Glass O Water

Initially when asked who I thought the protagonist in Glass of Water was I was more inclined to believe that the question was slightly irrelevant. I say this due to the fact that the play centers around several fairly likeable characters as opposed to just having one central protagonist. The play in its very nature presents a more lighthearted/farcical approach to character development, and gives us a chance to indulge ourselves in the story of several different characters, some of which we root for, and some we  don't. This also leaves one character (the dutchess) to pick up the slack and carry the mantle of antagonist. So, there in lies the question: If there is an antagonist then surely there must be a protagonist right?
So that being said I just couldn't really accept the idea of there being just one protagonist in Glass of Water, it just didn't seem to be the case me, but I knew there just had to be a way of determining this. Then after thinking about the question in regard to he amount of stage time, and overcoming of character conflicts I started to narrow down a selection within the list of characters. Then when taking into consideration that even though the majority of the characters wound up getting what they wanted it all came down to the cunning and savvy of one individual in particular who made it all possible. I had to choose Bolingbroke, I say this because he is the orchestrator of all the events that transpire, and the audience can easily back him as he plays his mind games with the Dutchess. Plus, due to the fact that there's hints of deceit from time to time we're not entirely sure that we can trust Bolingbroke. This makes for a level of ambivalence towards the audience in which an individual might want to root for Bolingbroke as a protagonist, but perhaps is unsure that one should root for Bolingbroke. Also just from a technical standpoint, if you don't have Bolingbroke in the story, you don't have a story....so there's that argument too.