The Maids

The Depot Theatre's production of Jean Genet's French classic, The Maids, feels more like a middle of the road performance showcasing the pitfalls of dealing with translated texts than a thorough and intriguing exploration of the class divide.

Director Angelo Samolis gives little to his actors who seem to fumble through the 85-minute play with little understanding of their intentions. The delivery is at most times harsh to the ears and lacklustre to watch.

The opening interaction between Claire (Jessica Saras) and Solange (Chantelle Von Appen) has that painful combination of longwinded unpunctuated and uninspiring chunks of dialogue. Genet is not to blame for the tedium of our introduction to the world of The Maids and neither is translator Bernard Frechtman.

The blame lies solely on the heads of this production who do not build the tension of this "harrowing dark comedy" and struggle to find light and shade in the beautiful turns of phrase and philosophical meditations. Instead, the actors waffle on, shuffling about the stage almost aimlessly while ignoring Drama 101, forgetting to get to the crux of what's at stake.

Louise Harding's portrayal of the "pretentious" Madame is a welcome intrusion into the underwhelming interactions of the maids. Unfortunately, it is too little too late as the audience has lost all patience with the floundering would-be cunning maids.

The final sequences prove an endurance race as Solange slides into a sort of dull and airy madness. Everything about this production seems like the dress gifted to Claire by her mistress, "made by Chanel" yet made of some garishly cheap and tacky swathe of red material. It is amateurish in its direction, dissonant in its delivery and torn and frayed long before its denouement.