when the light finally emerges. When the truth about Martha’s imaginary child is revealed we get a sense that this horrible night was in some ways to help her. It was an extreme case of tough love. As they sober up you can see that he does care about her even though they put each other through a night of hell.
You make a good argument for irony, but have left out the actual controlling idea. That’s the hard part.
Honey *is* the most benign character, but remember, she agrees with George about the telegram and the death of the son. You could say she’s just afraid to contradict him, or so out of it she doesn’t know what’s truth or illusion, but there might be something menacing behind it. She chooses to back him up for some reason.
Robert McKee explains the controlling idea as a combination of value and cause. He explains value as how much positivity or negativity there is in the characters life, he mentions cause is why the characters life ended in a positive of negative way.
I think the controlling idea is ” love can make you do crazy things” throughout the play and movie Martha and George have a very odd relationship, they verbally abuse and even physically abuse each other. The most important part of the movie was when Martha decides to tell a couple they just met about there “son”. It led the audience believe this was the reason for the couple always fighting with each other. I find it ironic At the end when the truth about their son is revealed and the couple goes from being abusive to each other to being calm and relaxed. It clearly shows how much they love each other and when George comes clean about how they made up their son Martha is defeated, you would think a stubborn woman like Martha would fight George about this but no, she feels defeated.
“Love can make you do crazy things.” but what is the cause? You’ve left out McKee’s second part.
According to Mckee, the controlling idea can be described in one sentence rather than a single word. To agree with him, I think the controlling idea of “Who’s Afraid Of Virginia Wolf” will be something like this: Desire create sufferings and suffering causes violence and mental instability. Mckee also said the controlling idea has two components: Value plus Cause. In “Who’s afraid of Virginia Wolf” the leading role Martha values success and a child in their married life. If we look at the cause that why she said George is a big, fat flop then we see that Martha wanted George to be successful in his career. The time-frame of this movie was during 60’s/70’s when women were less often in the job compare to our modern times where women holding management positions or a woman leading a country is not a big surprise anymore. Martha wanted to live her life through George since she couldn’t have any job for herself. She thinks George has lack of ambitions as well. Another cause was having no child in their married life. Martha thinks her married life is empty and incomplete without a child. Thus, she creates a mental illusion for her peace of mind. Her illusion was that they have a son who lives away from home and he’s coming back home on his birthday. And she said that to the newly married young couple who was their neighbor which is also a kind of a reflection of our society where those couples who are not happy in their conjugal life but they pretend to be happy in front of others.
Thus, I would say the controlling idea of this movie is ironic. Because, it doesn’t portray that life is always positive and happy ending so it can’t be idealistic. It can’t be pessimistic as well
because it doesn’t show only about sufferings and complexions of married life. It’s got to be ironic because George shows us through that game at the end of the movie how to make peace with sufferings. We learned from the movie that once we get to snap out of your imaginary world and learn to embrace the reality then we get to overcome the sorrow and sufferings.
Good analysis. So much depends on the time of when this story was set. A women in the 21st C or even the 1980s might not feel her life was so empty without a child or a successful husband.
As far as your controlling idea: desire creates suffering and suffering causes violence and mental instability, well, desire always creates suffering. (This is Buddhism 101.) You could say that about almost any story. But in this particular story, is it Martha’s desire for a child, etc. that creates their suffering or something else? And what of George’s desire? If we can identify his desire, is it really a cause of suffering and mental instability?
Ridicule dejects when things are taken too far.
According to McKee’s formula of the value, or emotional circumstance to which the character has changed throughout the script, plus the cause, or the reason the character has had to go through this change, the controlling idea has to do with the way George and Martha feel towards each other both at the beginning of the script, and at the end.
At the beginning of the story we have George and Martha, walking blissfully through their town, seemingly happy. Ten minutes alone with them in their home shows the audience that things are not what they seem. And yet it comes off as the norm for them. The two constantly play this cat and mouse game of teasing each other and goading one another to get a rise. Everything that happens between George and Martha seems to be a game, including the lies they tell about their son, a fabrication of both their imaginations, a way to distract one another. Knowing at the end what we know about the son, it makes certain things clear that happened throughout the film, like when George asks Martha not to bring up their son when the guests come over, it becomes clear that he was asking her to give the game a rest for the night, and when George tells Nick that Martha has never had any pregnancies, that confusing exchange becomes very clear.
