The Homecoming starring Jared Harris – review round-up

The Homecoming – devastating or dated?

The Homecoming concerns Max, his brother and three sons, one of whom unexpectedly arrives home from America for the first time in six years with his wife, Ruth. A twisted, testosterone-fuelled game of sexual power and domestic politics ensues. Does it make the critics feel uncomfortable?

For some, The Homecoming remains as riveting as ever. It is “a gripping, enigmatic examination of the power struggle between the sexes” according to Heather Neill (TheArtsDesk, ★★★), while Nick Curtis (Evening Standard, ★★★★) calls it a “timeless study of aggression” and Marianka Swain (Telegraph, ★★★★) writes that the play “should, and does, produce a nasty shock”.

For others, its depiction of domestic abuse has dated. The Homecoming is “nasty, brutish and misogynistic” for Sarah Crompton (WhatsOnStage, ★★★), and leaves her “cold”. For Alice Saville (Independent, ★★) it is “a queasily perverted version of Snow White” that is “packed with some of the most violently misogynistic jibes against women you’ll find anywhere in the theatre canon”.

According to Sam Marlowe (The Stage, ★★★), “the nuance in every jagged phrase – the gut-churning tension, the sewer-waft of choked-down trauma and festering grievance – is simply astonishing”. But “while the men and their history are depicted with a welter of intricate and disturbing implication, the woman remains little more than an enigmatic blank.”

The Homecoming – an underpowered production?

Director Matthew Dunster has staged scores of hits throughout his 20-year career, including Martin McDonagh’s Hangmen and Danny Robins’ 2:22: A Ghost Story. This year, he has already directed productions of Shirley Valentine and The Pillowman. Are the press impressed again?

Some are. Dunster’s production “compels remorselessly” according to Marlowe and is “stylishly expressive” according to Swain. It is “an impeccable production of an important, deeply unpleasant play,” adds Curtis. “It’s a gripping watch but a hard one.”

Others are not convinced. Dunster’s staging is “too timid” for Arifa Akbar (Guardian, ★★★), “unsatisfactory” for Clive Davis (Times, ★★) and “horribly underpowered” for Saville. Dunster approaches the play “naturalistically” and it “simply doesn’t work,” observes Andrzej Lukowski (TimeOut, ★★★). “It runs around on the play’s weirdness, and one of the greatest and strangest works of the 20th century ends up feeling flat and inconsequential.”

There is a similar split over Moi Tran’s set. For Marlowe it has a “decayed stylishness” and for Crompton it is a compelling “cross between bleak and fashionable,” but for Akbar it is “big and airy without any of the tight, claustrophobic intimacy needed to send the family to boiling point.”

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The Homecoming – enigmatic enough?

Jared Harris spent a lot of the 1990s and early 2000s working in theatre, but has since been swept up in film and television, earning acclaim for his roles in the series Mad Men, Chernobyl, and The Crown in particular. Here, he plays patriarch Max, and the reviews are mostly positive.

He “queasily combines sadism and sentimentality” for Marlowe and offers a “bitterly funny” and “grizzled” performance for Curtis, while Fiona Mountford (iNews, ★★★) praises how he “navigates from affability to explosiveness and back again in record time”. Akbar is less impressed. “Harris’ Max is not always a brute enough presence for the necessary menace to pervade” the play, she writes.

Harris is joined by Nicolas Tennant as Max’s chauffeur brother Sam, Joe Cole as his pimping son Lenny, David Angland as aspiring boxer Joey, Robert Emms as estranged academic Teddy, and Lisa Diveney as Teddy’s wife Ruth, who is variously abused and worshipped by the men in the play.

Tennant and Diveney receive the lion’s share of admiration from the critics. Tennant’s Sam is “sublimely played” for Akbar, has “subdued comic flair” for Curtis and displays “battered stoicism” for Marlowe. Diveney, meanwhile, has “the insouciant saunter and watchfulness of a cat, and can switch from predator to prey in a microsecond,” according to Curtis. She is “tremendous”, he adds.

The Homecoming – the verdict

Harold Pinter’s The Homecoming retains its power to disturb – but whether it discomfits the critics in the right way is another matter. Some find its depiction of sexual politics and domestic abuse enthralling. Others find it dated and difficult to swallow. The reviewers are likewise divided over Matthew Dunster’s staging, Moi Tran’s design and the performance of screen star Jared Harris.

Four stars from The Telegraph and The Evening Standard, but two from The Independent and three from everyone else suggest that Harris’ return to theatre might not be the happy homecoming he may have hoped for.