You Shouldn't Go Home Again

Teddy is a philosopher from a hardscrabble North London family who has made a new life in America. Part of that new life is his wife, Ruth, also a working-class Londoner who is now the mother of three sons. The couple returns to Teddy's family home so that his surviving relations -- his father, uncle and two brothers -- can meet Ruth for the first time. What follows is a series of misunderstandings, arguments, reconciliations and the cryptic reshuffling of family dynamics. Harold Pinter's The Homecoming is a dark and unsettling drama that offers no concrete answers. Instead, as in all of Pinter's best plays, multiple truths and possibilities are to be found in the long pauses of terse speeches, the physical actions of the players and the way a character lights a cigar. St. Louis Actors' Studio presents The Homecoming at 8 p.m. Thursday through Saturday and 3 p.m. Sunday (May 23 through June 8) at the Gaslight Theater (358 North Boyle Avenue; 314-458-2978 or www.stlas.org). Tickets are $30 to $35.
Thursdays-Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays, 3 p.m. Starts: May 23. Continues through June 8, 2014