And yet Martha doesn’t know when to quit. Whether it’s boredom, or whatever virulent hatred she may have for George, she persists in pushing his buttons, bringing up their fake son, flirting with the new biology professor, emasculating George in front of their guests, questioning his manhood, his intelligence, even his value as a professor. At a certain point, the back and forth becomes a series of retaliations, and the escalation plays out much like a military engagement. When she challenges him as a writer, making fun of the book he never published, he explodes and physically hurts Martha. George retaliates by including Honey in this game of humiliation George and Martha play. As Nick attempts to take revenge on George by sleeping with Martha, George does the only thing that could truly hurt Martha, ‘killing’ their son. By bringing his imaginary existence to a final close, George ends the game and deprives Martha of the only relief she had from the guilt of not being able to have a child; he tells her that he’s not going to play the game anymore.
And so in the end, with Nick and Honey slipping out, both George and Martha are tired and dejected, the sun rises, the game over. They had taken things too far, and neither one of them knew when to stop taking the other persons’ feelings for granted. That is what destroyed them.
Also, I would classify this as an idealistic controlling idea. Tee-hee.
A very thoughtful and compelling analysis. I would say your controlling idea is on the right track but a bit vague. This is more specific: Ridicule damages when husbands and wives blame each other for life’s disappointments.
The controlling idea of a story deals with the overall change from the beginning to the climax. In Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolf? the controlling idea is living in fantasy is not permanent, eventually reality will take over. From the first few moments George warns Martha to not talk about their “son”, which is the largest “living” piece in their fantasy. Martha breaks the rules and as punishment George destroys the fantasy of their son leaving the reality that they could not and never actually had any children, it was always and will always be just them. The fact the George kills their son in front of others suggests that there is no turning back because real people know the truth as well. I believe this controlling idea is ironic. Throughout the whole story/film Martha is the one who spins fantasy around the guests, the real people. She continually berates George and makes him out to be weak. Even though George plays along and contributes with his own games Martha is still the leader of the fantasy world. She is the one who decides to break the rules and speak about their son even after being warned, forgetting that fantasy can be changed and taken away just as quickly as it can be developed. So it’s suitable that Martha gets destroyed by her own fantasy. This also makes the story an “up-ending” one for George, who after being ridiculed all night finally gains control over Martha proving that he is not weak but the strength in the relationship.
I think you’ve given a good description of the dynamics of their relationship, but have left out formulating an actual controlling idea.
George comes out the victor in their war, but you wouldn’t say the overall ending is an up-ending, would you? Clearly, both their lives will be emptier without their illusion.
While reading McKee’s Structure and Meaning the idea of value plus cause jumped out at me. I think the overall theme is charades turn to truth. It appears to the outside world, the life of Martha and George was nothing more than a galant show to fit the model they felt they should be. They created characters that in turn made those characters real, the more they played them the more the character took over themselves. I think underneath it all there was real love, real hurt and real lives. I believe we create characters to overcome the inadequacies of our real lives. Martha created the lie of having her golden haired son to overcome the fact that she felt stuck, not necessarily unhappy but definitly not the life her expectations led her to believe she was entitled to. Maybe that stemmed from having a father of power, there is a princess syndrome, that somehow through lineage she was entitled to a life of power and prestige as well, meanwhile she finds herself in a marriage that may have begun as loving but it never blossomed into the union that would have her in the high ranks of the University. George wasn’t the type to lead the department, only to be a part of the system. Perhaps that acknowledgement stemmed the imaginary world in which to dwell, to create the persona that would draw others to her, to make her liked and recognized. The son fantasy may have begun from mutual need, neither George nor Martha really had what they dreamed of. George wanting to be an author and recognized by his peers for his contributions, not just the Presidents wife. They may have created this fantasy together to create a happier existence. The last climax of the movie exposes all thier lies, all thier creations and the movie moves from chaotic frenzy to sadness and loss. They loose the fantasy and have to face the real situations that confront them. The loss of the fantasy is shared as others have witnessed it, so there is no easy way to hide now from the truth, they must confront it head on and for once face reality. When Charades turn to Truth, lives and characters are shattered and the real truth must put back together the pieces….
