The scenic design in "Glengarry Glen Ross" is the best I've seen at the newish Severance Building theater space.

As this chipper yet gratifyingly dark production of Artists' Repertory Theatre's production of David Mamet's classic script opens, we're confronted with a cramped, claustrophobic jumble of vividly red upholstered restaurant booths. They appear smashed together, as if someone has moved all the furniture to one side of the room for carpet cleaning. Behind the gaudy booths, separated by a few desultory Chinese-restaurant-type screens, we see the guts of a sad and tired real-estate office: a few clunky metal desks shoved together, a coat rack on the wall for the salesmen to hang their inevitable off-the-rack suit jackets, several feeble parcel maps showing the "choice" Florida lots being offered to unwitting investors.

The practical benefits of the scenic design are obvious: It's as if you get the two settings called for in the play with the ease of a single unit set. All you have to do is remove the restaurant tables after the first two acts and expand the office furniture. But the effect of the set (designed by Jeff White) is more than just expediency: there's an Expressionistic impact -- a visceral emotional draw -- as well, particularly in the opening of the play. It's as if the cramped furniture is somehow paralleling the hemmed-in lives of the characters, who seem to be trapped in a never-ending, Sisyphean task of unloading worthless real estate on the same unsuspecting march of naive people.

With today's real-estate downtrun, this is a particularly good time to restage Mamet's 1984 play. There's always been an intriguing give-and-take between abstraction and realism in this story of bottom-feeding hucksters. Mamet writes of salesmen fighting over "leads" -- the names of the most promising customers (or suckers, as you might call them) -- but in many parts of the play, it's easy to lose sight of the fact that we're even talking about real estate at all.

The "leads" so sought after by the hungry salesmen become almost a thing of abstraction. They could be anything that a pack of cutthroat carnivores fight for: the best piece of meat, the most appealing female, the choicest territory. At one point the struggling Levine (smartly played by Luis Ramentas) unloads the most terrifying monologue of the play as he describes moving in for the "kill" as he closes a real-estate deal with a hapless couple. To hear Levine describe it, he can pinpoint the precise moment that he "won" -- when the couple simply gave up, almost imperceptibly slumping, as if bowing to their fate. It's what you'd imagine a hard-fighting animal finally does when it submits to a stronger predator. What Mamet seems to be saying is that in the constant battle to be top dog, human beings almost naturally fall into a pattern of ruthlessness. Survive or be eaten.

Then we add to this generalist gloom the very concrete reality of today's market. After all, there are likely people in the audience who are intimately familiar with the concept of real-estate investments heading south. The play takes on even starker tones.

Director Michael J. Peterson keeps his actors tight and on target as they navigate Mamet's trademark rapid-fire patter. Strongest in the cast in terms of the "Mamet touch" are Gordon Moore, as the beaten-down George, and Jaguar Bennett, as the conniving Dave, who hatches a plan to steal the precious "leads" from the real estate office. (Bennett is at his larcenous best with his seated, controlled and goading delivery; later in the play, when he paces the office in an uproar, he gets a little too intense.) In one wrenching moment, the hapless George asks Dave "is that the truth?", wondering if he'll get a new job if he agrees to steal, and your heart almost breaks at his gullible nature. (Of course, then you have to tell yourself that this is a salesman who makes his living bilking people out of their life savings.)

The very able Mike Harrison, who plays the most swaggering salesman, Richard Roma, is a standout. He's a combination of ruthless and smarmy, and his fiery persona -- which has to change abruptly when he talks to a meek customer (a nicely low-key Hal Bolen, II) -- is compelling. Ricci Mazzuca, hard-charging (but also a little too blustery) as an investigating police detective, and Jeff White, who is restrained (but perhaps a little too much so) as the office boss, round out the cast.

Chris Campbell's lighting design is stark and effective.

What struck me while watching "Glengarry Glen Ross" after several years is how mercurial this play is -- how quickly the balance of power shifts amongst the constantly jockeying characters. We like to think of ourselves as civilized, of course, and not mere animals who are ready to bring down the leader of the pack at the first weakness, but the playwright suggests otherwise. The stunning thing is how quickly it can happen. When I first saw the show, I remember that the real-estate market was soaring. Not anymore. What goes up can go down, and Mamet doesn't let us forget it.