Act II Scene V

[Well, here it is, finally... THE BIG FINISH! Badooompa! Pissssssshhhhh! Until the anarchaeologists uncover further examples buried beneath the deep strata of black comedy, that's really all there is... except for our opera... and the Shakespeare play we wrote... and the radio script we sent to the BBC (you really don't want to read that, it's embarrassing)... and a natural history novel called "Silent Creeps The Meadow Leech"... and all the collected lyrics... so that's really all there is apart from all that then... Let it be known that The Gold Lamé Skeleton came up with that "Endorse It/In Dorset" pun many years before they named a folk festival after it, and that the Ultra-ettes were actually a cheerleader squad made up of workers at a local television factory that doesn't exist anymore. It's true, I tells ya!]
 

...And Ruth Creased The Yellow Curtain
ACT II SCENE V

(The fields of Flanders - A little girl called Charlady washes herself in coal-tar soup. Edna Shoulders, who's bark is worse than her bite, unless it goes septic, wipes her nose on her slave. That Psychology Student From Norwich enters, stands before a mirror, examines his face for zits, checks his stubble and proceed to shave with a soft cuddly rabbit toy. He nicks himself)

THAT PSYCHOLOGY STUDENT FROM NORWICH: Ouch! (pauses, then shouts to side of stage) Darling, have you been shaving your legs with my rabbit again?

(He exits, rubbing his chin as he goes, dragging the mirror which, I forgot to mention, is on castors. Enter Narthor That Ol' Mole, to recite a "co-operative" poem by Alan Gilzean and Muriel Young, in Big Ol' Soliloquy Style)

NARTHOR THAT OL' MOLE:
(in Big Ol' Soliloquy Style)
Put the cat on, Mother,
Gullet first!
Bone football
Played at an address!
Don't listen to the man
Who said that
Sniveller Ducks
Suede in the wind,
Collide in the sunshine,
Burn down the gas fire,
Bark polythene tarts.
To quote a snobbish gilzeanerism,
"Do you want to buy some bees?"
This is not what I'd say myself,
If I wanted to mock or tease.
I'd grab a mollusc
And extract its tongue,
So that when it tried to laugh
It could only say "Thrung!"
At the back
Of the Anderson shelter
Where Tenner C Williams lived
Down on the delta...
And wrote "A Flapjack Called Desire",
Also "A Paintbrush Loving Wire".
Every Tuesday he would "logpit"
With his arm
The one the dog bit,
When Santa Anna came to play.
"Green Green Green!" I"d say,
Green Green Green! A trillion times Green!
Green Green Green Teen!
Angel Wangle! Casey Jones
Was green! Green to the bones!
Was Grone! Grone to the beans!
I've used Heinz to calm the Dean's
Pet pangolin, many a time.
You know the one, the one they call Sublime,
The one with the teeth a-biting...
This is some brand new kind of whiting
That its incisors often met...
Angelo the Italian Vet,
Whose throat was omnipotent
And whose vest was always opened
To the public on Sundays,
Now renamed "Xmas Fundays"...
...Apart from Green, of course,
Who rode up on his wooden horse
And claimed the land for Albert Crun,
Noted for his flabby mum,
Without a gilt throgmarble.
Grim Fourteen Agar-Agar link
Terracotta Gainage Animals,
Gilzean Marine Pittsburgh Gainsborough...
The Fabulous Four, John, Paul, George and
Ringo went up on stage to meet The Hannibals,
Who we met last year in Capri...
Say buddy! It's Chloro-bromine for me!
Chug-A-Lug! Chug-A-Lug! Bonk! Whoppity!
Come on! Sing along with Hoppity!
"Sara-Jane had a toy
As naughty could be
And he'll slit your throat
For a toffee flea.
He's big and dark green
And if you're really keen,
He might help you become green too!"
Hieroglyphic Seagull Glue?
Get me Extension 3671809 G-R-E-E-N
And don't forget to belittle your spleen
Before you go to the cool college dance
Kool at that Lrig in the rather Egnarts stance
And kick her shins with chestnuts...
That's the way I get all my best cuts.
Or by Gnillaf down the stairs
With Der Gnidir Hood
And the Three Sraeb
Knee-boxing in the Green Room,
As practised in primaeval gloom
By Mick McManus
And Beethoven,
His friend who had once been an earwig.
"Eeearggh! Errumph! That's a bad fig!"
Screamed the Maroon Baboon of East Cheam,
Who was not all that he seemed,
But almost entirely made of wood,
Totally misunderstood...
O'Valtine was an Irish Lay-Dentist,
Not a Seventh-Day Adventist
Or a chipmunk's lumber-room.
Whoosh! Bang! Vrrrooom!
And awa' to the kitchen!
Into the oven goes the lichen
And the radio comes ready-peeled.
Like a maggot alone in a field,
I have wandered
From Egypt to Dorking,
Which earned a disapproving frown
From all over the Commonwealth
And an ex-Minister of Health.
"That's no way to treat a baboon!
You must feed it soon,
Or it will die
And then where will you be?"
When the Queen shouts, "Watch me!
I'm a boat with the ears of an eagle!"
But they did not let her inveigle
Her way into the RAC,
So the sailor said, "Oh Arr! A sea?"
Then they gave him a lemon for trying,
But added, "Don't you go relying
On us to provide your meals!
Now drink up your breakfast of eels
To the tune of 'Broadway Melody'!"
On the first day of their holiday,
They both drank a pint of woad
To give their stomachs a colour-code.
Adjusting the Thing is illegal
Unless you're the son of a beagle,
In which case, it should be okay
And there's always the very good pay
And a xylophone every leap-year.
If you find you are able to steer
A xylophone in heavy traffic...
"Sorry! Can you be more specific?"
Said the Beak
Of a crested-grebe
Who was up for the day
From St Neve.

(Small ripple of applause and mutterings ["Hmm... not their best stuff, is it?" "Isn't it pathetic when they try to make it rhyme?" etc.] GRAMS - jingly xylophone music a la kiddies' radio programmes. Hey! It is a kiddies' radio programme! Not much to look at though. Maybe we could do a big expensive back-projected animation sequence for this bit... Anyway, we hear the voice of a unassuming lady announcer off of "Listen With Moth, er...")

UNASSUMING LADY ANNOUNCER: ...and who's in Chimpton today, children? Why, it's old Farmer Ned Nurton! Hello, Farmer Ned Nurton.

(FX - sheep bleating)

UNASSUMING LADY ANNOUNCER: Um, they're funny looking sheep, Farmer Ned Nurton...

FARMER NED NURTON: Arr!

UNASSUMING LADY ANNOUNCER: Er, what sort of sheep are those, Farmer Ned Nurton?

FARMER NED NURTON: They be giraaaaaaaaaafes!

UNASSUMING LADY ANNOUNCER: Why do you keep giraffes, Farmer Ned Nurton?

FARMER NED NURTON: Well, yer gets a better yield of giraffe-skin per acre...

UNASSUMING LADY ANNOUNCER: Oh, that's interesting... What do you do with the skins, Farmer Ned Nurton?

FARMER NED NURTON: Nuthin'!!

UNASSUMING LADY ANNOUNCER: Nothing, Farmer Ned Nurton?

FARMER NED NURTON: Nope! Oi wouldn't kill moi giraaaaaaffes!

UNASSUMING LADY ANNOUNCER: That's a rather sentimental attitude for a farmer, isn't it, Farmer Ned Nurton?

FARMER NED NURTON: But they be noble beasts, giraffes... wouldn't 'urt a floy!

UNASSUMING LADY ANNOUNCER: I expect a lot of folks around here think you're a daft pillock, Farmer Ned Nurton?

FARMER NED NURTON: Arrr... arr...

UNASSUMING LADY ANNOUNCER: Oh! Here comes young Fool Nurton. Hello, Fool Nurton!

FOOL NURTON: 'Allooooo!!

UNASSUMING LADY ANNOUNCER: What are you doing, Fool Nurton?

FOOL NURTON: Hur hur... Oi be pretendin' to milk moy boike!

UNASSUMING LADY ANNOUNCER: Ha ha ha, you are a funny little fellow, Fool Nurton! You won't get much milk from a Raleigh!

FOOL NURTON: Nope... don't look loyke it...

UNASSUMING LADY ANNOUNCER: So what are you going to do now, Fool Nurton?

FOOL NURTON: Shear it, so's Granny can knit me a balaclava!

UNASSUMING LADY ANNOUNCER: Ahem... Captain Nurton is the keeper of the Chimpton Lighthouse... It's funny having a lighthouse so far from the sea, Captain Nurton.

CAPTAIN NURTON: A lot er folks do say that...

UNASSUMING LADY ANNOUNCER: Do you get many ships sailing up the Chimpton River, Captain Nurton?

CAPTAIN NURTON: River? Arr... you means Chimpton Brook? Nah... yer wouldn't get a bloody minnow up that thing!

UNASSUMING LADY ANNOUNCER: Why has Chimpton got a lighthouse, Captain Nurton?

CAPTAIN NURTON: 'Cos it's a damn soit cheaper than movin' the 'ole bloody village down ter the sea...

(FX - babbling brook, ducks etc.)

NIPPER NURTON: (fade up under) ...Admiral Nelson was in the RAF... Aunt Bertha Nurton is going out with Father Christmas... (ducks quack)

UNASSUMING LADY ANNOUNCER: What are you doing at the pond, Nipper Nurton?

NIPPER NURTON: Mummy Nurton told me to feed the ducks.

UNASSUMING LADY ANNOUNCER: What are you feeding them, Nipper Nurton?

NIPPER NURTON: Oi be feedin'em false information...

UNASSUMING LADY ANNOUNCER: Here comes your old Uncle Smudger Nurton. What have you got there, Smudger Nurton?

SMUDGER NURTON: It be a bacon sang-widge...

UNASSUMING LADY ANNOUNCER: It looks a wee bit mouldy, Smudger Nurton?

SMUDGER NURTON: Arr... tez that...

