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Servants stage a murderous revolt
THE MAIDS
Pentameters
“WHAT we need is hatred,” radical French playwright Jean Genet once opined. “From it our ideas are born.” He meant it too, if this nightmarish drama is anything to go by.
Servant girl Solange (Gabrielle Meadows) and her sister Claire (Emma Carroll, pictured) are sizzling with hatred – of themselves, but mostly of their mistress.
They have no real love for each other either, informing us: “When slaves love one another, it is not love” and “filth cannot love filth”.
Diabolical fumes rise from this venomous broth. Between semi-erotic ceremonies in their mistress’ boudoir, the maids send letters to the cops, resulting in the arrest of their madam’s paramour. Nigh delirious, they turn to plotting murder, declaring: “Who am I? The monstrous soul of servantdom!”
This play is about power. The mistress, it would seem, has it, while the maids don’t. However, Genet forces us to question whether this is really so.
Murder – the ultimate expression of absolute power over another person – seems to offer the maids hope of escaping their claustrophobic captivity.
Genet, whose mother was a prostitute and who himself turned to smuggling, pick-pocketing and prostitution as a wandering tramp, must have known what it felt like to be a member of the underclass.
After achieving success as a writer, Genet entered the United States illegally to support the Black Panthers. Though hardly light entertainment, this play does make one want to know more about a writer who was evidently angry and probably experienced his fair share of hatred – but who was all the more original for it.
Until October 3
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