Character analysis
Grace
in Topdog/Underdog by Suzan-Lori Parks
Grace is Booth's on-again, off-again girlfriend in Suzan-Lori Parks's Topdog/Underdog, and although she never appears onstage, she has a strong influence on the play's action. Most of what we learn about her comes from Booth's boastful, defensive monologues: he talks about her coming over, cleans the room, practices seductive speeches, and even fabricates an elaborate lie about having slept with her. When Lincoln challenges him, Booth's stories fall apart—Grace has actually stood him up multiple times, revealing the disparity between his imagined persona as a charming ladies' man and his true loneliness. Her name carries a sense of irony; she embodies the social and romantic validation that Booth longs for but cannot achieve. Toward the end of the play, Booth discloses that Grace has left him for another man, a humiliation that intensifies his growing rage and feelings of failure. This rejection acts as one of the emotional triggers that drive Booth toward the play's violent climax. Grace serves as an offstage mirror: every claim Booth makes about her highlights his need for validation, while every truth that emerges about her absence points to his deeper inadequacy. She also plays a structural role, contrasting with the ghostly Cookie—Lincoln's absent ex-wife—to illustrate that both brothers are shaped as much by the women who have left them as by their relationship with each other.
Connected characters
- Booth
Grace is Booth's girlfriend, or more precisely the object of his obsessive fantasy. He lies about their relationship to impress Lincoln, cleans his room in anticipation of her visits, and is devastated when she ultimately leaves him for someone else—a rejection that fuels his final violent breakdown.
- Lincoln
Lincoln serves as the unwitting audience for Booth's fabrications about Grace. His probing questions and skeptical reactions force Booth's lies into the open, making Lincoln an indirect agent in exposing Grace's true absence from Booth's life.
- Cookie
Grace and Cookie function as parallel offstage figures—Booth's absent girlfriend and Lincoln's absent ex-wife, respectively. Together they underscore the theme that both brothers are haunted and diminished by women who have chosen to leave them.