Very interesting idea about Martha’s entitlement and her princess syndrome. Your controlling idea as expressed is missing a cause: “When Charades turn to Truth, lives and characters are shattered and the real truth must put back together the pieces.” You could reformulate this by saying: Lives are shattered when charades turns to truth, which makes truth the cause of the shattered lives. However, the real problem for George and Martha isn’t truth, but illusion.
Robert Mckee talks about controling ideas in “structure and Meaning” he states that a complete controlling idea is value plus cause and he further explains with examples what each mean. Mckee also states in his writing that a theme is not given in one word but in a sentence. The theme in “Who’s Afraid of Virgina Woolf?” To me is lie’s can heal but also hurt. Mid movie the audience are introduced to a character not seen which is Martha and George’s son. The audience finds out towards the end of this roller coaster ride of emotions that the characters “son” is a made up character made up to please Martha and also used to hurt her. George does as he pleases with this character and uses him to evoke different emotions to Martha.
I feel that this movie is an ironic movie. All the bickering and fighting between all four characters and the ups and downs of emotions make this movie and play very itonic and eratic.
Your controlling idea is missing a cause: lies can heal but also hurt, is a good start, but what is the cause? Lies can heal but also hurt, when people don’t recognize the truth, might be a possible cause.
Also, don’t conflate erratic with ironic. All the ups and downs and arguments are defiantly erratic but not necessarily ironic. Irony is when words or images are used to express the opposite of what they normally mean. Or, when there is an incongruity between the actual result of a sequence of events and the expected result. George exorcising/killing an imaginary child is ironic on a basic level because one can’t kill what doesn’t exist.
According to McKee “Structure and Mining”, controlling idea is when author begins with unavoidable conflict and “may be expressed in a single sentence describing how and why life undergoes change from one condition of existence at the beginning to another at the end”. In “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolf?” we see that controlling idea from beginning to the end. How the story begins from existence presented to the reader or viewer of the movie to the end through all new details added to the picture and the direction of the novel itself we can see this Controlling Idea described by Robert McKee. From the beginning of the novel we see Martha and George coming home from the party and everything looks pretty calm and nice, but already few minutes later we can see that this couple is far away from idealistic family. The way how Martha talks to her husband and that she made a decision to invite guests at so late hours on her own represents her dominant and more powerful part of the family in comparison to George. Later on when guests arrived and all the drunkenness begins all characters changes their faces. We all know that when people are drunk the speak more than expected to be heard by others. Martha and George tries to hurt each other more and more through the night and all this happens in front of other couple who are newly came to the town. Martha brings up the story about hers and George’s “son” to Nick and Honey which make conflict between her and George even worse. At the end of the demented night, when all terrible things was said, when all dirty underwear being shown to the audience (in front of other couple) and there are nothing else to lose the only way out is TRUTH. We discovered that George and Martha didn’t have any son, and this abhorrence between them turns out as love and care about each other. For Many years of George and Martha’s marriage they not just played but lived through the story about their son. It shows their respect for each other and lots of love.
This novel and play may look like pessimistic but to me it contains a lot of Irony. We never know what happens when you open a closed door of each family or couple, and family can only look idealistic but in reality it can be a disaster or all the way around, when it looks like a disaster (like in “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolf?”) at the end we see that it is a loving family, not ideal but caring about each other.
I think you’ve misunderstood what a Controlling Idea is: a single sentence that states a value plus a cause. As we discussed in class about Dangerous Liaisons: hatred destroys when fear the opposite sex. Please look above for other examples.