UNASSUMING LADY ANNOUNCER: Where did you get it, Smudger Nurton?

SMUDGER NURTON: It were in me demob jacket pocket.

UNASSUMING LADY ANNOUNCER: Why that's revolting, Smudger Nurton!

SMUDGER NURTON: Nar... it were quoit a noice little jacket...?

(FX - cascade of advanced non-rhythmic spoons playing. Enter The Human Craig Douglas and The Pink Sweab, wreaking haddock)

THE HUMAN CRAIG DOUGLAS: Strangeness and quark! Drain a wet liquid!

THE PINK SWEAB: ...On their pickball doo-whats, lightly laundered and how!

THE HUMAN CRAIG DOUGLAS: To fill the holes in their Rogatian Sundae! It's part of the proverbial "real world"...

(Enter, from the Isle of Fute, where they make the popular Fute Isle sweaters, The Worm, God, Carrot, Neon-Grafted Intestine, Shirtflannel, Norgo Henson, Bamalam Landlamb and the Quantock Hills, all as happy as a sandbag...)

THE WORM: (panting) There's a rift in the Multiverse!

GOD: That's okay! Soon fix that with some Epoch-C-Resin!

CARROT: Nanko Thrup McIntyre Spleen! My uncle's a lecturer on parrots at Harvard University!

NEON-GRAFTED INTESTINE: Bullish Home's Tours!

SHIRTFLANNEL: (wonko-ing) Fantarctic Zenta-Cot Fralnarm Gord Gorf Trallenisp Low Hay Trallenisp! Don't you wish you were here instead of me, in the Jello Sea?

NORGO HENSON: (thrubbing) Let's go to Lemming Tonspar for the afternune! Or Sutton Death?

BAMALAM LANDLAMB: (four-luggage-racked) There are times when I think that I am being attracted mystically to Shirley the Guided Antwerp Chicken, polarised from the waist down!

THE QUANTOCK HILLS: I went to see the Grey Bitty Molars last week, but they weren't really radish-addicted Gobors! They were dotting their "i"s and crossing their red "c"s...

(Exit the Worm, Carrot, Neon-Grafted Intestine, Shirtflannel, Norgo Henson, Bamalam Landlamb and the Quantock Hills - Enter Stephen de Sintere-Grated, God's Mum & Dad, Warmerson, the Intellectual Waitress, Grinton Cartuktuk, Rex and Dave and the Women of the Week, Sandy, Mandy, Tuesday and Wendy. Stephen de Sintere-Grated climbs a conveniently pointless staircase)

STEPHEN DE SINTERE-GRATED: (excretes) Forgive the truncated bolus of erudition! I have a bran tumour! I can't use this computer, I'm inputent! I'm an Errorsmith!

(The entire space-time continuum implodes with a gigantic KABOOOOMPH!!! Fragments of antimatter rush through the cosmos, demolishing entire galaxies)

GOD: Shit! Balls!

GOD'S MUM: (revokingly) Tut tut! Mind your language, young God!

GOD'S DAD: 'Aving trooble wit' young God, our Moom? Ah'll tan 'is arse when ah coom 'ome from t'mill!

WARMERSON: (ducks) Four Shanes the pole krerb, but it cost £849,2634.03... Names spread outward one-third! ...And if I were you, Fred Willbymad, vung! Rest and contemplated, Krunsterter Gated Jamstarter Germstater... It won't take long now... meanwhile, it was becoming clearer to see the Oilerwoit...

THE INTELLECTUAL WAITRESS: Expose your abnormalities? Happiness is a warm Ongar... Is there a baseball team called the Macon Minervas?

GRINTON CARTUKTUK: (retaliates, ear-wings for yurst) Create cocoa-faces, Dunlin! Insect trouser usurper, Supper! Rinko Corg the Raw Yuk! Polo Plop Doolong, Long Upper! Barthort Hut the Muck! Talbot, not Tootal...

REX: (stooping loudly into his trousers) Plot the charts! Rant, Froggy! From now on, only headsquirters fluge Runnerdale!

DAVE: (shovelling) How would it be if I boned your turkey, Lumpy Ben? I don't think I can couple the Homerdbroom... give it a twist, Rawlings, that usually causes it to murmur... I, Swindon Fire!

(Eventually it worked... Exit Stephen de Sintere-Grated, God, God's Mum & Dad, Warmerson, the Intellectual Waitress, Grinton Cartuktuk, Rex and Dave, Udmern Gowfridge on top - The voice (off) of the unassuming lady announcer continues as before. This'll give you a chance to move some scenery around in time for the big song and dance finale.)

UNASSUMING LADY ANNOUNCER: What are you doing, Granny Nurton?

GRANNY NURTON: Oi be unpickin' moy idiot gran'son's boyke.

UNASSUMING LADY ANNOUNCER: What? To make him a balaclava?

GRANNY NURTON: In bloody August? Don't be daft!

(Enter [unless he never left before] Narthor That Ol' Mole)

NARTHOR THAT OL' MOLE: (as if commentating on a royal occasion) ...as it rounds the sweeping curve towards the Gosport Palais Des Béfunes... And the crowds are cheering and waving flags... Young children sit on parents' shoulders, to gain a better view... Policemen, in dress uniform, smile precisely, as the entourage passes by... The coach arrives at the entrance... and look! A young Sea Cadet marches smartly forward and proffers a bunch of flowers to the smiling Monarch... Her Majesty alights from the carriage, dressed in some shoes and some trousers and what looks like, from here, a jersey... (he is drowned out by very loud fanfare - Yes! That one!) I said "Just listen to the fanfare played by the Women's thingy whatever..." ...and as we watch the Quoon enter the building, one can somehow sense her approbation, for this magnificently refurbished Palais Des Béfunes, this Théatre Des Strange Entertainments... "Trident!" said the dog, "Trident! Trident Monday!"

(Enter Dunx The Clot From Act Two Scene One, the Lois of the Lowe, carrying a bottle. He points at the bottle in cheesy advertising pack-shot style, grins cheesily and then exits, in a cheesy manner, to Jupiter or Sutton)

THE PINK SWEAB: Endorse it? No, in Hampshire! Let ball-bearions accept their plight - A string of perils! Soda-bearing mucus machines said, "That's trite!"... You didn't mention overfed Albanians or single storey Youth-Geraniums, but don't weep for...

THE HUMAN CRAIG DOUGLAS: Fzzzt! Arrrggghhh! The dog! Face it Dad, we need a new horse...

NARTHOR THAT OL' MOLE: And he entirely disappeared into ferocious analogue computers... and what if it doesn't scan!?

THE PINK SWEAB: May the Velvet Winged Porridge afeteria, the Mouflon or Bearded Argali - that's a real kind of sheep - and all kinds of creatures tooth-ed, beak-ed, tongue-ed or inarticulate, all the birds of the sea and the fish of the air, the Conumdromedaries, Kites and Hazards, Goatsuckers, King Condors and Queen Bees, the Sparrowhooks, the King Toady - a real bird - the Badstart, the Plumber Bird, the Bedroom Ouzel, the Stocking Bird, the Long-Tailed Catastrophe, the Bullet Finch, the Soft-Backed Penguin, the Celebrated Pumacrake, the Skylarch, the Gossamer Shag, Hawkins' Screarbinger, the Linked Avocado, the Dunlopillo, the Cynical Pipette, the Flightless Artichoke, the Dog-Eared Paperbat, the Soya Lynx, the Sea-Camel and the Mountain Loach, all fly, slither, swim, crawl, jump or just look, up your nose this festive season... Oh! I forgot the Cod!

THE HUMAN CRAIG DOUGLAS: Beano Shug Gorg, Shug-a-ling! "Grey" the American way, man! Mavis Wilson's an Ultra-ette...

THE PINK SWEAB: And Marion Wilson's a marionette! Not like her dog, the one I gave the spot-cheque for ten pounds.

THE HUMAN CRAIG DOUGLAS: I wish to manipulate equipment too, now that it's marbles season... I want to get my teas on... The screen in a Throbmoron Evening's entertainment... Tanya Hyde?

THE PINK SWEAB: ...If I - Panic No-no situation! - can!

THE HUMAN CRAIG DOUGLAS: What on Earth! Ball-bearions find the rat, eat a bed, use the drain, Alan!

THE PINK SWEAB: To inflate a nostril lignoon structure in the communal anti-aircraft bun?

THE HUMAN CRAIG DOUGLAS: Goat, son! Link throats, for our Edward! Hazeltine Ointment is great!

THE PINK SWEAB: Foot.. Zingy... Blogg... Serious Mason... And so to bed!

THE HUMAN CRAIG DOUGLAS: Drop it, asshole! No one takes home a doggy bag from one of my dinner parties!

(Tristan & The Insults prance onto the stage. They are bathed in a sea of orange. The guitarist belts out the first bars of "Quasar Squat Marimba Baby" and the audience is treated to hot, shock rock'n'roll, Lido-style. Narthor That Ol' Mole joins them on bassoon 'n' narration for the big- finish and, we hope, maybe, a couple of encores. The Human Craig Douglas and The Pink Sweab dance around the stage provocatively along with some Rue Dancers.)

TRISTAN & THE INSULTS: (singing)
One third
Met two thirds
In a hole.
He's always coma-ing and Goring,
Removing furniture like the wind.
Why pout?
Barf up a light bulb
For the infinite perfect rubbish-tip.
(Chorus) Efil tneloiv otni sedolpxe lleb retirwepyt eht.
Frozen stain where a buffalo micturated,
Interlaken like pink icing sugar,
Cellular waiters engulfed in Bordeaux gristle,
Each with a name and a walled shirt.
Riffing live waiters
Dart lithely
Between clothing
Sorting Coke
Walls have testicles
Trouser tribulations... I own a table cloth
On a bald mountain,
Who supplies your mucus?

