SOURCE: Morley, Sheridan. “Pinter Surprise.” Spectator 285, no. 8990 (25 November 2000): 69-70.

In the following review, Morley applauds a production of Pinter's The Caretaker that emphasizes the comic elements of the play.

Now here's a funny thing, and it happens rather surprisingly to be Harold Pinter's The Caretaker. In celebration of the dramatist's 70th birthday, and indeed the 40th birthday of the play itself, Pinter's first international hit is back with us in a new staging by the playwright Patrick Marber, who also knows a thing or two about menace and minimalism.

But the surprise is in the tone of the playing, notably that of Sir Michael Gambon who (now in his full Ralph Richardson eccentricity on stage) moves the title character about as far as it is possible to get from the original, defining, sinister and secretive stage and screen presence of the late Donald Pleasence. It is not that...