In “Structure and Meaning” Robert McKee talks about 3 kinds of Controlling Ideas. . The Controlling ideal that I believe in the film “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolf” would be the Idealistic Controlling idea. according to McKee Idealistic controlling idea can be define as”Up-ending,” stories expressing the optimism, hopes, and dreams of mankind, a positively charged vision of the human spirit; life as we wish it to be. “I interpreted the idealistic controlling in the story to be shown from the beginning of the story to the end of the story. The beginning of the story starts off with Martha and George arriving home from and night out. Martha tells George that’s company is coming over. The young couple was Honey and Nick. During their visit they were quite amused by the brutal argument and vulgar threats that Martha and George portrays in front if of them. In the film there was scene were George choked Martha out for revealing a story that George had come up with some year’s back which Martha was patheic. Martha seems to constantly reticule George for not leading up to the same level of success that her father had reach as being president for the history department. A positive aspect of George and Martha can be shown when George told a story about mousey hysterical pregnancy they led mousey to get upset at her husband Nick. During that moment Martha commended George for being so evil. After leaving the bar George and Martha got into another altercation leading Martha to drive home with the car. George found his way home alone. George suspect that Martha was sleeping with Nick. When George arrived back home they both ganged up on Nick calling him a “House Boy, “this was another time that George and Martha collaborate together even if it was in a negative way. The story end with Nick revealing that Martha and George son didn’t really exist. They were both in denial throughout the whole movie. The story they told to Nick and Honey at a son that was only a glimpse of their imagination. In the end Martha and George was left alone in a more calming scene of them talking about the son who didn’t exist.
You haven’t formulated a controlling idea. But to your point about this being an up-ending; I think the up-ending argument could be made, though showing that George and Martha came together to ridicule their guests, or that Martha commended George on his ridicule isn’t convincing for an up-ending.
Mckee defines the controlling idea as a partnership between value and cause. It isn’t so easy for me to explain what I feel to be the controlling idea. Mainly because I am still conflicted with myself to what it might be. But when it comes down to it I would say the controlling idea in “Who’s afraid of Virginia Woolf” is a sense of regret and realization.George and Martha use “games” to fulfill their lack luster, disappointment of a life. They play these games so often that it actually blends into their reality and sometimes forget what is actually real.I believe these games are more or less a coping mechanism the couple had developed to get though their days as an unhappy married couple. They created this false reality with changing rules to help fulfill their lives, whether it be by Martha creating an imaginary son whom was only supposed to be discussed in private or George creating elaborate stories to make up for his failed writing career. But their is another couple in this story, Nick and Honey. Nick and Honey are a young couple in their mid to late twenties with some secrets of their own. George is able to find out many of these secrets while playing these manipulating games, finding out much of both Nick and Honey’s somewhat dark pasts. I find this story more ironic than anything for lack of a better option. The very games that George and Martha play to both manipulate Nick and honey and to escape their reality are the very same thing that brings them back to reality. When George “kills” their son Martha comes to the realization that her son is not real and that compounds to the failures of her and her husbands lives. Nick is able to figure out the ruse by the end of the night and begins to make sense of it all.
Some really good points. “When George “kills” their son, Martha comes to the realization that her son is not real and that compounds to the failures of her and her husbands lives.” From this, I would assume that you would say this is a pessimistic ending. A controlling idea for your analysis might be: Our failures are compounded when we foster illusions.
In Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? We see a controlling idea of avoiding reality and making illusions. The illusions in the story are seen in how George and Martha create games with their guest and each other. Seen the two guests arrive, George was already trying to make Nick look and feel dumb. Nick was already uncomfortable with how George was acting with him, “…what do you want me to say? Do you want me to say it’s funny, so you can contradict me and say it’s sad? Or do you want me to say it’s sad so you can turn around and say no, it’s funny…” George was impressed in this scene of the movie. I personally feel that Martha loves George but doesn’t mention it to him. She demonstrates her love towards him by creating games and pushing his buttons. George and Martha want to avoid reality by telling their guest they have a child. However, in the end of the story the truth was revealed. They both are very disappointed to not be able to have a child. Nick and Honey can relate to their disappointment because they have gone through it to. In the end of the story we see how ironic the story turns out.
