Knowing the inevitable doesn’t negate the suspense in Quintessence Theatre Group’s superb staging of Jean Anouilh’s Antigone. A martini-swirling commentator (John Williams) shares at the start that Oedipus’ titular daughter “plays a part she has to play” when she opposes King Creon’s decision to let her traitorous brother’s corpse rot without proper burial. Later, Creon admits the same about himself when he orders Antigone’s execution.

It’s an old, old story, first told by Sophocles 2,400 years ago; the wartime concerns of Anouilh’s take, drafted in 1943 France, remain in Jeremy Sams’ translation. Though the plot is either several decades or a couple of millennia old, it’s easy to draw numerous modern parallels with the themes of resistance to authority.

The play’s talk-heavy, mainly in intense two-person scenes. Tension builds in artistic director Alexander Burns’ production through our connections with the clearly drawn, smartly played characters: Lavita Shaurice’s adherence to her convictions as Antigone; Robert Jason Jackson’s pragmatic Creon, willing to bend rules to avoid a showdown; and the affection and dismay of Antigone’s nurse (Cheryl Williams) and fiancé (and Creon’s son) Haemon (Khris Davis). Even the seemingly petty concerns of the bodyguards become real factors in Antigone’s clash with authority.

As in Quintessence’s exciting repertory of The Merchant of Venice and The Venetian Twins last fall, Burns employs a large, bare stage, modern-dress costuming by Jane Casanave and Mike Billings’ sharp, spare lighting to focus our attention on his cast’s genuine performances and the play’s larger themes. Antigone is drama sans dressing: a brave approach that asks much of both actors and audience and allows neither to hide.

(m_cofta@citypaper.net)

Through March 25, $30, Sedgwick Theater, 7137 Germantown Ave., 215-240-6055, quintessencetheatre.org.