Play review – “The Home of the Brave” by Arthur Laurents

The work that launched Laurents' career it was at the forefront of the post war interest in psychology – a soldier has had a breakdown, and it turns out the reason was anti-Semitism. Act one and two deals with the soldier’s breakdown including flashbacks to a fatal mission to a Pacific island, and a climax where the doctor gets the patient to walk by calling him a dirty Jew (oh those tough love shrinks). So act three feels a bit anti-climactic – its about the Jewish guy learning its OK to feel guilty that he’s like anyone else – though there is a satisfying moment where he punches out a bigot and its nice he and the one armed man go off to set up a bar together. OK maybe to neat but after all the death and stuff a bit of neatness isn’t amiss.