Robert McKee introduces three controlling ideas In “Structure and Meaning”: idealist, pessimistic or ironic. According to McKee, the controlling Idea has two components: Value plus Cause. The controlling idea, says McKee, identifies the positive or negative charge of the story’s critical value at the last act’s climax, and identifies the chief reason that this value has changed to its final state. Value according to McKee means the primary value in its positive or negative charge that comes into the world of your character as a result of the final action of the story. Cause, in turn, according to McKee means the primary reason that the life of the protagonist has turned to its positive or negative value.
I believe the controlling idea in Who’s Afraid Virginia Woolf is ironic. We see an unhappy couple, Martha and George, fighting with each other throughout the play. Both of them are full of illusions. Their illusions are actually a way to cope with the reality, unhappy marriage and disappointments in life. Martha tells Honey about her son. That makes Martha seem a happy and fulfilled person. The couple makes the audience believe that that their son is the reason of their destroyed marriage throughout the play. However, ironically at the end of the play we find out that their son does not exist, Martha and George made it all up. The reason I believe, once again, they did was to help them to cope with the reality, unhappiness in their marriage and disappointment in life. At the end of the play we see that in spite of hatred and tiredness toward each other, the do love each other, and care about each other.
“The couple makes the audience believe that their son is the reason of their destroyed marriage throughout the play.” This is an interesting point. And the irony, as you point out, is that George and Martha are making themselves unhappy.
Who’s afraid of virgina wolf? is a great example of a character driving plot. There is very little change of setting and the whole story is over the course of one evening. Robert Mckee’s ideas of controling ideas are highly evident in the film. Mckee’s writes about knowing your charcters and allowing them to be portrayed in the correct way. I liked his example from Dirty Harry were you see how a characters mood and temperment is the largest contributing factor when writing dialog. Whos’s afraid of Virgina wolf is so great because George and Martha are such strongheaded characters with very back and forth dialog. The use of certain words used at the right time make the interactions between george and martha so profound. Mckee says a controlling idea can be expressed in a sentence and describe a change from one condition to another. We see in Who’s afraid of Virgina wolf? that the night begins finge and even George and Martha are getting along. but as the night continues things begin to unravel. With each glass of booze the energy in the room changes and goes from good to worse as time passes. Im unsure if it was intended or not but I noticed that as the night got later and later the ice in Martha’s glass in perticular made more noise the later it got. I think this is a small clue that shows this growing temperment inside of her that we see her let out in the last few scenes.
You seem to have not read the question. Controlling idea? Idealist, pessimistic, ironic?
Robert McKee describes the controlling idea as having a value, and a cause, which will establish a positive or negative effect on the story. Value expresses the main meaning of the story, and cause, tells you how and why it happens. In the play, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolf, George and Martha had a dysfunctional relationship that was fueled by the illusion that they had a son. They used this factor to the fullest to pretend to themselves that they were like other fulfilled families with children. Their interaction was filled with sarcasms and harsh insults towards each other, yet ironically they used terms of endearment in the midst of their cruelty. Each one tried to outdo the other in this illusion. By inviting a new couple to their home for a night cap
their game took another turn. In Martha’s eyes George was not the leader she thought him to be and George blamed Martha for keeping their son away from home. George and Martha could not refrain from living out their illusion before their guest Nick and Honey, and in no time had them exposing their own dark secrets, proving that they were not the perfect couple either. They too were living an illusion. When George realizes their illusion can no longer be sustained, he kills off the son.
I believe, although the play is replete with ironies, ultimately it is pessimistic.I believe that Albee’s controlling idea is that no matter how much our illusions make life bearable, we must ultimately live without them.
Good work. “no matter how much our illusions make life bearable, we must ultimately live without them.” This works as a theme, but to put this in McKee’s vocabulary, value + cause, it might read something like this: Illusions must be forsaken, when we use them to bolster our empty lives. Stated this way it almost sounds idealist.
