The Housekeeper is one of those American “problem” plays which stumbles over to us with a furrow in its brow (located squarely in the middle) and asks us to believe in an elderly father and a middle-aged son who stand locking fists while they feed each other lines like, “You used me like a football.” Leo McKern rumpoles and grumpoles through a cod Brooklyn accent. Clive Merrison is miscast as his son; Connie Booth is a hapless softball; Tom Conti, for some reason, directed it. Frank D. Gilroy wrote it.