Introduction & Overview of The Homecoming by Harold Pinter

The Homecoming Introduction

The Homecoming, now considered by many critics to be Harold Pinter's masterpiece, was not universally admired when it was first produced in England by the Royal Shakespeare Company at London's Aldwych Theatre, on June 3, 1965. Many critics, while praising the production directed by Peter Hall, found the play itself to be baffling and enigmatic in the extreme. Harold Hobson, critic for the Sunday Times and an early proponent of Pinter's, predicted that the play would "suffer In the estimation of audiences who will perceive an aesthetic defect that does not exist, In the place of a moral vacuum that does." Despite numerous viewer reactions that verified Hobson's forecast, The Homecoming had a long run to packed houses in London before moving to the United States.

The Broadway opening of The Homecoming on January 3, 1967, at the Music Box Theatre was greeted with great excitement Repeating its London...
(read more)