Georgina Hill reviews Harold Pinter's The Homecoming at the Almeida Theatre

Michael Attenborough’s production of The Homecoming places emphasis on the disjointedness of the family of Pinter’s script.

The ochre-set with chairs placed in a crescent shape each have a gap between them symbolic of the family’s separateness. The acting, as well, demonstrates the disjunction between the inhabitants. Max, played by Kenneth Cranham, adeptly portrays himself as the patriarch of the household and practitioner of verbal, and probably, physical, violence. His longer pieces of dialogue often erupt into vicious, hissing speech where the meaning of the lines becomes obscured by his anger. He also effectively conveys a sense of his own dissolution, by wistful or self-reflexive looks out to the audience during pauses. Lenny his son (Nigel Lindsay) is also well-acted as a London wide-boy: he is both natural and able to produce comedic effects.

Teddy and Ruth, visitors to the household, despite not living in the house convey their own personal disparity. When they enter they do not seem united in their stance, and their acting serves to demonstrate their underlying antipathy to one another. This is compounded by the introduction of Lenny to Ruth; they have an immediate frisson suggesting Ruth’s marriage is not all that stable.

Sam, Max’s brother (Anthony O’Donnell) is the only character with real compassion: his allusions to Max’s late wife are drawn out by the actor to achieve a sense of his personal and unresolved love of her. He has real dignity and an air of frustration amidst this dysfunctional household.

In Act Two, the action becomes more bizarre with Ruth’s embrace of Lenny and then his brother, Joey. The rendering of the scene is balletic almost: they embark on a kind of sexual dance. This sets about the reconfiguring of the masculine home: Ruth (Jenny Jules) ends up taking control of the men and demanding what she likes. Teddy is left to return home to America and Ruth takes her place in the central arm-chair. Attenborough leads us to see Ruth as the new dominant figure of the London household with the men all positioned towards her at the end.

This is certainly an ambiguous play: one wonders how Ruth can decide that living in this disjointed home is better than her old life; and also how the men can choose to share her. Jenny Jules as Ruth is distinctly cool and detached in her part, but at times this is too much; with all that occurs one imagines she might show more ambivalence to her situation. Her curling grin in the last moment of the play shows an unexpected pleasure in her new world.