NARTHOR THAT OL' MOLE: (spoken)
You will pass through many strange forests
And cross many streams of grey water.
Wear this amulet as protection
Against Trio The Devil Bear.
He will not harm you
Unless you remove the dust jacket.
Sort yourself out into single human beings!

TRISTAN & THE INSULTS: (singing)
I saw three ships go sailing by
Followed closely by a couple of inflatables
Decorated with amusing combs.
Behind them
I noticed Ned Sherrin, posing as a Greek waiter
Who, for the last two years,
Had worked as a bus driver in Newcastle
And behind him...
Hang on! My binoculars are steamed up...
That's better!
I think it's a meringue...
No! Meringues don't have ears...
Oh! Is it a dolphin?
And behind that,
Wearing a red suit and false beard
Is Plymouth!
On Christmas Day!
On Christmas Day!
On Christmas Day in the morning!

(The Human Craig Douglas suddenly comes to his senses, stops his frantic festive frugging and addresses the other members of the cast)

THE HUMAN CRAIG DOUGLAS: Whoah! Just a minute! I represent the Fields Of Flanders' University Culture Cadets... Who's been telling jokes, miming satirical situations or singing suggestive songs about leading Tories? Bring down the backdrop! (A paper backdrop is lowered to the stage) This shouldn't be happening! It's just not on! If news of this so-called "Evening" leaks out, this ancient University will be a laughing stock! ...so I'd like you to pledge your silence on this matter... not for my sake, but for the sake of these hallowed walls, hallowed flooring and hallowed roof-tiles... I'd like you to read aloud the following... just follow my cane... All stand please and place your hands thus...

(He makes an amusing gesture, by wiggling his fingers about his ears, "blenny"-style. He reads aloud from the backdrop and the audience follow suit.)

THE HUMAN CRAIG DOUGLAS:
I saw, with the use of my special scuba equipment,
Three submarines go Asdic-ing by,
Bumping into hapless cod
On their Christmas hols.
I didn't see any Cressington Pumas
Or Gonzanilla Gorsons
But that's hardly surprising
Any... any... any... any... any... any...
In the morning!

(The Human Craig Douglas rejoins the other members of the "band" and continues his go-go routines as they continue their song)

TRISTAN & THE INSULTS: (singing)
I'm dreaming of a white Xmas,
Just like the ones I used to know,
Where the chestnuts glisten and throw
Bags of Weezlegum Throaties in the snow!

NARTHOR THAT OL' MOLE: (solo singing)
Dum da dah! Dum da da da!
Dum da dah! Dum da da dah!
We whistle as we go
Then we take aim and throw
Weezlegum Throaties
In the sand!
Weezlegum Throaties by an open fire,
Kids from two to ninety-one...
Though it's been said
Many times,
Many ways...
Weezlegum Throaties!
Weezlegum Throaties!
Today!

TRISTAN & THE INSULTS: (sung)
Daub cod on walls
Of used batteries
And exchange ways of demobilising egrets.
(Another chorus)
And on the eighty-third day, God created typewriters.

NARTHOR THAT OL' MOLE: (solo singing)
I'm a fly in the soup of society,
The boil on the bottom of sobriety,
You might think that I'm a sorta deity,
But I'm the fly in the suit of society!

THE ENTIRE ASSEMBLED CAST: (sung)
Um Diddle Iddle Iddle Um Diddle Eye!
Um Diddle Iddle Iddle Um Diddle Eye!

NARTHOR THAT OL' MOLE: (solo singing)
I'm the bogey up the nose of normality
And the acne on the chin of banality,
Yes! I'm the dog turd on the carpet of reality!
I'm the maggot in the fruit of rationality!

ANYONE GATHERED HEREIN: (sung)
Stick it in yer fairm-ly owl bum!

NARTHOR THAT OL' MOLE: (solo singing)
I'm the vomit on the street of credibility,
Oh! I'm the rancid chocolate cake of triviality,
A really rotten sod in my totality
And have you tried to guess my nationality?

MASSED ENSEMBLE: (sung)
You've gotta pick a pocket or two!

A SOLO INSULT: (spoken) That's right! He's from Leamington Spa!

NARTHOR THAT OL' MOLE: (solo singing)
Going to the bog's my speciality...
I think my taste for sprouts is the causality!
When I fart, we all vacate the locality,
I admit I've got a juvenile mentality!

THE ENTIRE POPULATION OF OBERAMMAGAU: Consider yerself... Our mate! Hooray!

TRISTAN & THE INSULTS: (sung)
Whiting pout before the Demi-Cod,
All the trees were cherries
And the station remained
Near the bomb scare.
The sailor said,
"Go down the High Steert!
I don't mind genuflecting,
But I'll have to tell the Priest!"
Production of perdition
Has been halted
By a stoppage of Demons.
Nowadays,
There are strict regulations
Governing the production
Of old ladies.

NARTHOR THAT OL' MOLE: (spoken)
Yiminik Drinil was a Plutonian without a heart,
A high being of great age and scientific wisdom,
But a real sod, when it came to being nice.
When the Salvation Army called on him
To ask for a penny or two for a flag,
Yiminik just shouted
"Go tread on a water-baby!"
From out of the kitchen window.

TRISTAN & THE INSULTS: (sung)
I married twelve mulatto typists.
You're a real maker of tatty goats kin stationery,
A hundred-thousand careless drains
Mauve clouds of peasantry
Turning to excavations at midnight,
This is the bit where the good guy jumps
Into the raging torrent
And saves a young Igneous girl from drowning
And when he gets out
His hair is still tidy
And the bad guy takes off his trousers.
Weezlegum!
Weezlegum!
Throaties all the way!
Oh! what fun it is to ride
In a soft-top Chevrolet! Oh!
Dukes and Rakes
Play electricity
In the drunken, driving rain,
A connection of vamps
Dry
As trees carve their initials on people.
Expectation is a Polish girl
Wearing a lead corset.
Chain a Chihuahua
To my leg,
Ba-Ba-Ba-Rah!
These boots 're made for walkin' babe
An' budgies 're made for talkin' babe
An' bats 're made for milkin' babe
Chicken soup with silk in, babe!
Oh yeah!

(Repeat several choruses ad noisome. End on massively prolonged series of power chords. Exeunt Omnes, to tumultuous applause and innumerable curtain-calls. Ah! but wait...)

...And Ruth Creased The Yellow Curtain
ACT II SCENE Vb - A SORT OF CODA

(We end as we began, all those months ago, in the library of Santa Marina El Coyote and Sharon Braithwaite. Enter Santa Marina El Coyote and Sharon Braithwaite themselves to re-enact a famous dream sequence of yore!)

MIGUEL SANTA MARINA EL COYOTE: (imploringly) Boo to a goose?

SHARON BRAITHWAITE: (sternly) Oh! I wouldn't say that!

(Right! That's that out of the way! Exit Miguel Santa Marina El Coyote and Sharon Braithwaite, to audience-generated noises indicating approval... and that really is...)

THE END!

Act II Scene IV

["Love this bit!" he exclaimed modestly, "I found myself laughing out loud several times while I was formatting it..." - This penultimate scene mostly consists of our idea of what an episode of the popular BBC 'soap' "EastEnders" looks and sounds like (although one or two references to Gosport still got snuck in there). The thing is, none of us had actually watched "EastEnders" except briefly for the purpose of 'research', so this is much funnier... or so I would imagine... I bet they don't have as many fart gags as us, anyway.]
 

...And Ruth Creased The Yellow Curtain
ACT II SCENE IV

(NB: For this scene you will need a pair of scissors - The scene is a typical East End street scene. Atmospheric oompah-stroke-accordion music. Various members of Johnson's Gridling Band walk past, some in disguise, some wearing shades and one wearing antlers and a straw hat. Newspaper vendors vend their wares and wear their vests. One of them, Ken, is approached by Mr Cracknell.)

ONE OF THEM, KEN: (loudly addressing passers-by) Runcorn Aaaahgaaas! Raaaan Khooon Aaaaah Garrrz! Run Gorn Aaaarrrgghh Aaaaaz! Ra Ngom Nargas! Reeed Orl Baht It! "Tuna Fish Beast In Postmistress Five Men In A Bucket Scandal!"

MR CRACKNELL: Morning Ken! I'll take one of those, please!

ONE OF THEM, KEN: Morning guv! There y'go mate!

MR CRACKNELL: Morning, Ken! And a packet of toffees!

ONE OF THEM, KEN: Morning Guvnah! This chuner fish whassname is a rare t'do, Mr Cracknell!

MR CRACKNELL: Yes Ken and no mistake! Morning!

(He reads aloud from a newspaper article entitled "How To Grow Latrine-Attendants On Damp Blotting Paper")

MR CRACKNELL: Beware the Auntie Edna-vore and the Clitumnestradon, because neither exists... which means, if you see them, you're in pretty unusual trouble... Tom Mix Comics, like delinquent encyclopaedias, act only in the interests of self-radio, when they eat kippered herons... Laugh at antipodean devils from the safety of your own park bench... Let a cigarette-end be your torch, let the sinuses amalgamate and play Dorchesters, hearing as the node computers sessionaries, Millet Kong, there's elastic in them thar' hills... Gold-pin seasoning, father on the road, grey ham sandwiches in a card house, built on a stormy day at sea... Morning!

ONE OF THEM, KEN: Morning Squire! Let's go motorcycling in the sea... or order some aftershave from a Male Odour Catalogue... I say! Isn't that a Neal's Portable Hand-Mug you've got there?

(They enter a nearby Fake Pub. Rinky Dink On The Ol' Joanna. Here we encounter Numerous Cheerful Cockneys)

DOT: Cor blimey! I dunno... wot wiv me an' Alf gettin' thrown aht of the maisonette... an' our Barry's Norma pregnant... Well, I 'ad to go back on the ciggies... 'Ow's your Willie, Ethel?

ETHEL: Mine's a little stout, Dot!

DOT: 'Ere! 'Ave you seen Den wiv 'is new fancy bit? Accordin' to Lottie, she was a barmaid at the Dagmar durin' the war...

