Pinter (b. 1930-d.2008) won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2005 for a body of work that included 29 plays and numerous works for the movies and TV.  He also acted and directed more than 50 productions.

His plays have been called ‘comedies of menace’, and The Homecoming, which won the Tony Award for Best Play in 1967 as well as one in 2008 for best revival, certainly fits that description.  In Act I we meet Max, the father of Lenny and Joey, and the brother of Sam.  Max is in his 70’s and is a retired butcher while Sam continues to work as a chauffeur. The two sons are Lenny ( the starring role played by Ian Holm in the play’s first performance)  who is a pimp while Joey works in demolition and has aspirations to be a boxer.  The third son, Teddy appears late in the Act with his wife, Ruth (played in the original production by Vivian Merchant, Pinter’s wife) , arriving home from America where he is a PhD professor in philosophy.

The Act has an aura of danger–Max insults his sons and his brother while Lenny goads him on and even the arrival of Teddy and Ruth feels wrong.  In Act II there is a total breakdown of the social order.  Teddy is ignored as first Lenny and then Joey kiss and fondle Ruth and then Max and the brothers come up with a plan to have Ruth work as a prostitute to support them.  Ruth agrees and the play ends with each character isolated and dreaming of a better world.

I’ve now read this play twice and I’m still not sure where Pinter’s going with it. One critic described Pinter’s plays as “beginning with an apparently innocent situation that becomes both threatening and absurd as Pinter’s characters behave in ways often perceived as inexplicable by his audiences and one another.” That ‘inexplicable’ certainly was my experience.  Was the theme the alienation from a society whose expectations fail to lead to happiness?  Was it that everyone fails in this life and will be unhappy despite what they accomplish?  Was it the failure of the family to provide for our needs?  Not sure, but I know you don’t leave the theater after watching this play humming a tune and snapping your fingers. What a tough drama to watch!