Kip Williams Opens 1947 'The Maids' at St. Ann’s, Recasting Madame as a 20-Something Influencer
Updated
Updated · The New York Times · May 26
Kip Williams Opens 1947 'The Maids' at St. Ann’s, Recasting Madame as a 20-Something Influencer
1 articles · Updated · The New York Times · May 26
May 17 marked the start of performances for Kip Williams’s “The Maids” at St. Ann’s Warehouse after a 2025 run at London’s Donmar Warehouse.
Williams rewrites Jean Genet’s 1947 drama in a contemporary idiom, turning Madame into a vacuous billionaire influencer while keeping the plot of two sisters who fantasize about killing their employer.
Yerin Ha plays Madame, with Lydia Wilson and Phia Saban as Claire and Solange, in a staging that uses phones, live filming and mirrored wardrobe projections to blur identity and performance.
At the center of Williams’s version is a question about modern selfhood: he said phones push people further from themselves in a world that offers constant chances to perform rather than simply be.
As our lives become more performed, how can theatre reveal the line between our authentic and digital selves?
Is 'cinetheatre' the evolution of live performance, or a concession to a screen-obsessed world?