Sun, sea and resentment

In 1963 Cliff Richard shot to no.1 in the charts with Summer Holiday. On the soundtrack to this feel-good road-trip movie, he sang about how on such a holiday there would be “no more worries for a week or two”.

Yet, as we approach the summer, the BBC’s new drama Two Weeks In August instead offers us an eight-part series giving us a glimpse into the holiday from hell. Described as “sun, sea and suppressed resentment” it provides a darkly tragi-comic depiction of 40-somethings, university friends, on a group holiday, complete with spouses and children alongside singles. It’s been compared to The White Lotus, with its ensemble cast and illicit-time-abroad vibes but this is not the same luxury trip. This group aren’t nearly as affluent, despite their attempts to outsource childcare onto someone else.

Combining social satire and Greek mythology, it doesn’t paint a flattering picture of anyone. The Times promises “you will hate everyone on screen”. Writer Catherine Shepherd involved a psychologist in her creation of the characters to inform what they might be going through – from the gay guy played by Hugh Skinner (W1A, 2026) and his female best friend, utterly reliant on one another though she’s getting resentful, to the actor on his second marriage, and the primary couple, protagonist Zoe and her husband Dan, struggling with business collapse and depression.

Zoe is probably a familiar archetype to many of us – the people-pleaser, a mum trying to do everything for everyone, sandwiched between her children and her parents, seemingly unable to say no to anything. She insists “it’ll be fun”. (She is of course wrong – when did anyone get a “happy ever after” on a fictional island?) The tension between her relentless positivity and her husband’s negativity is palpable from the start. The Mediterranean heat, her hallucinations of the Moirai myth, and her husband’s awful behaviour combine to lead her to decide to stop sacrificing everything and instead to choose to put herself first – which the actress Jessica Raine playing her says “unfortunately … still feels revolutionary”.

As a character, Zoe decides to pursue what she wants while admitting “it’s quite hard to know what you want – it all gets quite confused what you’re supposed to want, and some things you want, you can’t necessarily have”. What do we want on holiday – does this look different from our everyday life? The utter chaos shown on screen in Two Weeks in August feels far from the rest many of us hope for from our holidays. Augustine reminds us in his work Confessions that our hearts are restless until they rest in God – how does our time away from our work or vocation help us to refocus on Him? How might a holiday help us to take a break from the pressure to achieve, to purchase, to perform, and instead focus on the presence of God, and those we love?

Two Weeks in August depicts time away on an island. But even on a staycation, the rhythms of a schedule change temporarily on holiday. Bedtimes shift, for those without tiny children there may be the luxury of a lie-in. Different generations may spend more time together. Away from the usual demands of daily life, in a different setting, relationships can deepen, memories be created, and conversations blossom. But it isn’t necessarily easy for everyone. What the BBC shows us in this series is grim – but elements of it may well feel familiar. Holidays can feel full of tension. Spending time with those we don’t usually, even loved ones, can be stressful. The suppression we see on screen with this group of friends shows us how little they know each other – and themselves.

We see characters attempt to have a good time despite uncertainty, anxiety and confusion. Which might be how many of us feel this summer. Their choices as they try to do this are a disaster. Comically so. But we have a model to do things differently. We have the Biblical principle of Sabbath rest, Jesus’s model of occasional retreat from the world to pray, and a God who can give us confidence in who we are in Him. What that looks like worked out in practice will be different for everyone. Cliff Richard sang about how people on holiday are “doin’ things they always wanted to”. See that beach, wonder at a sunset, sure. But unlike the characters in Two Weeks in August we don’t need to make a song and dance about following selfish desires and putting ourselves first – we just need to keep trying to put Him first.