McKee describes a controlling theme as both value and cause. In Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolf? is an ironic one. The controlling theme is that living in fantasy can destroy reality. Throughout the story the couple fight and argue. Martha clearly upset with who her husband turned out to be. The two of them live in a fantasy, acting different around company and of course their made up son. Martha is the one in control of the fantasy, until George, the weaker one in their relationship, decides to publicly end it, making them both have to confront the fact that they can’t and haven’t had any children. Fantasies are supposed to be an escape for people, but in this story it ended up destroying them. Only when it was ended was the couple able to appreciate each other.
“living in fantasy can destroy reality” this is the first part of a Controlling Idea. You’re missing the cause.
Robert McKee defines why the life of the character ended in a positive or negative way in the reading Structure and Meaning as controlling ideas as value plus cause. There is such an emotional pain involved in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf with the married couple George and Martha who invited guests over and ended up exposing their personal secrets by playing an intense game. Even though it was not mentioned in the story this game seemed to have been played before with the rules of not to mention their “son” and as soon a Martha did do this that’s where the game changed and became very exposing. With Martha and George saying hurtful and degrating things to each other leaving the invited couple in shock and in fear.
I found this to be Ironic that George and Martha’s marriage is built on hurtfulness even when the audience thought that they were going to end their marriage but instead ended up staying together you can see they still have a strong love for each other even through the turmoil.
Mckee defines the controlling idea as a blend of value and cause. He explains that a value represents how much positivity or negativity there is within the characters life while the cause represents why there life is that way. Based on the values and causes of the story, the controlling idea can be idealistic, pessimistic, or ironic. In the case of “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?”, I believe that the author demonstrates an ironic controlling idea. From the very beginning of the story the audience and the readers sense a very unhappy couple that share a relationship that seems like it is ready to crumble down any second. The audience witnesses how Martha and George are always constantly bicker and fight. Their conversations consist of them barking at one another with their opposing views and arguments. The two live such an unhappy life as a married couple that the only way they seem to get through everyday is by playing games to fill the void in their lives. The rules to these games can be changed anytime whenever Martha chooses to change them. This seems to anger George. At one point in the story George becomes so angry, he begins to physically abuse Martha. The last climax is when Martha starts to talk about an imaginary son in front of Nick and Honey. This really sets George off because that story about their imaginary boy was meant to be a secret hidden between only Martha and George themselves. At the end, George reveals the truth about their son to Nick and Honey and how he never existed in the first place. It was just something they made up as a part of one of their games to distract themselves from the reality of their unhappy lives. It is after this moment Martha becomes weak and allows George to comfort her. The audience finally realizes the truth about their relationship. They recognize that Martha and George truly love and care for one another but they are unhappy with where they stand in life.
When Martha firsts talks about their son, it’s in the first act. This is what angers George. When she talks about him in the third act it is at George’s request. The climax of the play is when George announces that their son is dead.
The controlling idea in who’s afraid of Virginia wolf is Controlling idea’s. This is because Virginia and her husband George start off by playing a little game. This game is one where they create a fantasy world and the rules are established pre game. Virginia breaks the rules by mentioning their son and her husband gets mad. And later in the movie, Virginia mentions a book about a boy who had murdered his mother and caused the death of his father. She states in front of Honey and Nick that George was a failure because he didn’t amount to anything. Then she states it is based on a true story. George then tries to choke out Virginia. Virginia runs off into the car drives away with Honey and Nick, leaving George to walk home himself. When George gets home, he sees Virginia and Nicks silhouette from downstairs through the shades. He then proceeds to go in and stops and goes back out. He sees that Virginia has changed the whole game and then starts rearranging the game.
You need to read McKee’s essay. Obviously you haven’t. Also, George’s wife’s name is Martha. Virgina Woolf is a reference to a famous novelist and a play on the song: Who’s Afraid of The Big Bad Wolf.