ETHEL: (conspiratorially, is that a word?) Shut up Dot! 'Ere's 'is Nibs!

DOT: Pardon me, I'm sure!

(Enter Henrietta Mimling's Famous Burmese Glove Poopettes)

FIRST GLOVE POOPETTE: You stole the sausages! (taped laughter)

SECOND GLOVE POOPETTE: No! You stole the sausages!

FIRST GLOVE POOPETTE: Surrealism is the mistress of illusion! (real laughter)

SECOND GLOVE POOPETTE: Art triangle! (applause)

FIRST GLOVE POOPETTE: Have you read about this Tuna Fish Beast, Mike?

SECOND GLOVE POOPETTE: Yes! It's really scary! I won't go out at night!

FIRST GLOVE POOPETTE: Hmm! I've bought an alsatian!

SECOND GLOVE POOPETTE: Why, Dave?

FIRST GLOVE POOPETTE: Well, I reckon that the Tuna Fish Beast would be more likely to eat a dog than a glove...

SECOND GLOVE POOPETTE: You've got a point there...

FIRST GLOVE POOPETTE: Fancy a beer?

SECOND GLOVE POOPETTE: Righto...

(Glove Poopettes move off to another part of the bar. Nearby we see Mrs Fluidlink being questioned by a constable. He is showing her various dubious pictures of Tuna Fish Beasts with terrifying ears, insane grins and green woolly hats crudely drawn in blue biro. Ken "Carwash" Grindle walks into the pub, goes up to the bar and tells the landlord a joke about a man going into a pub and going up to the bar. He sits down un-noticed. Mr Cracknell continues his conversation with One Of Them, Ken.)

ONE OF THEM, KEN: Moles, of purest cauliflower, test accountants on a southbound train to Venus.

MR CRACKNELL: The bottle of accordionists salutes a partial granite salesman, Lemurama!

ONE OF THEM, KEN: Finally we arrived at the cheese counter and Uncle Sertola bought half a pound of mild Lancashire with a dead ant's face in it. If all the people in baths at this moment sang "19th Nervous Breakdown" by The Rolling Stones, it would be a coincidence.

MR CRACKNELL: Dry Fry can elongate on a long gate, on a snarling vanilla mutant.

ONE OF THEM, KEN: Ball and chin... Park cold operators beside freshly festered mutants!

MR CRACKNELL: Taste calm, green statements... If all the people in this pub were laid end to end, I wouldn't be at all surprised...

KEN "CARWASH" GRINDLE: (stands, addresses rest of pub - big build-up) Heh heh heh... Hello gang! It's great t'be back in Swanage... What?... Gosport? Heh heh heh... That's right, Gosport! Heh heh heh, Ah 'ad a mate who lived in Gosport... 'E 'ad t'clean 'is car on Wednesdays! (applause and cat calls, but no cat appears) Thank you... Thanks! Calm down missus, or ah'll 'ave t'cover you in suds... no missus, ah said "suds"! (canned laughter operated by someone behind the bar) See this suit? I got married in this suit... Heh heh heh! We couldn't afford a church weddin'! (laughter) You're on form t'night! Do you fancy a sing song? Or shall I clean me car? Seriously... I'ad the pleasure of workin' with the one and only Emerson Lakenpalmer, this summer in Blackpool... an' we did a little duet, just the two of us... Ah'd like to do that number for you now... only ah'd like t'do it as a mon-o-ette 'cos ah'm on me own... Heh heh heh! The next act to appear are a pair of up-and-coming stunt motorcyclists from Evesham... In all my years in newspaper selling, I have never seen such an exciting performance... They almost make those motorcycles talk! They have starred at the London Palladium, The Hippodrome, The Swanage Trocadero... their successes are endless! For three years running, they have won the Golden Nutmeg of Montreux... they have been nominated for several Oscars, notably for their appearances next to Bugs Bunny in the "Death Rabbit 2000" series of films... I could go on... but judge for yourselves... Ladies and gentlemen! Hold on to your seats and be amazed by...

VOICE OFF: Someone's pinched the bloody wheels!

ONE OF THEM, KEN: (for some reason, taking up Ken "Carwash" Grindle's introductory schpiel) Become enthralled to the marrow by...

NO! YOU VOICE OFF: It's a soddin' student prank!

ONE OF THEM, KEN: Um... Ladies and gen...

VOICE OFF YOURSELF: Bastards! Get the curtain down and start the disco!

ONE OF THEM, KEN: Oh well.. We'd better have the Dancing Shed sketch then...

(For the next couple of minutes, accompanied by a crackly old '78 of Les Paul & Mary Ford doing "The World Is Waiting For The Sunrise", a professional dancer, dressed in a 'Shed' suit constructed from cardboard boxes and carrying an umbrella, with two others wearing lampshades on their heads and three-pin plugs hanging from their trousers, dance around in a provocative but pointless manner. Eventually they are joined by some more dancers dressed as garden gnomes. Then they leave. No one is to react to their appearance at all.)

ONE OF THEM, KEN: Look Mr Urbanrenewalprogramme! It's raining children!

MR CRACKNELL: Take a wife... Any wife... and buy her a curtain! Avec 'tis mine!

ONE OF THEM, KEN: Come in, dear... take your chosen socks off...

MR CRACKNELL: Alfred The Grate was a brightly-coloured woolly terrorist with a manicurist up his sleeve!

ONE OF THEM, KEN: He held up bridges with a gun carved from a bottle of Swarfega!

MR CRACKNELL: He became a hi-jacket...

ONE OF THEM, KEN: He was pretty turf...

MR CRACKNELL: In fact, he slept in a bed with bubonic bubos, instead of a teddy...

ONE OF THEM, KEN: Alfred The Grate's mate dated Kate's mate's Mother's Mum.

MR CRACKNELL: Learn to torture a typewriter - In seven days, you could be strumming! Whiskey on the bone, please!

ONE OF THEM, KEN: Will all the passengers for East Mekon, please take tricycles to pieces in the sumptuously-appointed reception area, as indicated in the manual on frog-wrestling... and do not drop spiders on the stationmaster while he's construing timetables for old ladies in luminous dresses. Your Royal Highness, Admiral Sir Drake, ladies and gentlemen, please stand for the National Anthem... except for Your Majesty and friend, of course...

(Taped music - Jimi's Woodstock rendition of "Purple Haze")

MR CRACKNELL: Yessir! Everyone's a banality! Salute to taste!

(Enter Kelvin, a typical Cockney of the coloured persuasion. He approaches the landlord, Den "Dirty Den" Spadgitt)

KELVIN: How de do dere Den! Gimme skin - but not on de top o' me pint! Mi saw ya out wahr-kin' de hippo last night!

DIRTY DEN: 'Ere Kelv! You watch yer mahf! That was no 'ippo, that was me fancy bit on the side! 'Ave yer got the address, Kelv?

KELVIN: What's "The Address" rhymin' slang for, Den? Mustard and cress? New blue dress? Stress fracture?

DIRTY DEN: Yer askin' for a Naked Lunch, my san!

KELVIN: What's a Naked Lunch den, Den?

DIRTY DEN: A panch ap ver bracket, my san! Get Arfur aht of the pickled eggs, someone!

LOFTY: Up yer cam, Arfur, mate...

ARTHUR: (talks bubbles, but not in the accepted sense) Leave me alone, Lorfty lad... Yer a good boy, not like yer farver... I've 'ad enough of this series, Lorfty lad... I've lorst me job dahn the centre an' me budgie's been taken by the 'emeroids, just after I bought 'im free quid's worf of dodgy cuttlefish of Den... It wasn't always like this Lorfty lad... Nah! This street was a street t'be prahd of... Y'know. we 'ad a party, right by yer ol' Auntie Moll's allotment... all the kids was there... It was the day Chelsea won at Wolves...

DIRTY DEN: (screwing lid back on pickled egg jar) 'Night Arfur!... An' you shut up an' get Ethel a poisoned Mackeson, Lofty, or I'll put you in there wiv 'im...

KEN "CARWASH" GRINDLE: (standing and announcing for no apparent reason) Thank you! A great bunch of lads... Remember, you can always spot a good musician by the state of 'is car... Ah tell yer... y'can see yer bloody face in these guys' Datsuns! Ladies and gentlemen... I'd like to sing my latest hit... no! No, hang on... I went to one of them acid house parties, the other night... Phew! Bloody 'ell... (does a ludicrous jerky dance movement) ...There was one of them "punk rockets" there... you know the type... drainpipe kilt and 'arf a scrapyard nailed through 'is ears... ah said to 'im, ah said, "Why 'ave you got that bloody great mohican 'aircut?"... 'E said, "Ken.... ah use it t'clean me car on Wednesdays!" (polite audience laughter and applause) Heh heh heh... My daughter's one of them punk rockets... Eeeh! Yer would'nt believe the names on some of them punk records! 'Ave you 'eard the Six Pistols? Don't bloody bother! but this next number 'as got class... Ladies and gentlemen, from my next album... Ah'd like t'sing this little song written by my good friend... yes, you've guessed it... 'Ank Telford... "Love, Love d'Amour The Merrier"... Take it away Denny!

(He sings his song accompanied by Dirty Den on a trombone)

DIRTY DEN: (on completion of song) You stole the sausages!

DOT: Arfur's drahnin' again in the Public, Eth! You certainly wouldn't catch me givin' im mahf-ter-mahf... Poooh! Yer can smell 'im from 'ere! 'Ere Lofty! 'Ow abaht two Gin'N'Its for me an' Ethel? Y'know, Eth, 'e's never worn that cardy I knitted for 'im last year!

ETHEL: Probably never will now, Dot! Nor the cheese-striped jacket!

(Enter Professor Drake & Martin The Performing Grapefruit. Professor Drake addresses the occupants of the pub.)

PROFESSOR DRAKE: (hushed tones) Ladies and gentlemen... I will now put Martin, a highly dangerous African Bull Grapefruit, into my mouth... This trick has never, to the best of my knowledge, been performed in the East End before...

