The Maids

Jean Genet

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Photos From the Play
Photos From the Play



Directed by: Mahir Gunsiray

Dramaturgy by: Cetin Sarikartal

Translated by: Salah Birsel

Stage Designer : Claude Leon - Selim Birsel

Music : Turgay Erdener

Lighting Design: Yuksel Aymaz

Technicians: Ece Eroglu, Ayca Damgaci

Actors: Alper Develioglu, Guven Ince, Mahir Gunsiray

The date of premier : 18.02.2000

Cast of 1997

Directed by: Mahir Gunsiray
Dramaturgy by: Cetin Sarikartal
Translated by: Salah Birsel
Stage Designer : Claude Leon - Selim Birsel
Music : Turgay Erdener
Lighting Design: Yuksel Aymaz
Actors: Taner Birsel, Erdinc Dogan, Mahir Gunsiray
The date of premier : 04.04.1997

 

 

"I could not say exactly what theatre is, but I know what I don't like it to be. Theatre will not be showing from the stage of the quotidian in its exterior manifestations. I go to the theatre to see myself on the stage. This me could be someone created as an individual or could be staged as a multi dimensional personality and shown in the form of a dream.; I will see myself, or I will try to imagine or try to see myself, but knowing that it is a such a personality. Thus, the function of the players is to assume the behaviours and appearances that will help to show myself to me and to stage me as naked, solitary and happy in my loneliness.
Jean Genet (How should "The Maids" be played)

About "The Maids"

The maids, amongst the first plays of Jean Genet, deals with the contradictions of man-woman, master-slave, dominant culture- other culture. The play, which is built upon the elaborate plan of the two maids to kill their mistress, goes much beyond a simple murder story. The actors change roles, each becoming the other, in accordance with the text. In the production of Theatre Oyunevi, the three female roles are acted out by male actors. In this way, the borders between the murderer- the victim, right-wrong, mistress-maid, male-female get blurred and the identities are turned into illusions. Thus, the play develops into a ceremony in which crime and death are celebrated. The dominant discourse, which obliges people to stay within the boundaries of race, sex and class distinctions, inflicting upon their roles which they themselves have not chosen, is threatened by the dangers of the act carried on stage.

The maid-female identity, constantly humiliated by the system and unable to express itself, is exposed to the society through a ceremony of violence created on the scene.

Staged at


Critics

"The hardness of killing the madame"
"In "The Maids ", Mahir Gunsiray carried three female characters to play by three male actors on the stage. This replacement, coinciding with the spirit of the play avangardist, abstractionist, be exent to incoherence, facilities to bring about the secondaries except for the text. Gunsiray, with Cetin Sarikartal's dramaturgy, has simplified the text. The scenery and the costumes are also in the same simplicity. Every object on the stage is reciprocating an action exists in the text. Red armchair is that associated with murder, the mirror as the beginning and the complementary of the female beauty, plastic clothes which kills the sense of realism, warps with flowery patterns are the supplementary elements of the play."

"..."The Maids" with its language, acting and direction, is more different, closed and harder to be comprehended than the others which have been presented in our country until today. It's suggested for the ones looking for a different taste."
Nazan Manyasli Alakent Gazete Pazar, 11.5.1997

"The oppressed swallows the oppressed"
" ... This hard play of Jean Genet in which the 'bad' and 'crime' are exalted and forcing the player to shoulder an unfamiliar role, is put in front of us as a production with full care for its direction, music, scenery and acting."
Sibel Arslan Radikal, April 1997

Interview with Mahir Gunsiray

 

POSITION OF A WOMAN IN MAN DOMINATED SOCIETY AND MASTER-SLAVE RELATIONSHIP: "THE MAIDS", Emre Koyuncuoglu, Cumhuriyet, 27 April 1997


Why did you prefer male actors to perform female characters?
M.G - Jean Genet claims that he wants male players to perform female characters in his plays. We searched the reason for this. Then we find out the reason is also suitable for us; and we made our decision as male actors.
If you have a look at he theme of the play, you'll se that it's not only a women play. The play "The maids" tells about master and slave relationship. On the other hand it investigates position of women troughly in men dominated society. In this point of view, play turns to a dying-killing game. Therefore, performing it with male or female actors displays no significant difference. And at the same time performing with male players has some advantages in increasing the effects of the play. Firstly, when it is staged with female actors all the elements shelters in text would be translated in very "normal" platform.
The most important way of performing with men is creating an abnormal situation. This also includes the idea "creating a body (trunk) show that bases on abnormality" of Jean Genet. Our purpose was to manage discovering the new expressions with joy on stage. In play with male actors, we create a distance between the 'meaning' and its voiced-articulation. In this way we have the chance to threaten the words/statements and make them reperceptable again.

But in text, isn't the form of relationship between women is also emphasized? But on stage, it's between men as soon as requested. So how did you approached to this interpretation?
M.G.- Actually, it's a play about women-men problems. "the lady" is also in a slave position towards "the husband". So her relation with the maids is based on a dependence. I, personally don't want to live in a man dominated society. And as an actor, I have the chance to represent a woman's situation in a man dominated society. As male persons, more or less we like to take some responsibility about this issue.

In your opinion, can men solve problems of women?
M.G.- In our performances, plays, we more want to show that 'we are living that situation' instead of trying to solve something.

Is there a physical language in play?
M.G. - We tried to discover very different voices. With those voices and differences in tones and rhythms, we tried to make the words re-comprehensible. But there are some levels in play. In this way, we separated some scenes from each other by different acting styles, physical languages and voices. Genet feels sick about "being distanced from traditionalistic, cool-headed acting, academically educated and urbanely characterized presentation and classical attitudes"

In Stage design, in costumes and in some references in acting, we see an eastern style.
M.G. - Yes that's a choice we did on purpose. There's another saying of Genet: "Where ever the play is being staging, it must considered harmoniously to that region." "Where ever in world there were people who were looked on with scorn, and people want to escape from slavery and humiliation, I was on their side." And truly he did it this way. And if take this idea as basis, it's really important for us the area we're stepping on. It's said that we re in the east side. If you'd pay attentioned, our costumes, pants are from Bitlis; jackets are old "efe" jackets and inspired from old Ottoman costume arms. In costumes west and east are against each other. That's a very important point for the play. Of course, our physical movements are in a way closer to the Orient.


Did you build an east-west relationship in woman-man dilemma?
Actually, here, there's a micro or a minor attitude. We approached with Hegel's approaching to master-slave relationship. It's obvious that nobody's going to be a master if there won't be any slave. And if east is 'the other' considering to west, in other words in a slave position; as long as it carries the purpose of dominance, opposing of east against west will be dissolvable. The problem is, staying away from the danger of building a contrary dominant discourse. From this point of view, we can both approach to contradiction between woman-man and east-west with the same attitude.