According to Robert McKee “a controlling idea may be expressed in a single sentence describing how and why life undergoes change from one condition of existence at the beginning to another at the end”. In my opinion the controlling idea of “Who’s afraid of Virginia Woolf” was expressed in the conversation that Martha had with Nick. She said the following:
“George who is out somewhere there in the dark. Who is good to me. Whom I revile. Who can keep learning the games we play as quickly as I can change them. Who can make me happy and I do not wish to be happy. Yes, I do wish to be happy. George and Martha. Sad, sad, sad.” Although all these words are equally important in order to understand the main meaning of them, I would like to highlight the sentence that I believe is a controlling idea of the play: “(George) can keep learning the games we play as quickly as I can change them”. These words show us that all their life consists of games; they want to escape from reality and live in their imaginary world, the world where illusion plays a significant role. It is interesting that the author decided to open the play from the episode where Martha and George were playing a guessing game. For me personally it was not clear why the author would choose such a boring beginning of two crazy people that as it seemed to me, both did not know what they want and what they were talking about. However, by the end of the play I realized it was kind of a key episode that gave meaning to the whole story.
Yes, games play a very important role. “They want to escape from reality and live in their imaginary world.” How would McKee formulate this controlling idea?
Robert McKee talks about three kinds of Controlling ideas: idealistic, pessimistic and ironic. According to his words the Controlling idea has a relationship between the value and the cause.Explaining the Value, he’s saying how positive or negative the characters are. When he speaks about the Cause he means in which way the characters’ life ended(also either positive or negative). In “Who’s afraid of Virginia Wolf” we can see how people are changing throughout the whole movie(or playwright). Alcohol does what its supposed to do: people start bringing all their “family trash” into public, as Martha and George did. Their every word and every phrase is being said with an intention to hurt each other. Their jokes sometimes go over the line. They speak about fictitious things which either never existed or were just their fantasies.
So,to my mind, the Controllimg idea of the movie is ironic, but has some traces of pessimism. Almost the whole story and dialogues are revealing who they are and what’s in their minds. After they say something you don’t even know whether you should smile or take it serious. Let’s take an example of the “Son” story, which Martha created to feel herself more self-confident and successful. She just wanted to have that in her mind and she did. She truly believed in what she was saying. Because we could clearly see how stressful she was and how she was suffering and screaming after George “killed” their “Son”. At that moment I felt the Controlling Idea more pessimistic, because one of the main characters was or become unhappy and very upset. In the very end, here I agree with many comments, we actually saw that George and Martha, in spite of their argues and conflicts,still loved each other. From the first glance their relationship could seem unstable and provocative but in reality they did take care of each other.
Being that the controlling idea is a mixture of value and cause, I personally believe it is somewhat of a mixture of irony and pessimism. From the beginning of the movie, we see Martha and George kind of getting along, but also see this sort of line or boundary that gets crossed multiple times. If Martha crosses this line, I feel like George has to retaliate and get back at her, to show that he is the man of the house and the one in control. When George crosses the line, Martha tells her share of the story and tries to get back at him, only to regain some sort of control.
To me, the biggest of the arguments happen over the talk of their 16-year-old child. As the story progresses, we come to find out more about this child of theirs and also about Honey’s pregnancy. The side of me that says the controlling idea is ironic focuses on these points exactly. By the end of the movie, we come to realize that there really isn’t a son. Martha and George, for whatever reason, don’t have a child but are living some sort of sick fantasy that envisions one. As viewers watch the movie, they kind of figure out that something is fishy when George mentions by the swing to Nick that Martha was never pregnant. At this same time, Nick releases information that makes us believe he married Honey when she was pregnant, but didn’t end up having the kid. The twist towards the end of the movie is when Honey is completely drunk, lying outside, and releases information about the kid. George get’s the hint that she killed the kid (abortion) through pills of some sort. Shortly after, George tells Martha that their son is dead. To me, he did this to get back at her for two reasons. The first reason is for even talking about the child, and the second reason would be for having some sort of sexual encounter with Nick. When he kills the child off, I feel this is the twist and the ironic part
The part of me that says there is some sort of pessimism involved in the controlling idea is due to the fact that people were emotionally hurt. Specifically Honey, more so than others. Honey kind of realized the truth about the Nick’s view of her, her father, and her pregnancy. When we first see Nick and Honey, they appear to be a happy couple. But when the movie ends, she is now emotionally scarred because of George and Martha’s fantasy world.