(There is the usual kind of theatrical drum roll and Drake puts Martin into his mouth - It may be necessary to cut the grapefruit into segments at this point... it depends on the size of the grapefruit and/or mouth in question, really...)

PROFESSOR DRAKE: ...And now, for my next trick... Aaaaaaggggghhhh!

(Using the magic of stagecraft - a bit of string, copious amounts of blood capsules, the acting ability of Professor Drake and the imagination of the audience - Martin appears to leap off the stool, tear at Drake's throat and grapple him to the floor. Several stage hands rush on with butterfly nets, 'catch' Martin and help Drake 'out of the pub' and offstage. Dot addresses the audience)

DOT: Remember, ladies and gentlemen... Citrus fruit can be dangerous! Don't try any of these tricks at home... And always ask a grown-up before you eat an orange!

DIRTY DEN: Where's my kid, Ange you slut! Just read this!

ANGE: "Cette Sauce de Haute Qualité... Art Guinnefs... Made in Dublin..."

(FX: Bottle smashing on skull)

DIRTY DEN: You cah! Get back to Doug at the Dag! My solicitor knows abaht the whippets in the taxi! You've ruined my life, you cah! Lofty! Take over the pub! I'm orf to Morocco to settle a debt...

LOFTY: ...As we Eastenders say when we go to the toilet! 'Ere's yer poisoned Mackeson, Ethel...

ETHEL: Ta Lofty! Is poison extra?

LOFTY: Not to regleear customers, Ethel! Who's put napalm in the staff Xmas box?

KEN "CARWASH" GRINDLE: We've got an 'Ungarian for yah tonight... all the way from 'Ungary... 'E's a great lad... great lad... 'E's a master of the ventriloquial art and very very funny in an 'Ungarian sort of way... Heh heh heh, 'E cleans 'is car on Wednesdays! Heh heh heh... Why do Skoda's 'ave 'eated rear windahs? Heh heh heh... Yeah! To demist 'em in cold weather! Heh heh heh! An old 'Ungarian joke there... Ladies and gentlemen... the great, the amazin', the very wonderful... Vlad, The Great Dissecto!

(Nothing much happens at all - somebody lies on the floor, covered in stage blood)

DOT: Wicksy looks a bit pale tonight, Eth! 'Ave you bin givin' 'im your old crimbo cake? The Doctor says I 'ave to relieve my wind, Ethel, so beg pardon! (amusing raspberry sound) It's the gin, Dear... sumfink to do wiv alcohol and bacterial eructations of the lower colon... My George reckons I could do wiv anover operation... (raspberry) Beg pardon again, Ethel! My George won't let me do that at 'ome... 'course, 'e was a submariner, 'an they're touchy abaht that sort of thing, wot wiv no winders... I'm a martyr to me bowels... (raspberry) I'll just pop to Morocco...

DIRTY DEN: I'll do yer operation if yer like, Dot, we're a bit slack! Was it a resection or just tie a knot in it? 'Ere Lofty, put yer finger 'ere a minute! Right, now if you blow off again, you'll blow yer eyes right aht yer 'ead an' into the snug!

LOFTY: I 'ate doin' operations, Den! It ain't no job for the bar staff... can't I do the crimbo decorations instead?

WICKSY: There's a bloke ahtside says 'e wants t'see Den... 'an 'e's got a suitcase...

ETHEL: The rest is silence, I suppose... (she dies)

DIRTY DEN: Get the bloke wiv the suitcase in, to take Ethel out... 'an check the expiry date on the Mackesons... Any Iranians out there wanna buy an Exocet, slight seconds? Tanker very much sir!
DOT: I always knew Den would come to a sticky end, Lorfty! (raspberry) Beg pardon!

WICKSY: ...'an 'e says Arfur's 'ad a big pools win... twenty-seven draws an' Joanna Lumley's gonna present the cheque...

DOT: 'Ere Lofty! Get Arfur aht of the pickled egg jar an' dry 'im aht in the microwave! Cor stripe me pink! So ol' Arfur's come up on the pools at last... small world, ain't it, Ethel?... Ethel?... Oh gawd!

DIRTY DEN: Bring Ethel into the snug, I'll see if Ange 'as left 'er.... The cah! She 'asn't!

ARTHUR: Don't you come near me!... Pauline, help me!

PAULINE: Just a minute, Arfur, I've got to get Martin orf t'sleep an' clean Dr Legg's surgery an' clean up after that daft ol' woman wot lives wiv us an' clean up after the woofters an' take the bodies aht at the Vic an' get Michelle married orf to some sucker... Evenin' Lorfty!... an' look! Dot's bowels come undone... Here, Dear... Put yer finger there, Lofty...

LOFTY: Gawd Mrs Fowler... I'd rather marry Michelle than do that again!

PAULINE: I swear that launderette will be the deaf of me, look at my ankles! Now Martin's started cryin'... Give 'im 'is dummy wiv jam on, Arfur... Oh gawd! The clock's wrong... we'll 'ave to eat a snack at Ali's or we'll be...

(FX Off - Car skidding and crashing)

LOFTY: (breathlessly) There's bin a... dreadful axydint... girl on rollerskates wiv a tray of Martinis... come in the Vic an' Den shot 'er wiv 'is shooter... I fink 'e's sorry 'e lorst 'is temper, vo...

PAULINE: Well you'd better 'ave a cuppa tea Lorfty! Oh gawd! That volcano's started Martin orf... Mam! Give Lorfty a cuppa tea!

DIRTY DEN: I dit'n't mean it... I was provoked... I fort it was one of Wal's crahd!

PAULINE: I'm never gowna speak to you as long as I live, Den Spadgitt! 'Ere's my Ladies' Darts Team rota sheet an' badge!

DIRTY DEN: Ah's abaht I get my barman to marry yer pregnant daughter an' I stop the volcano so's Martin can get to sleep an' I'll pump aht Arfur into the bargain an' I'll get yer a Launderette all yer very own to skivvy in... then will yer stay in the darts team?

PAULINE: But wot abaht Lou?

DIRTY DEN: I was gonna use 'er to plug the volcano...

PAULINE: You'll do no such fing, Den Spadgitt! I wouldn't accept your Launderette, not even if you was the lorst man on erf! Come on Mam! I'll buy yer a Rickendorfer Wangdanger at the Dag!

LOU: I always did like the toilets at the Dagmar... lovely wooden seats...

PAULINE: Are you comin' Arfur?

ARTHUR: I ain't goin' to the Dagmar, wiv its 'Oity-Toity toffs... If the phone rings, I'll be on me allotment, plantin' next year's Pearly King Assortment...

PAULINE: Suit yerself Arfur! Come on Mam... I'm payin'!

DIRTY DEN: Eat pumice lava, Looby Lou! An' just watch yerself, mixin' Martinis in the Launderette's centrifuge drier for the Dagmar, Pauline! I knows all abaht yer tricks... an' stop Arfur growin' them olives!

(As they exit, fade up the megaphonically-challenged voice-off of the Narrator-Cum-Mole, giving a fascinating illustrated lecture about fish. The lights dim a notch or two and a number of colourful slides of fish are projected on to the backdrop)

NARRATOR-CUM-MOLE: ...and this is the Swiss Army Mullet... note the useful corkscrew, to open wine bottles... or with its whisk attachment, it can quickly make a rich Christmas pudding... Now, behold the Crenelated Wallpaper Newt, available in over thirty seven up-to-the-minute colour combinations, ideal for that Lost Lounge of Atlantis... And here's the unassuming little Sea Wha's's'ame, distantly related to the Paper hanky. Note how it blends in with its surroundings... And lo! The Bearded Tiffin Loach, small but magnificent to the eye... Any more?

(Curtain - Audience shuffles in their seats but there is no applause)

Act II Scene III

[Good evening. You will experience a strong sense of dredger view. Not only will you be re-introduced to several of your favourite pantomime characters from earlier in the story, there's a whole section where some of the strange creatures from Act I come back and recite exactly the same lines as they did the first time, just in case you weren't paying attention. What were we thinking? It seemed like a good idea at the time. Perhaps Beckett could get away with it (no, not Samuel Beckett, I meant Sister Wendy...)]
 

...And Ruth Creased The Yellow Curtain
ACT II SCENE III

(This is going great, isn't it? - The same garage forecourt, three-and-a-half hours later. Enter A Different Mole Who Looks Like Robert Louis Stevenson.)

A DIFFERENT MOLE WHO LOOKS LOUIS STEVENSON:
Raspberries walk
Shanks's politician-style
Like adulation
Through a pinefield.
Arches of lost pantheons
Try to put me off
By wearing marked hats.
Crossed spits air over the massed shingle
Of dew-fogged promenadians.
The purple quotation mark of finality
Won't speak to frogs
Unless wearing a crash helmet.
Chrome-vanadium pastures devour cows
On a sleep failing.
Tog up Frankenstein's mistress,
In the Yukon, crows evaluate
Slowly.
Rabbits ignore considerations of Ginsberg
Filled with water.
Hope the lights will soon turn
Into blazing chickens,
Rita Book!

(Enter Mrs McVitie, pursued by fake looking B-Movie Aliens)

FAKE LOOKING B-MOVIE ALIENS: (in unison)
We're Deviants from beyond the void,
We speak with ESP
And we'll blast you with our laser beams
And cover your fridge with grease! Fade!

(Enter Simon "Rosko" Diggermix and Gordon)

SIMON "ROSKO" DIGGERMIX: Oh hello, Gordon! It's nice to see you... There's something I wish to ask you!

GORDON: Please ask your question, which I may answer, if it is within my capabilities...

SIMON "ROSKO" DIGGERMIX: I'm sure you're capable...

GORDON: Well then... I'll answer! Please state your question... Speak out your inquisition...

SIMON "ROSKO" DIGGERMIX: My question is of importance... Es ist about diejenigen Hosen?

GORDON: Mein Hosen?

