What Is the Story of The Trip to Bountiful?
Horton Foote’s emotional 1953 play tells the story of Carrie Watts, an elderly woman who longs to return to her beloved hometown of Bountiful, Texas, one final time before she dies. Carrie’s protective son Ludie and authoritarian daughter-in-law Jessie Mae forbid her to leave Houston, although Carrie and Jessie Mae are constantly butting heads in the Watts family's two-room apartment. While Ludie is at work and Jessie Mae is at the drugstore, Carrie escapes to the bus station, and befriends a young woman named Thelma. Together, the new friends travel toward Bountiful together, but when Carrie arrives in nearby Harrison, Texas, she discovers her beloved town isn’t the same as she remembered it.