It's England under Thatcher and career woman, Marleen, has just been promoted to MD of the Top Girls Employment Agency. And she's having a dinner party to celebrate. With some of myth and history's most powerful women. This is how
Caryl Churchill's play opens.
Written in 1982, when what it described was modern life, the themes of female power and women in the workplace won't be lost on today's audiences. Because the question of how women can 'have it all' - as in career and family - is one that we'll continue to ask ourselves generation after generation. So it's useful for Marleen to help us by asking her historic comrades about their own experiences of 'doing it'.
Asking history for advice
When the play premiered at the Royal Court it was directed by Max Stafford-Clark, who's also directing this revival, which itself was premiered at the Chichester Festival. This might be one of the reasons why the play got reviews there as good as the original ones. In London it's on at the
Trafalgar Studios, and stars Stella Gonet, Suranne Jones, Catherine McCormack, Lucy Briers, Laura Elphinstone, Lisa Kerr and Olivia Poulet.