SIMON "ROSKO" DIGGERMIX: Yes! Your trousers!

GORDON: (sings, to the tune of "Streets of London")
Have you seen old Simon,
On the streets of Munich,
Peddling guns and passports
To the Bader Meinhof Gang?
He supports the Red Brigade
And he's handy with a stun grenade!
He's a right-wing fascist bastard
In a world that doesn't care...

(Exit Simon "Rosko" Diggermix and Gordon) 

A DIFFERENT MOLE WHO LOOKS LIKE ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON:
Raspberries walk
Poison seeps from the open wound
Of licensed puberty.
Houses Erectus
Ride lateral saxophones
To entropy.
Recline like a speck of dirt on the highway,
Don't ever make a blanket
Crates of lazy bastions
Use bastions on John,
Rakes hunt fibreglass tourists in a toads digestion.
Need a good spanner?
Try the Forth Road Bridge!

MRS McVITIE: You don't scare me, you senile hulks of pangolin dirt! I have two deadly jet rocket blasters, hidden in special silos in my Psycho Zoom Corset!

(Enter Master Of Ceremonies Craig Hearn, unceremoniously interrupting)

MASTER OF CEREMONIES CRAIG HEARN: (addressing no one in particular) Do you want to see the eight lovable chins from Newbury, eh?

FIRST ALIEN: Mrs Lorraine McVest! You are a devil woman!

A DIFFERENT MOLE WHO LOOKS LIKE ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON:
Unfold
Untold
Spartan Afghanis,
Jailed in Ad Nine and soaked
In an aubergine Christmas.

SECOND ALIEN: Let's play "Martian Newspaper Headlines"... You can be "Wereem Kilitrenic"... and you come home to find your sports page reading "Raltcon Zip Hilarvo, Zammut Code Lyplammuting Ig!"... You remind her of the words of "Labbo Kazone", which read "Kilik Hindus On The Hilde..."

A DIFFERENT MOLE WHO LOOKS LIKE ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON:
Raspberries walk
As far as I'm concerned,
Rover's a blind name
For a quintet of braces.
Cocker pythons slither through Hoopfaced Borisses
And emit a glaring sigh,
Sounding like, "Pillar Knees! Pillar Knees!"

MASTER OF CEREMONIES CRAIG HEARN: (Talks to chair) They're on next y'know...

A DIFFERENT MOLE WHO LOOKS LIKE ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON:
Buy fog now
And get off with a squirrel
As only a wet baby can!
Rin Zilli Tongo
Is the Afghan feeling
Of being attacked by savage balloons...

SECOND ALIEN: Come on, Mr Bimbo! Let's make a real humdinger of a smell and destroy this Wonder Wench! Fade!

(FX: Fake theatrical fart noises, you know the sort...)

A DIFFERENT MOLE WHO LOOKS LIKE ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON:
Raspberries walk...
Sign away two weeks of someone else's enhanced euphoria.
Jackie O'Nassis tells her story exclusively
To the Slate Island Rain Colony Gazette,
Advertiser & Chronic.

MASTER OF CEREMONIES CRAIG HEARN: (Talks to wall) We'll have to stop meeting like this!... No... I'm only kidding... You really are a smashing audience... You're not from Rent-A-Crowd are you?

A DIFFERENT MOLE WHO LOOKS LIKE ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON:
Shining Kiwi!
Grant Kontiki!
Hargo Trine The Limpet!
Elastic Herbert waved Lucky Bags underwater...

FIRST ALIEN: There you are, Mr Starcupboard! We have destroyed the Earth... Goody goody!.. with one good blow-off! Heh heh heh!

SECOND ALIEN: Yes! Ha ha ha ha ha ! Echo! Ha ha ha ha!

MRS McVITIE: But no! You stinking menaces! I still exist! And look behind you! Fade!

(FX: Cacophony of raspberries)

A DIFFERENT MOLE WHO LOOKS LIKE ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON:
Raspberries walk
It's Magic!
A new way of unzipping snails!
Serious talk
Featuring
Big Bang Theory
The Expoding Universe affects
End Of Story
But whale meat again,
As the record says,
Don't think - Write!

MASTER OF CEREMONIES CRAIG HEARN: (Talks to curtains) I had a friend once... I did, honest, heh heh!... I had this friend who got a job with one of those Rent-A-Crowd outfits... Mind you, he only got the one job... Heh heh! He was the audience at a Ken Grindle Show! Heh heh!... Reckoned it was the hardest twenty pee he ever earned...

A DIFFERENT MOLE WHO LOOKS LIKE ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON:
Stoves in labour with raiding halibuts,
Ready to rack up Indians.
Where do cheese straws lose opinion boats
To pop-up coffee?
Dustbin of empty tins.

(Exit Mrs McVitie, hand in hand, Julie Andrews-style, with one of the Aliens)

A DIFFERENT MOLE WHO LOOKS LIKE ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON:
Raspberries walk...
Aggravate the only tall building in Senegal.
Tardboard Carbuck opens the slow-release valve
To reproduce quiz-show emcees,
Sparrows lie like croupiers
With self-adhesive robot harlequins.

MASTER OF CEREMONIES CRAIG HEARN: (Talks to fishbowl) Now let's all sit back and relax to the sound of sweet music... Ladies and Gentlemen, the hottest harmonisers in Britain today, The Skelton Twins!

(Exit in disgust, A Different Mole Who Looks Like Robert Louis Stevenson, on crutches, his face being daubed in bright green paint by one of the remaining Aliens. Enter in Triumph or, failing that, in an Austin Allegro, The Skelton Twins)

THE SKELTON TWINS: (tune of "Siegfried's Idyll" by Richard Wagner or "Happiness" by Ken Dodd)
Techudin Pronounced Tequadin!
Techudin Pronounced Tequadin!
Techudin! Tequadin!
We are the Ker-nights of same!
Techudin!
Techudin!
We set cereals on flame!
Techudin!
Techudin!
We are naughty
And worse!
Techudin!
Techudin!
We never get prezzies
From Santa Clerse!
Techudin!
Techudin?
(humming tunelessly) Mmm mmm mmm mmm!

A SOLITARY SOLO SKELTON: (sprechstimme) Geography? Home, Sick James!

(Exit The Skelton Twins. Enter Richard and Maddy Pryor and their small child, Snooky.)

RICHARD & MADDY PRYOR AND THEIR SMALL CHILD, SNOOKY: (reciting in unison, like in church) Gravel has a future... Saliva has shreed protector. Bumbelina was the Arkin Clove, the Three-Feek Lever Chastites, The Cleaver Sleet of Charm, The Gilded Slat of Quarm... Lady Godiva increased through the shallow melody, her horse-tail sniffer hung aloof, as predicaments shovel down Victorian skyscrapers. Hooga parades thumbs, kiting fire-worms. Cholesterol sellers' carts, cheating catburgs by the million, an Anglican reservation, a flinch of thumb, an ankle-archer's raincoat...
Flimsy farmers' falling faces...
You can take coal to Newcastle, but you can't make it jump,
Woh woh yeah and again!
Stilton Rinstead and again!
Finest feathered moondust and again!
Oval go-go Royalists and again!
Reepicheep, own a frequency, Thumbathumb, own a yard!
Flaxen Acto-Sherbs and Serbo-Cruets
Silk-axe perbolees versh a steertip, crumbling on high!
The Baroness of the Desert impressed us with her bleakness
And our shores are being washed by a great notion...
Versatility the Hun!
And somehow, I feel we are killing some little part of ourselves everytime we turn off the radio...
The story of a dead brain
Trying to come to life,
Oranges of the Species?
The grimy juices of the American centennial,
Vagaries of the common mutant
Eating butterfly yoghurt.
At the height of the party,
A golden eagle was trampled to death
On the dance floor.
Armagidee-Up-A-Ding-Dong!
Her entry was like a lounging bug dropped into a still pool...
For the man who has everything;
Individually monogrammed cornflakes!
The Fruit-Faced Stilletto is
At the moment,
A name without an amimal!

(Exit Richard & Maddy Pryor and their small child, Snooky, unnoticed. Enter Mrs Harvey, a tall and bearded female impersonator, and her son Jack. We hear the end of their conversation)

MRS HARVEY: Look Jack, my son! Let's settle this with a knife fight in the car park... but no lunges to the face, mind you!

HER SON JACK: No, Mother, let's not maim each other over this trifling Chrimbo matter! Let's compromise! We'll ask Santa for a Tardis with a built-in lavatory!

MRS HARVEY: (poking him with a bony finger) You're a clever child, Jack, and no mistake, Dave!

(Exit both. At the other end of the stage, we see part of the garage forecourt transmogrify into a facsimile of Santa's Magic Fun Factory. Various Winky Underlings mill about and busy themselves, doing whatever it is that Winky Elves do in Magic Fun Factories. Santa Himself is seen reading a scrap of Studio 6's scruffiest notepaper)

SANTA HIMSELF: Ho ho ho! What have we got here? Ah! A letter from the Harveys of Ordinaryville? They want a Tardis with a built-in lavatory? Head Winky! Have we got such a grand gift?

HEAD WINKY: No guv! But we've still got all those red GPO boxes...

SANTA HIMSELF: Bloody good idea! We'll fob 'em off with one of those!

(Through the magic of "stagecraft", the Santa's Grotto bit of the garage forecourt fades to darkness and the other end of the stage now reveals itself to be the Harvey's living room on Xmas morning - Isn't "stagecraft" magical, kiddies?)

MRS HARVEY: The reindeers have drunk all the sodding paraffin! And there's no sign of our gift!

HER SON JACK: And they've eaten all the turkey! What a swizz! (addresses audience) Oh children! We are so unhappy... And on Xmas morning!

(An overlarge plastic telephone descends from the ceiling, ringing.)

MRS HARVEY: Answer the phone, Jack!

HER SON JACK: We haven't got one, Mother! You said they give people spots!

MRS HARVEY: Answer it all the same, dear! It is Xmas day!

