Top Girls

Women & Work

Power in the workplace

The play investigates the power inequalities AMONG women as a result of professional status, social class, education.

Reveals that among themselves, women are as capable of creating and reinforcing rigid hierarchies as men are

A series of interviews and meetings that enable the larger issues and dilemmas facing working women to emerge

Note the shifts in tone and diction as the ‘top girls’ interact with people

Interview Scenes

Reveal the opportunities open to women as well as the limits they face.

Provide insight into the qualities and sacrifices which are required for ‘success’ in the workplace

Allow comparison between the 3 ‘top girls’ Marlene, Win and Nell, and the women they interview

People are seen as units of production in the capitalist economy whose value is determined by a combination of their educational qualifications, ambition and general ability

The interview process assesses individuals for their perceived ability to play a role in the capitalist system

Interview Scenes

A hierarchy of industries Industries associated with products that are linked to ‘feminine’

domains like fashion or domestic products (knitwear, cosmetics, lampshades) are lower down the hierarchy compared to the ‘top fields’ associated with traditionally ‘masculine’ domains like electronics and computers

Marriage / family and career seen as conflicting priorities

Marlene and Jeanine

Highlights the difficulties faced by women with limited educational qualifications

Presents marriage and family as a viable escape for such women

Stark imbalance of power between Marlene and Jeanine Marlene’s quickfire succession of questions rapidly places

Jeanine as someone without the qualifications and drive to ‘make it’ in the competitive fields (eg. advertising) she aspires towards

Marlene & Jeanine

Jeanine’s uncertainty and lack of confidence expressed in statements like ‘I don’t know’, ‘I don’t think so’, ‘I might do’, ‘I thought…’, and unfinished sentences (‘I don’t really…’, ‘I just mean…’)

In contrast, Marlene’s tone is brusque, even peremptory and patronising

She wastes no words in extracting the information she wants from Jeanine – uses one-word sentences (‘To?’, ‘Friendly?’, ‘Prospects’), interrupts Jeanine, ignores questions that she considers irrelevant

Marlene – characterised as aggressive, goal-oriented: her promotion to managing director seems well-deserved

Win & Louise

Highlights the way women have to imitate men to succeed in the workplace – Louise claims that she ‘pass(es) as a man at work’, sees herself as above ‘the girls’

Draws attention to the sacrifices made by career women to advance in the workplace (‘I haven’t had a great deal of social life’, p.51)

Introduces the ‘new woman’ – ‘a kind of woman who is thirty now who grew up in a different climate. They are not so careful. They take themselves for granted.’ women like Marlene, Win and Nell

Louise ironically reinforces patriarchal biases against women in the workplace in her attitudes towards other women (‘I don’t care greatly for working with women’, p.52)

Parallel between Louise and Marlene in their single-minded focus on their career

Win & Louise

The power imbalance between interviewer and interviewee is not so stark here – Louise is more confident in the face of Win’s questioning, Win is friendlier and more polite than Marlene

Win uses more complex sentences than Marlene’s short, sharp questions (eg. Win: “Have you dependents?” vs Marlene: “Prospects?”)

Louise – uses more sophisticated diction than Jeanine and Shona – Win assumes this in her use of euphemism (‘No long term understandings come to a sudden end, making for an insupportable atmosphere?’, p.51)

Louise – initially polite, guarded replies, but eventually lets down her guard and gives vent to her resentments about how she has been overtaken by younger men and women

Contrast between Louise’s long, emotional outburst and Win’s carefully-diplomatic questions accentuates the vulnerability beneath Louise’s initial professional demeanour

Nell & Shona

Underlines the desperate desire for glamour and success engendered by media depictions of career women in the 1980s

Nell’s interviewing style has more in common with Marlene’s than Win’s similar direct, brusque questioning

Together with the fact that Nell has also applied for the position of managing director, suggests that Nell shares Marlene’s focus and aggression

However, Nell’s response to Shona leaves room for widely differing interpretations

No stage directions to suggest what Shona looks like, how she behaves or at what point Nell realises it is all ‘a pack of lies’

Does Nell realise from the start that Shona is not all she presents herself to be? If so, why does she allow the interview to carry on for so long?

