The Friday Afternoon Club: A Family Memoir

Memoir is a genre of narrative nonfiction but is distinct from autobiography. Memoirs and autobiographies are both firsthand, written accounts of the author’s life. However, an autobiography hews closer to the chronological facts of the author’s life, while a memoir offers readers the author’s personal experience of a pivotal moment or a series of thematically connected moments. In a memoir, the author’s “feelings and assumptions” are central to the narrative, rather than the facts of events (“What Is a Memoir?” Celadon Books, 3 Dec. 2024).

Memoirs are typically personal, offering reflections and insights based on the author’s life experiences. Ann Patchett’s collection of essays, These Precious Days, is one such example, in which Patchett explores themes of relationships, community, and the importance of writing to her sense of identity, as experienced in her life. Several subgenres within the memoir genre have arisen over the years. Transformation memoirs, for instance, are those centered around the author’s experience of overcoming a specific hardship or challenge in their lives. Tara Westover’s Educated details her journey of obtaining an education after overcoming the challenges presented by her survivalist Mormon family. Confessional memoirs are another subcategory in which the author shares secrets about themselves or their loved ones and explains how these have impacted them. As suggested by the name, The Confessions by Jean-Jacques Rousseau, also considered the first modern autobiography, is one such example, with Rousseau exploring some of the personal scandals that impacted his public life. Another popular subcategory is the travel memoir, with Cheryl Strayed’s Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail and Elizabeth Gilbert’s Eat Pray Love being prime examples.

One subgenre that has found renewed interest in recent times is the celebrity memoir. The celebrity memoir is usually a famous person’s personal account of events and experiences from their life, offering readers a glimpse into what exists behind the public persona. Prince Harry’s Spare and Andre Agassi’s Open are examples of celebrity memoirs. In the former, the former royal recounts his experiences of living a restrictive life as a member of the British royal family; in the latter, the international tennis player honestly recounts his true relationship with the sport that made him famous and successful. However, celebrity memoirs also overlap with other subgenres thematically: For instance, Agassi’s Open can also be read as a confessional memoir in parts, especially when he details his drug use or his secret hatred for tennis.

The Friday Afternoon Club is another celebrity memoir that straddles multiple subgenres. It is undoubtedly a celebrity memoir, with Griffin Dunne writing about his famous family and his own career in Hollywood. The Dunnes are well-known in both Hollywood and literary circles: Griffin’s father, Dominick “Nick” Dunne, was a Vanity Fair writer and published author; his sister, Dominique, was one of the stars of Steven Spielberg’s Poltergeist; and his uncle and aunt, John Dunne and Joan Didion, were celebrated writers in their own right. Griffin himself is an actor, director, and producer, having starred in movies like An American Werewolf in London and After Hours. The Friday Afternoon Club is also part confessional, offering intimate insight into the goings-on within the Dunne family: Nick’s sexuality and secret affairs with men, for instance, or the tense family dynamics between Nick and his famous brother and sister-in-law, especially following his daughter’s murder. Ultimately, however, the book is a deeply personal memoir. Since it offers glimpses of Hollywood life and experiences with the Manhattan elite, Griffin uses these anecdotes to explore the interaction of fame and identity within his own and his family’s lives. He recollects childhood experiences and friendships that shaped him growing up, as well as the horrific tragedy of his sister’s murder that united his family and changed them forever.