Throughout most of his one acts, it becomes obvious that Albee is searching for a style. The setting is differentthe characters rotate around a large pit of sand while directly addressing the audience about the rifts in their familybut the characters’ relationships to one another are much the same, and the play’s absurdist setting and themes were further. In The American Dream and The Sandbox, Albee has used some of the superficial elements of the absurd tradition to make a penetrating statement about the American family and American values. Edward Albee’s 1959 play The Sandbox also features four characters named Mommy, Daddy, Grandma, and The Young Man. It premiered in Jan 16, Eg rated it it was ok. With The Death of Bessie Smith and Tiny Alice, Albee has attempted a complete fusion of styles. Taking our norms and turning them inside out and upside down is Albee’s signature, and ‘The American Dream’ reminds us that we must constantly refine our own version of the American Dream before we eventually dive into the finality of the Sandbox. In Who' s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Albee moves into a formal style. Edward Albee was a particularly cynical observer of American society and the unrequited pursuit of the mythical American Dream, a theme he would explore more directly and at greater length.
At times Albee shifts abruptly into a surrealistic style, as in The Zoo Story and A Delicate-Balance. In his naturalistic plays, which include The Zoo Story, The Death of Bessie Smith, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Tiny Alice and A Delicate Balance, Albee has uniquely combined past literary styles. His plays belong for the most part, however, in the Naturalist-Symbolist school. His style has changed from time to time over the years, swinging from a naturalistic style to an absurd style and back again. Throughout his work, Edward Albee’s characters create illusions to mask their lives and thus uphold the status quo.
They then briefly pretend to morn for her because they want to appear normal.