Good analysis. I wish you had formulated a controlling idea.
I think the controlling idea in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolfe is that life’s dysfunctions are multi-demensional, and doesn’t always present itself in a staight forward way. I see the controlling idea as being equally pessimistic and ironic. We can identify the beginning of this when we first hear George warn Martha to never mention their son to anyone. Throughout the story we get a up/down, up again escalation of motiom until the very end when we realize that the “son” is figment of their imagination. We finally see why Martha had so much isdain for her husband who couldn’t give her the child she’d aways longed for. It also speaks to the intensity of their love (& clouded sanity); that they could conceieve, birth and raise an imaginary child for 16yrs.
Typo: …finally see why Martha had so much disdain for her husband…
Robert Mckee view on controlling ideas is that they contain value and cause. He states in his work “Structure and Meaning that a theme is not given in one word or in a sentence. The controlling idea in “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” is cruel as a veteran couple wager with one another to bicker in front of the town’s new couple. Lying is cruel. We are introduced to Martha and George’s son in the middle of the movie. The audience finds out towards the end of this roller coaster ride of emotions that the characters son is imagined by Martha. I feel that this movie is an ironic. The characters’ constant quarrelling amongst each other; Martha and George still manage to stay together.
“Lying is cruel.” What is the cause?
The controlling idea of Edward Albee’s “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” is pessimistic. The story is of two married couples having drinks with one another on a late night after having met at a party for the college both men of the couples work for. As the night progresses the hosts, George and Martha a middle aged couple get progressively drunker, fight, and play games with both one another and their guests, Nick and Honey a younger couple. George especially gets angry and violent as the story unfolds. Martha attempts to seduce George in front of her husband while his wife, Honey is in the bathroom sick. George and Martha eventually turn this into another game, with George telling Martha that their son had died to upset her. I find the whole story to be pessimistic because it assumes the worst in these people. George and Martha play with one another’s emotions and those of other people’s, some practically complete strangers.
Pessimistic, except perhaps at the end when some tenderness is revealed between the couple.
I had a hard time with this movie and this question. The movie was so confusing with all the characters and they all seemed to have it out for each other. I think looking at George and Martha they have one of those extremely volatile relationships but they can’t seem to separate. These are the most tragic relationships in my eyes that you love someone so much that no matter how you act towards one another you keep coming back. I can’t really decide which controlling idea would best fit this story. Perhaps pessimism with their outlook on life and towards one another at many points in the story is the main focus. They also seem to strive for this perfect or ideal relationship within the two of them by making up stories and jokes that only they understand. It is perhaps the most ironic out of all the three. The fact that they are so mean to each other throughout that you think this would be the end of them, and it ends with them being in love. It is also ironic that these secrets and fantasies have worked for them for so long but when brought out in the open, it can literally tear them apart. For me, I have a hard time analyzing or wrapping my head around such a relationship and I’m not sure what their relationship was really trying to show us in the end.
In Structure and Meaning, Robert McKee introduces three kinds of controlling ideas. He explains that a controlling idea sums up the whole story in a sentence and is comprised of value and cause. In Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf George and Martha are constantly fighting and arguing about things throughout the movie. It seemed never ending and it didn’t seem like they loved each other. They kept bringing each other down and when Martha started telling everyone about Georges writing and he attacked her, the film seemed like it was going to end there. It isn’t until the end when we learn that their son does not even exist and is made up does everything start to calm down and we realize that they do indeed seem to love one another. I would think that the controlling idea in this film would be ironic “ Living in an illusion does not lead to happiness”. It’s understandable that not being able to have children can be devastating, but it seemed ironic that they were living an illusion, pretending that they did have a son, when that was not bringing them any happiness but instead even more misery. I felt tense throughout the whole movie as they kept bringing each other down and I felt that their marriage was going to end. But finally at the end when they both face the truth that they do not even have a son I felt myself relax even though Martha and George were very upset, they had put the truth out there and might finally be able to move on instead of living a lie which caused more pain and misery.