If Nell only sees through Shona during Shona’s long speech at the end of the interview, then her competence as interviewer has to be questioned

Nell & Shona

Many clues that Shona is not what she says she is Shona’s answers often echo Nell’s questions not

very articulate, does not speak for herself (in contrast to Louise)

Shona’s long set speech describing her fantasy life on the road is an unrealistic portrayal of the life of a travelling salesperson

Full of repetitions, indicative of her inexperience and insecurity

Employs clichés of the 1980s success story peddled by the media at the time

Office politics

Stage design: the 3 desks are a symbol of each woman’s independent professional status

The scene takes place on a Monday morning marks the transition between the worlds of home and work, allows for more casual conversation between the women that reveals something of their personal lives

Dialogue between Win, Nell and Marlene

Interweaves comments about their work and colleagues with discussions of their personal lives

Presents the professional personas of the 3 women Almost no overlapping dialogue suggests that the women

are listening to what each other have to say and wait their turn to speak

Use of informal diction (slang expressions and expletives) and short, sharp sentences keeps the conversation brisk and casual

Language that can be crude and unrefined a masculine spoken language that is adopted to appear tough and invulnerable

Despite the glimpses into the women’s personal lives (Win’s affair with a married man, Nell’s multiple dates and a rejected marriage proposal) and career ambitions, the conversation is impersonal in tone, stripped bare of emotion

Their earning power ensures that marriage is no longer necessary as a source of financial security liberal sexual values

Anecdotes that highlight their independence and defiance of social convention (eg. Win’s weekend escapade at her lover’s is described as a ‘bit of fun’; Nell’s preference for ‘Ovaltine’ on her own on Sunday over her two weekend dates)

Edgy discussions in which both women attempt to probe into each others’ career plans and prospects without revealing anything significant about their own – marked by terse questions and replies

Mutual sharing of information about their clients labelled as ‘high flyers’, ‘little girls’, ‘pretty bastards’

Banter that could be read as friendly or competitive, or a combination of both

Apparent solidarity in the labels they give themselves: ‘tough bird like us’

Attempts to appear worldly-wise and fashionably jaded

Friendly (or competitive?) teasing about Marlene’s promotion which is met by a good-natured rebuff from Marlene (‘shut your face, pet’ – use of slang and a casual term of endearment ensures the right balance in this friendly rebuke)

Marlene’s relative silence a variety of possible interpretations. Her speeches are short and functional reveal her pragmatism and

lack of sentimentality – typically ‘masculine’ qualities which enable her to succeed as ‘top girl’

‘I’m doing some of Pam’s ladies’, ‘Anyway they’d see you in the garden’, ‘Do you feel bad about it?... Who does?’ (p.50)

Effect the women appear intelligent, witty, calculative, strong and fiercely independent, competitive, unconcerned about traditional notions of sexual morality

Marlene & Mrs Kidd

Symbolic clash of two incompatible value systems that perceive family and career from opposite perspectives

Mrs Kidd ironically reinforces and reproduces the patriarchal norms that entrap women

Speaks using the same educated diction as Louise indicative of her middle-class status

Contrasts with Louise in her prioritization of marriage and family over self

Parallels Louise in the resentment she feels at the sacrifices she has made

Voices her resentment at the role she has taken on (‘I put him first every step of the way. And now what do I get? You women this, you women that.’ p.58)

Yet continues to take on the role of the supportive, protective wife who has to guard her husband’s dignity without letting him know it (‘You mustn’t tell him I came. He’s very proud.’ p.59)

Takes it for granted that it is ‘only fair’ that Howard should get the job, appeals to sentiment in her attempt to persuade Marlene to give up the post

Critiques the bourgeois feminist values that Marlene espouses: ‘You’re one of these ballbreakers… You’ll end up miserable and lonely. You’re not natural.’

In contrast, Marlene appeals to reason and adopts the more formal language of business in her conversation with Mrs Kidd (‘Naturally I’ll be tactful and pleasant to him, you don’t start pushing someone round. I’ll consult him over any decisions affecting his department.’ p.58)

Win and Angie

Angie’s role – her age and naivety allows Win to drop her professional persona so that the audience is given glimpses of her personal life

Softens the aggressive professional image that has been presented of Win so far

Underlined by the kindness she shows Angie (teasing allusion to the tale of Goldilocks, asks about Marlene)

In contrast, Marlene’s coldness towards Angie reinforces the impression of Marlene as hard-hearted and unsentimental

Angie represents the group of women who will be left behind in Thatcher’s capitalist, market-driven economy ‘She’s not going to make it’, consigned to being ‘packer at Tesco’ (p.66)

Win’s long monologue presents a more vulnerable, less aggressive personality than Marlene and Nell