The Clean House

The play is set in “a metaphysical Connecticut,” in a home “not far from the sea and not far from the city” (7), in a living room entirely decorated in white. Ruhl specifies that throughout the play, subtitles may be projected to announce scene titles, translations, and stage directions. According to the character descriptions, “everyone in this play should be able to tell a really good joke” (7). In the first scene, Matilde, a Brazilian cleaning woman in her late twenties, dressed in black, speaks in Portuguese to the audience. Even to audience members who do not understand the language, her delivery makes it clear that she is telling a joke. When the joke ends, Matilde exits. 

Lane, a doctor in her early fifties, enters wearing white and addresses the audience. In a brief speech, she talks about her Brazilian cleaning woman (Matilde, whom she does not name), who “decided that she was depressed one day” and would no longer clean Lane’s house (9). When Lane told the woman to clean, she refused. Finally, Lane brought her to see a doctor, but even once on medication, the woman still would not clean.