Top Girls @ The Actors Centre, Covent Garden

Impulse Theatre Company presents Top Girls by Caryl Churchill, the 1982 play about a career obsessive woman by the name of Marlene who comes from a troubled family background and has made it in business in the big smoke. The play examines toxic female friendships, women's attitude to success, men and love. Marlene has a troubled relationship with her sister who took on the role of adoptive mother to her child which is a top kept secret throughout the play.

Although the play was written in the 80s at the height of Thatcherite politics, Top Girls has an ever prevalent importance in today's dog eat dog society, particularly in city life. Top Girls is a thoroughly mixed play in that the first half concentrates on symbolising important female historical characters, that perhaps later go onto inspire Marlene's cut throat approach to life. Having never read the play, I found the first half didn't really connect or make sense to me until the very end when I was able to succinctly summarise the behaviours and activities within the piece, and also feel a connection to Marlene and a certain empathy when she delivered the emotionally charged conversation piece with her sister.

 The first scene opened with the intimidating dinner party setting where Marlene (Laurence Vaissiere) made her striking entrance with some indirect flirting with the waiter which signalled her seductive personality. The piece incorporated diverse casting which Impulse Theatre Company should be congratulated on, as the themes transcend all races, cultures and societies across all time frames. Each of the female invites to the party seemed completely averse to the traits of Marlene, in that superficially they seemed intelligent, weaker and unlike Marlene until we get invited into deeper and more intimate conversation with them as the evening strikes on and the wine just keeps flowing. The first half of the play is inspired on American feminists and historical women of importance including Pope Joan, the explorer Isabella Bird, Lady Nijo, and later a Buddhist nun. Each of the women displayed strong leadership characteristics and revealed their plight in life which almost gave the audience a hint of healthy realism and that these women are not super bitches for nothing- there is always reasoning behind a tough, strong woman and why she behaves aloof, superficial and even arrogant. Top Girls conveyed the sad and lonely journey of a lost and emotionally void character in Marlene, given her loveless family and disconnection or sense of belonging to a family unit.

Emotionally, the piece was very fluid as at the beginning no-one could make sense of the action or behaviours of Marlene in particular who gave us that initial impression that she was a hated woman, and we would not change our opinion of her. The play is very real as we all possess that toxic relationship with friends, partners, colleagues or even family and there is no obvious explanation as to why we can't cut the emotional cords. Towards the end of the piece, I did shred a tear or two for Marlene as I related to her insecurity, hunger for success but more importantly desire to be loved and of course love something or someone. Her relationship with her niece (real biological daughter) didn't ever hit the real depths of dysfunctionality, as this could have been a play on it's own to examine the relationship between mother, sister and daughter.

The actors portrayed an unconventional play with their own style, and didn't necessarily stick to the rules which was only to be expected. The positive effect of Top Girls is that is has no rules and can be re-directed in many different fashions given it's non-linear style frame. Impulse Theatre Company is a well established acting company, based in London and Paris (given it's French casting) which focuses on truth and characterisation which are firmly embedded in the teaching style of this acting school. I think Top Girls was an apt choice for the company as each actor was able to grapple with complex emotions, multi-characters and of course convincing the audience that they were on the connected journey for these complex characters who were multi-faceted in nature. The staging was intimate which signalled the need to be close but also on the outside of the action, as each character was closely and carefully dissected for their toxicity and real self.

Top Girls is playing @ The Actors Centre, Covent Garden until Saturday 6 August.

Tonight: Love and Money @ Network Theatre, Waterloo.