Some plays go through an awkward adolescence. Too young to be new, they are not old enough to be period. For a while, they can seem to be less about the playwright’s themes than about the trappings of their era.
Just over 40 years after its Royal Court debut, Caryl Churchill’s Top Girls sometimes looks in this revival by Suba Das like a commentary on the decade that brought us shoulder pads, macramé owls and the Eurythmics. Dallas is showing on the spindly legged TV and a couple of the actors are so overstated they could be auditioning for parts. Even the theatre’s publicity promises the “music and fashion that transformed Britain” as if we were in for a night of retro fun.
