By Nelson Pressley
Special to The Washington Post
Thursday, November 15, 2007

Shall the maids in "The Maids" be played by women or men? When Jean Genet wrote this play of searing resentment and loathing in 1947, he wanted men (although he didn't get them), and that's certainly the more subversive choice.

Scena Theatre, however, is making a good case for women in the company's extremely well-acted version at the Warehouse Theater -- a comparatively kind and gentle staging of a play that can be as harsh as a director wants to make it. It is, after all, a ferociously rebellious game of dominance and submission played by two sisters while their dreaded mistress is away.

Director Gabriele Jakobi delivers this as straight class oppression, with the sisters wearing humiliating gray uniforms that look like prison garb (the fine costumes are by Alisa Mandel). Claire, the younger sister, sometimes slips into Madame's elegant gowns as the maids fantasize about killing her, revving themselves up by mimicking the humiliations they daily suffer. Nanna Ingvarsson's Solange even looks like a junta leader now and then, striking weary, defiant postures with a kerchief tied around her head.

But the sisters are better at playacting than acting; their revolution is merely improvised. The fervent anti-Madame rituals have a high polish, and the maids are so practiced that they can nudge the scenarios with a quick word spoken out of character, snapping back into the master-slave relationship effortlessly.

For the maids, this is pathetic stuff, and the production expertly captures their quiet desperation. The acting has a furtive, low-key quality, with Jenifer Deal's Claire often impersonating the vile Madame almost as if she's in prayer. Not that the performances lack bite; Deal and Ingvarsson each register enough hot bitterness and grim anger to give the scenario a plausible sense of danger.

But it's an admirable paradox that while playing characters engaged in histrionics, Deal and Ingvarsson never remotely go over the top. The grievances come across in their nuanced deliveries of Genet's seething speeches and in facial expressions that you're close enough to read in the small theater.

As Madame, Danielle Davy brings a bit of "Great Gatsby" reckless indolence, and Jakobi emphasizes the character's supreme power by subtly amplifying her entrance. Jakobi's method is to add bits of atmosphere without laying it on thick, so music wells up under the scenes only briefly, and Marianne Meadows's lighting design shifts without straying far from its basic dappled, shadowy look.

Richard Montgomery's set smartly blends hard and soft elements, namely the lush flowers strewn about the room and the fine metal mesh against the walls caging the maids. Everything works (you wouldn't have dared to guess it, for no company in town is more hit-and-miss than Scena). And as Deal and Ingvarsson cuddle and abuse each other on this one-way trip down, the production captures a rare theatrical quality: It breathes.

The Maids, by Jean Genet. Directed by Gabriele Jakobi. Sound design, Chris Pifer. About 1 hour 40 minutes. Through Dec. 16 at the Warehouse Theater, 1021 Seventh St. NW. Call 703-684-7990 or visit http://www.scenatheatre.org.