Theatre Casting Call for "Top Girls"

The protagonist of the play, Marlene is a high-ranking official at the Top Girls Employment Agency in London, and, at the start of the action, has just received an important promotion. To celebrate, she convenes a dinner party at a chic London restaurant—but rather than inviting friends, family, or coworkers, Marlene is surrounded only by women plucked from history and legend alike. As the play unfolds, Marlene is shown to be an adroit, smart, cunning, and sharp-tongued woman.

A real-life, thirteenth-century concubine-turned-Buddhist-nun. Lady Nijo was raised from birth to live a life of sexual service to the Emperor—her own father gave her over to the Emperor, & instructed Nijo to become a nun if she ever fell out of favor at court. Over the years, Nijo faced sexual & psychological abuse, & had any female children she bore the Emperor ripped from her arms & taken away to be raised so that they could one day be sent to court as a concubine, just as Nijo herself was.

Pope Joan is a figure who, according to legend, disguised herself as a man in the Middle Ages and reigned as Pope for two years until her true identity was discovered. Pope Joan wanted power so badly that she renounced her womanhood—not only did she hide the fact that she was a woman from her attendants and devotees, but she herself forgot her own womanhood, and did not realize that she had become pregnant as the result of an affair until she gave birth in the street.

Nell is a young woman who works at the Top Girls Employment Agency. Gossipy and aspirational, Nell is happy for Marlene’s success, but nevertheless cannot stop plotting how she herself will manage to rise through the ranks of the corporate world.

Louise is a woman who comes for an interview at the Top Girls Employment Agency with Win. She is forty-six, and Win describes her age as a “handicap.” Louise is frustrated in her current job, where she feels unappreciated and unrecognized despite the twenty-plus years she has put in there. She has watched young men whom she has personally trained go on to receive better jobs both at her own company and elsewhere, and is angry that she herself has been unable to advance.

Mrs. Kidd is the wife of Howard Kidd, a man who works at the Top Girls Employment Agency. Mrs. Kidd comes to visit Marlene to beg for Marlene to refuse the promotion she’s recently earned, so that Howard can have it—Howard is deeply embarrassed and very angry that he has been passed over in favor of a woman. Mrs. Kidd herself is indignant that she has devoted her whole life to her husband in hopes of ensuring his economic success, only to have him lose out to a woman.

Isabella Bird is a real-life, nineteenth-century English explorer, writer, and naturalist. Isabella is the only character at the dinner party who never bore children, and the only character whose work was honored in her lifetime. Churchill no doubt includes Isabella as a dinner party guest for this very reason—she shows how motherhood has, unfortunately, been regarded throughout history as a burden and an albatross.

Dull Gret is the subject of Dulle Griet, a Flemish renaissance painting by Pieter Brueghel the Elder. The painting depicts Gret—an older woman clad in long skirts & battle armor—leading a group of women to pillage Hell. The painting is meant to depict shrewish, demanding women in pursuit of their own greed—in including Gret in the dinner party, Churchill highlights the sexism inherent in this portrayal and yet also draws a subtle comparison between Gret’s desire for power & riches, & Marlene’s.

Patient Griselda is a figure from European folklore, most famously featured in the tales of Boccaccio and Chaucer. A peasant of humble origins, Patient Griselda was selected to marry a handsome, wealthy, and powerful Marquis, who took her away from her family and introduced her to a life of luxury.

Joyce is Marlene’s sister and Angie’s adoptive mother. Whereas Marlene is ambitious, self-serving, and cosmopolitan, Joyce is humble, giving, and rooted firmly in her small, working-class hometown. Joyce is not by any means happy about these differences between herself and her sister—she doesn’t begrudge Marlene her success so much as she disagrees with the choices Marlene has made in pursuit of it.

Win is a young woman who works at the Top Girls Employment Agency. She is having an affair with one of her superiors, Howard, and seems more amused by than jealous of Marlene’s recent success at the agency.

Shona is a young woman who comes for an interview at the Top Girls Employment Agency with Nell and lies about almost everything on her resume, exaggerating her success and inflating her age in order to seem more worldly and successful.

Jeanine is a young woman who comes to the Top Girls Employment Agency for an interview with Marlene. Jeanine wants to make more money, as she is saving to get married and settle down, but Marlene discourages her from prioritizing family life over her work. Marlene also tells her that admitting to future employers that she plans to get married (and perhaps have children) will lower her chances of securing a job.

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