The crucial top girl in theater activist Caryl Churchill's complex Top Girls, being revived by Manhattan Theatre Club at the Biltmore, never appears on stage. She's former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, who was setting the country's political tone during the early 1980's when the play was written in what appears to be a quiet rage. Unfortunately, one of the besetting problems of the play -- which 26 years later has lost more than some of its topical impact -- is that only late in the third act does it become clear what Churchill has been driving at. She is taking a bluntly critical look at Thatcher's dehumanizing social programs and their far-reaching divisive effects, especially on the country's women.
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