HER SON JACK: Righto Mother! Um... How do you do it?

MRS HARVEY: When it stops ringing, pick up the receiver and say who you are.

HER SON JACK: Righto Mother!

(The phone continues to ring for a boring length of time - eventually it stops ringing and Jack picks it up and talks into it)

HER SON JACK: Who you are!

MRS HARVEY: (addresses imaginary audience of seven-year olds) What was that, children? (pause) Yes, I know Jack has the brain of two-thirds of a stuffed aubergine!

(The phone rings again)

MRS HARVEY: The kids say to answer the phone while it's still ringing... How ill-mannered!... but give it a try...

(Jack picks up the phone)

HER SON JACK: Um... who you are?

(We hear the voice-off of the Genie of the Handset) 

VOICE-OFF OF THE GENIE OF THE HANDSET: (voice off) Hello? Is that young Jack Harvey?

HER SON JACK: Um... yes?

VOICE-OFF OF THE GENIE OF THE HANDSET: I am the Genie of the Handset and you may have three wishes, Jack!

HER SON JACK: I wish I could meet my favourite star of stage, screen and Daily Mirror, Uncle Cyril The Kiddies' Favourite!

(There is an impressive flash of theatrical-grade pyrotechnics and there stands Uncle Cyril the Kiddies' Favourite and his intrepid sidekick, Ulex Ulex the Inflatable Gnu)

UNCLE CYRIL THE KIDDIES' FAVOURITE: Hello kiddies! It's me, Uncle Cyril... and look who I've brought to see you... That's right! It's Ulex Ulex the Inflatable Gnu! Let's have a volunteer from the audience... Up here, come on... What's your name then?

HER SON JACK: Conan the Dragon Slayer, Uncle Cyril!

UNCLE CYRIL THE KIDDIES' FAVOURITE: Hello Conan! This is Ulex Ulex... Ha ha ha! That's the wrong end, Conan! Did you have Sugar Puffs for breakfast, Conan? See... I'm a mind reader, heh heh heh! ...anyway, you've got breakfast all down your front, heh heh heh!

HER SON JACK: That's my Bros Terror of the Snakes Picture Disc Logo Super Cravat, Uncle Cyril!

UNCLE CYRIL THE KIDDIES' FAVOURITE: What do we all need? That's right, everyone... spoons! Everyone grab yer spoons and join in!

(He sings his song, to manic advanced non-rhythmic spooning from all present)

UNCLE CYRIL THE KIDDIES' FAVOURITE: (sings to the tune of "You Need Hands")
You need spoons
Oh! Neo-Birmingham Omelette Show!
Hey mate! The scene's got a yellow leg,
The scene is squinting lengthwise at its own superb existence
Raschizchovkov Omelette Coleman!
I say Sponge! Speunge! Speunge! Speunge!
Coeleocanth and die!
Are you insured against the depredations of a rogue cockateel?
There's a real mean dude from Hong Kong
At the door, Mum...
He's looking for Dad...
I think it's about the lettuce...
Obvious frogs!
See me with obvious frogs!
In damp countries
They eat a fruit called a Raingage.
Similarly
We kicked huge blue iguanas
Into life
And started hunting
For the Assorter! You need spoons! Yeah!

(Huge applause from the imaginary audience of seven-year olds)

UNCLE CYRIL THE KIDDIES' FAVOURITE: Heh heh heh! There was this bloke... and he worked at a French Polishers'... and one day, he found a picture of Ava Gardner in his locker... so he said, "Who put this picture of Ava Gardner in my locker?"... and this little boy pipes up... Heh heh heh! "I dunno!"... Heh heh heh! Thank you and goodnight!

(Uncle Cyril and Ulex Ulex disappear with another impressive demonstration of the art of theatrical pyrotechnology)

HER SON JACK: (to no one in particular) Wasn't that great everybody?

MRS HARVEY: I want a wish now! After all, it's my present as well... (grabs phone) Hello? Mr Genie?... He's bloody hung up!

HER SON JACK: Look in Yellow Pages, Mother... under "Lovable Pantomime Characters"...

MRS HARVEY: (leafs through phonebook) Let me see... "Limbo Dancers"... "Liposuction"... "Log Salesmen"... "Loofer Hire"... "Lump Hammer Suppliers"... Ah! Here we are... (Dials number and waits) Hello is that the Genie? ...Can I have my wish now, please?

VOICE-OFF OF THE GENIE OF THE HANDSET: (voice off) Yes, of course you may, my dear! What'll it be? I'm sorry I hung up, but I was bursting for a jimmy...

MRS HARVEY: I wish I could tap dance like Ginger Rogers, sing like Val Doonican, yodel like Frank Ifield and quack like George Formby!

VOICE-OFF OF THE GENIE OF THE HANDSET: What? All at the same time?

MRS HARVEY: Yes?

VOICE-OFF OF THE GENIE OF THE HANDSET: Go on then!

MRS HARVEY: (hoofing and singing)
Paddy McGinty's goat,
Duh da duh dad duh!
You've never seen anything like it!
Yodel-ay-ee-tee!
Quack!
And Rafferty's motor car,
In the windmills of your mind!
Yodel-ay-ee-tee!
Quack!

(Enter Simon "Rosko" Diggermix, panto villain-style. Boos and hisses abound.)

SIMON "ROSKO" DIGGERMIX: Ha ha hah! What's going on 'ere? ...Eurgh! I 'ate Xmas... it's for pansies!

MRS HARVEY: Pooh Bah and no mistake, treacherous Simon! Get back to Her Majesty's lock-up, this minute! Look! You've upset Jack!

HER SON JACK: (grizzling) Boo hoo! Xmas is an enchanted time... sniff sniff!

VOICE-OFF OF THE GENIE OF THE HANDSET: (voice off, remember!) Never mind, Jack! Here's a picture of some crested newts!

(A picture of some crested newts drops onto the stage)

HER SON JACK: (suddenly cheering up) Cor! Thanks, Gene!

VOICE-OFF OF THE GENIE OF THE HANDSET: Genie, not "Gene"! I'm not a crazy-quiffed rock'n'roll sex machine... (pause) ...But then again...

(The Genie of the Handset manifests himself in person for the first time, looking for all the world like a low-budget Shaking Stevens, in a silver lamé tuxedo and enormous pompadour de la rump du canard)

THE GENIE OF THE HANDSET: (sings)
Well! It's one for the money!
Two for the show!
Three for Mrs Harvey!
Come on, let's go!
Let's go!
Let's go to the pantomime!
You can do anything
But miss the pantomime! Yeah!
Spot the disembodied car
And win a happy time! Yeah!

HER SON JACK: (spoken aside) Come back Alan Breeze, all is forgiven...

MRS HARVEY: (sings)
It's Four for the cast
And Five for the crew!
Six for something else
And away we go...

SIMON "ROSKO" DIGGERMIX: (cutting her off mid-stanza) Silence! Shut up! I want to eat a systems analyst, my stomach is rumbling! (rumbling FX) That gasometer I had for breakfast went straight through me!

(Offstage raspberry ripple effects. A scary snake enters)

SCARY SNAKE: Stop that man! He's a credit card swindler!

(Sudden curtain and lights down. A brief, darkened pause, then the lights go up again to reveal loads of characters from Act I Scene I sitting arround, smoking klerns and scratching their arses, as if waiting for Samual Beckett to turn up and write them something to do. They carry on in much the same manner as before.)

ROBBO SPIPES: Fetch me my Trike-O-Ethylonic Kardinly... Sorry! Only my pipe!

BLUE ON PALE YELLOW: As you can see, this diagram holds the key to existence... If Yuri wells up the Farnetoloraine Islandbestos, we're elite!

ZYKOOZ ZILK T'ZAH ABKA FUTCUK JUNIOR THE WONDER FISH: No! No!

LENCH THRIPPAHENCH: Yes! Yes!

TRUM CORBETT: So after that, the limpet was blowtorched to surrender... If only Mama could see us now!

POPE GREGORY: React to my nasal sounds, The Stuffed Fillmore Seal! Slide wet banana-geese between shiny potassium chutes...

THE STUFFED FILLMORE SEAL: I, and only I, knew what the Navy wanted! Quickly, I removed the raccoon cage that stole surreptitiously towards my mother... purely on the off-chance of seeing a Loaded Soap Creature!

CRYLEX THE HILLMAN: You see gentlemen... that sentence has carried us to the edge of the world... Only the Marble Civet Cat can answer the thrice-requested question, "Am I really the Photon Digitoid?"

(Enter Beau Tharne The Stirrup... was he in Act I Scene I? I can't remember!... Beau Tharne The Stirrup rushes forward, only to be spurned by a self-sufficient squid)

A FRENCH MOLE: (screams) I'm loaded!

NARTHOR: (retorts) Even better!

THE FORGOTTEN RUNG: Opulescent Stirrup Tetrylchlorocaribou-Leoleo, Carnex of Plates!

SCHOONER JIM: We look through the water globe of arterial life... vedanta through the black smoke of the burning Rome... we see Nero & The Spiders In Jars, playing the Death March Latin-style!

DESERT THE MOLE: (shrieks) No! The only place for a Babbitt is a crutch!

THUMBS CLAGGAMILK: (bleats like an Esconule Rapier-Onyx Corgon) Pune! Pune!

ROBBO SPIPES: (retorts like a different squid fisherman) Piss off!

BLUE ON PALE YELLOW: Deep, deep, is my only crayons face!

ZYKOOZ ZILK T'ZAH ABKA FUTCUK JUNIOR THE WONDER FISH: If only Logan was here... the cargo could be contained in his Omnipresent Pouchorographica...

LENCH THRIPPAHENCH: (stoons not unlike Eamonn) Three Dead Moths of Detention barned at the cablecart... Infirm Ma-anations, it may be, but it's my life!

TRUM CORBETT: (also stooning Eamonnly) You unnecessary device of a knife-craners bolus! Grapple with me, would you... you... you...?

