It has the misfortune of looking like it's piggy-backing on
The Audience (and in fact was almost shelved when that play was announced) but
Handbagged actually predates it: Moira Buffini's play started life as an installment of the Tricycle's
Women, Power and Politics in 2010.
When that show's director, Indhu Rubasingham, became Artistic Director of the venue, she commissioned a full-length version of the battle of wills between Britain's two most powerful women of the 1980s, the Queen and Margaret Thatcher. The setup remains as eccentric as before: A pairing of the two women in more recent years, Q (Marion Bailey) and T (Stella Gonet) introduce the meetings - primarily at the weekly audience Peter Morgan's play revolved around - between their younger selves Liz (Clare Holman) and Mags (Fenella Woolgar.)
