The Leads

David Mamet’s play, Glengarry Glen Ross, is a play that is full of egotistical business men; each of them trying to get ahead in their cutthroat business no matter what it really takes. These men are willing to lie, cheat, and even steal to be able to succeed in business. The one thing that Mamet’s play lacks, however, is any seen woman characters. There are several references to women throughout the play, but not one is seen.

Early in the play, Levene mentions the “ex” that had “kicked out” of a deal. His mention of this woman makes her seem somewhat bad in a sense that we as readers are not quite sure at this point what the big picture is. A little while later Leven makes another reference to a woman, this time his daughter. He tries to use his sick daughter as a means of negotiating with John to get the good leads. With these two women, it seems that Levene is only good at making excuses for himself through these women. He tries to use them to get ahead, it’s disgusting.

Levene also mentions one more woman in the play. He speaks briefly of Harriet Nyborg, who bought crumb cake from the store and fed it to Levene and her husband while agreeing to sign a contract she has no intention or means of purchasing. This last woman that Levene mentions is slightly different from the other two. She goes so far as to sign the contract and give Levene a bad check. At least she did this to get him to shut up. For we all know salesmen won’t shut up or leave until you buy something from them, so it might as well be a faulty check to get rid of them.

There is one more mention of a woman in the play. Mrs. Lingk is brought into the picture when Roma tries to sell her and her husband some land they didn’t want. Roma was able to close the deal the night before, but the next day gets a rude surprise when Mr. Lingk comes to tell him he needs his check back because his wife said to get everything back. She seems to be the most sensible out of all the women mentioned. She sees right through Roma’s shifty lies and realizes that what he has offered them is a bunch of b.s., as is the entire contract.

There is argument that these women mentioned not only ruin Roma’s contract but also bring about Levene’s final fall. I argue against this. It seems to me that the only thing these men were good at was lying, cheating, and stealing. Their business deals were b.s. and the lies that poured out of their mouths just to get people to sign a contract were ridiculous. The lack of actual women characters actually makes them seem stronger. Without them there we are only able to go off of what the men give us. Knowing how the men are in a business sense allows us to see right through them when they speak about women. The only reason they even seem to deal with the women mentioned in the play is because they need both signatures the close a deal. They must always be closing.