Review: THE HOMECOMING, Young Vic

Matthew Dunster’s production of The Homecoming promises a “refocusing” of Pinter’s 1965 classic. I’m not sure what that is supposed to mean, but in reality it translates to a plastic production defanged of its guttural animal instincts and brutal bite. If you squint, you can make out Pinter’s genius, it’s sabre sliced cross-section of gendered power dynamics is just about detectable through the smoky haze.

On paper the production is a recipe for success. Dunster is a commercially savvy director, renowned for his theatrical collaborations with Martin McDonagh and runaway hit 2:22 A Ghost Story. Throw in A-listers Jared Harris and Joe Cole (Chernobyl and Peaky Blinders) with a narcotically jazzy soundtrack that oozes 60’s Soho cool, and you have the recipe for a theatrical heavy hitter. But all the surfaces are too polished. The grubby psychological depth that audiences crave from a Pinter play is totally and tonally sanitised.

We are in the decaying living room of Max, an East End Butcher, and his aimless sons; the nihilistic Lenny and dim-witted Joey. Their claustrophobic family dynamic is shaken to its foundations when oldest son Teddy returns from America with Ruth who he has married unbeknownst to the rest of his family. Instead of cannibalistically gnawing at each other they posture and pose attempting to savagely fashion her into a mother, wife, and sex object.

Pinter’s tale is a grim one of misogyny and masculinity so toxic that you should want to shower after watching it. Instead it is defanged, none of that claustrophobic grit takes a life of its own on stage.

Dare I say Dunster is too eager to please. The “refocusing” is likely an attempt to detoxify the play, toning down the nasty misogyny to make it palatable for cautious audiences. In doing so it misses the point. That nastiness needs to be thrown kicking and screaming into the cold light so that we can see it for what it really is; Pinter characters are beasts that need to roam free, not waddle under the over-stylised spotlight of a sanitised sanctuary.

Cole’s Lenny is the worst offender. With full throttle charisma, here he is a hormonal adolescent with a cartoonishly East End accent. His grime-stained monologues detail sordid nights prowling around London’s dark underbelly picking and beating up prostitutes, questionably handled as an easy to please gag.  Much of Lenny’s sardonic menace, that needs time and attention to conjure, is ignored leaving Cole more a prancing peacock than the gutter rat that he is on the page.

Threat is the cornerstone of early Pinter plays. Without it a production has no structure on which to build. The knock-on effect is palpable especially for Ruth whose defiance in opposition to her male oppressors is rendered tepid as a result. Harris’ Max suffers too. Though always watchable, he is a bumbling buffoon with no danger to wield. 

Flashes of crisp spotlights garish hot-blooded moments, icy standoffs and the infamous Pinter pauses, all aesthetic overkill throwing the guttural rhythm off kilter. This isn’t to say that the production is messy in execution. It is focused and tightly crafted. But the vision doesn’t conjure any weight. 

The Homecoming plays at The Young Vic until 27 January 2024

Photo Credits: Manuel Harlan

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