POPE GREGORY: Only if you want...

CRYLEX THE HILLMAN: Dogger Bight of toad-slime! The ever-ready Ed Crappit-Lizard, stringer to a nation...

A FRENCH MOLE: Discie! Discie! My banjo container's been bitten by a snark-trap baiter's son!

NARTHOR: The candle-moulder lerbed with the grace of a shrimp-net, then snapped off at the face!

(Crimp McCoy erects the goal apparatus. He bends double, limps badly before the court, then he passes out.)

THE FORGOTTEN RUNG: (murmering) I'm not a well... Excuses! Excuses! Stab your goat?

(Rip Nolan unveils the huge beast, only to be trapped, yet again, in Gonad's Amazing Trick Walnut Exhibition. He bites the lozenge pedlar good day, then plunges his genitalia into Crushed Unabili Voyeur Soup)

SCHOONER JIM: But Dad! Marlon only crushed the cat in a fit of self-abuse!

DESERT THE MOLE: (screams) Tank Love-Toys!

THUMBS CLAGGAMILK: So like those tame neo-decadent ballistrades!

ROBBO SPIPES: The sharp implement tatooed a nifty bird-lime stain on D'Bus!

ZYKOOZ ZILK T'ZAH ABKA FUTCUK JUNIOR THE WONDER FISH: Only if you wanton, sire!

LENCH THRIPPAHENCH: (quoth as Eamonn's twin, Lindon) But Marshall! Cat-skinning is a great turn-on for the Sol Hogwash Fan Club...

TRUM CORBETT: It may well be... but only if your ducks' eggs knew...

POPE GREGORY: So... he's Jewish... I'd still feel safer performing violent lacerations about a movie director's anal regions...

CRYLEX THE HILLMAN: (piercing shriek) No! Not Anti-time! From Edith's womb-support and marrow-shaver?

A FRENCH MOLE: (cries like Little Algie) The Bishop's address was a soupier thing... It was "Mavis Cront, Fifteen Blit Gardens, Avé Maria, Dungeness".

NARTHOR: Posturing like a famous halibut-fondler may not pay well, but it sure beats chapped hands and vet's fees...

THE FORGOTTEN RUNG: Jasmine perfume has seeped into my nolan gland... Touch the galactile lozenge to escape the cortége...

SCHOONER JIM: Firmly we grip the wailing implement...

MR YEA HEAVY AND A BOTTLE OF CHRYSANTHE-AUNTIE ESQ: But no! Degradation Emporia bite through Presley's white cowboy truss... Come on baby! Unzip the French Prime Minister's oval cuttlefish with me!

(Violent Carson hangs upright once more from a military pole, craving the wet kiss of a pompous stadium.)

DESERT THE MOLE: Every picture waits to taste the whip, when handled by the Marquis de North Baddesley... We beep hooters, in a vain attempt to move the lion-tamers who queue, relentlessly, between slices of bread and dripping, in our front room...

THUMBS CLAGGAMILK: We pile apparatus against our mouths, but words disguised as lame pelicans hobble out of our nostrils. Roll back the red carpet... brush the corgis under the lino, remove all emblems of retired Twyla Tharp-ites...

ROBBO SPIPES: (like that giant sodium lamprey) Leggins the Cat! Leggins the Cat!

BLUE ON PALE YELLOW and ZYKOOZ ZILK T'ZAH ABKA FUTCUK JUNIOR THE WONDER FISH: Message from base, sir!

LENCH THRIPPAHENCH: Punardian capsules have landed, sir!

TRUM CORBETT: Rita Tushingham has been invaded, sir!

POPE GREGORY: But sir! Those aliens have wives and kiddies at home!

CRYLEX THE HILLMAN: Rita Tushingham has been invaded!

A FRENCH MOLE: Rita Tushingham has been invaded!

NARTHOR: Rita Tushingham has been invaded!

THE FORGOTTEN RUNG: Go float in a bucket of liquid X-rays, face-ache!

SCHOONER JIM: Draw Jimmy Factotem across your own Hot Appalachian Tissues!

MR YEA HEAVY AND A BOTTLE OF CHRYSANTHE-AUNTIE ESQ: Don't stop to think... just get out on that stage and say, "Moon Gantry between Milateral Guk will save the starving mullions!"

DESERT THE MOLE: The music goes round and round and it comes out heard...

THUMBS CLAGGAMILK: But that's your naso-lachrymal gland, sir!

BLUE ON PALE YELLOW: Let it be known, throughout all Hastings, that I, Alexophiliac, Ruler of All The Galaxies, Ovate, Bard and Maker of the Great Duodecahedron That They Use As A Prize For The Best Easter Bonnet, never eat dutch eel with the batter off...

ZYKOOZ ZILK T'ZAH ABKA FUTCUK JUNIOR THE WONDER FISH: Heave on the capstan, me lungies... Heave up the anchor... we're leaving this Liverpool... leaving this black den of people with drawing pins in their eyes...

NARTHOR:
We hope for help, we cope with kelp, but cry for a contact...
We rope-a-dope, we hire-a-fire, we use the modern analog,
"The Canadog is Oper Flog!
Flog Dog Cab Agricultureen,
Flag Dab Rab Cultureen!"
Between transmissions, I see peace,
Wallaby-fur peace, collar bee for ogre-stretcher
Chris P. Packet!
Chrispian stretcher koto fee my diet Energen!
Energen and again
And genitalic we must treat them!
Treating traders,
Drinking drapers,
Like a total team of tailors.
Like tartan tanks in testing times,
We panic in the sundial...
Like leaping lions, slightly sick
Of something we can count on...
Counting candy in the canny, stirring cannister or cauldron,
I called on all the corded candy Fornians
To canter on towards the dam,
The counter-measures guarantee
The time we need to see the spam...
The Canadamsel on the camelÕs carousel, cans damsons
In the enigmatic shell of wan divide attention...
"I cauterized!" she smiled, the room went up in glory...
Your mind is numb!
My guide is dumb!
I now can end my story! Thank you!

(Thus we witness the destruction of all comprehension... All those Leftovers In Pullovers from Act I Scene I now leave the Garage Forecourt in solemn procession... By the way... a message from Neo-Gastric Realism Communications... Jimi Hendrix phoned while you were out...)

Act II Scene II

[Not much to say about this bit, because I'm not sure I fully understand it myself. But does it r--e--a--l--l--y matter? There are one or two ACTUAL dates quoted, which should give you a subtle clue as to when parts of this were originally scrawled (New Years' Days of 1975 and 1991 respectively)]
 

...And Ruth Creased The Yellow Curtain
ACT II SCENE II

(A garage forecourt. A sign reads "Television Studio A - Rory McGroon's Hogmanoony Show". Another sign reads "Vatican Radio". A fully-equipped Italian Film Crew knocks at the door. Dunx, the man who says "Scrotum!" all the way through Scene I, answers the door.)

DUNX THE MAN WHO SAYS "SCROTUM!" ALL THE WAY THROUGH SCENE I: Piss off wops!

(He slams the door.)

A FULLY-EQUIPPED ITALIAN FILM CREW MEMBER: Sod it then! Let's go to the pub for some spaghetti!

ANOTHER FULLY-EQUIPPED ITALIAN FILM CREW MEMBER: No... We'd better find a window to climb in... or find a conduit to filter through...

A FULLY-EQUIPPED ITALIAN FILM CREW MEMBER: Is it worth it, Luigi?

ANOTHER FULLY-EQUIPPED ITALIAN FILM CREW MEMBER: Thirty Six Million Lire say it is, Nicademus!

A FULLY-EQUIPPED ITALIAN FILM CREW MEMBER: No one wants to see this crap in Milan...

ANOTHER FULLY-EQUIPPED ITALIAN FILM CREW MEMBER: Ah! But they do in Umbria... The Pope is partial to a bit of Caledonian tomfoolery!

(They climb through a window. We hear Dunx's voice, offstage, crying "Hoots Mon! Dagos!". Enter Narthor The Narrative Mole and his new accomplice, Magnet The Coat)

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE:(sings)
Green grow the three round swans,
Spawn of damp pune in grass clothes.
Bloo bone, the rodent was...
(spoken) Get the equipment, Magnet The Coat!

MAGNET THE COAT: Musical tilt in an undertow, thick vegetable soup in a painting by Bosch!

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: Sinning by numbers! Trade in your memories for a new dress of airplane scales. Meet Mr Slime, King of the Anorak People!

MAGNET THE COAT: Flick Russian architects like bogies, would you, Ra, Sun God of the Mail People?

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: Begone flat coypu! Remove your scarred face from my egg-methane crumble!

MAGNET THE COAT: Drag rubbish bins to Deptford! Illustrate pistons!

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: Quickly, before the return of the lizard... evaluate the situation and vacuum-wrap it, so you can transport it to the place of polish! Summon up a magic beerglass-full of posters, pierced by a million tiny cigarette-papers. Be a good witch and use a polished and sanded guitar-tutor. Music may not be everything, but twelve mattery Italian root-bear salesmen say it's three grades of diving suit...

MAGNET THE COAT: This is the first line of writings of 1975 - Can you d-i-g-i-t, Soul Mole? This is the last tin canary to be dragged through the verbal assault course of a Chinese retirement party. Dead clocks don't make cats grow smoke trails.

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: In that case...

MAGNET THE COAT: The scholactic error was not rectified and all the people were sent home... We are now only - well, I'm only - nine years old!

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: And now it's 1965 and The Beatles might get around to writing "Paperback Writer"... I love Paul... Will Sandy Shaw ever wear shoes?...

(The Italian film crew suddenly appear, doing a line-dance to Zorba The Greek-type music and wearing plastic police helmets - they leave just as quickly, to cries of "Mama Mia! Wrong studio!")

MAGNET THE COAT: Most peoples budgies haven't even been born yet... Mr Woodhouse was a desert rat until 1963, then he found himself swaying through the mists of Snow White... and prematurely blew his mind, staring at Bridget Riley drawn with a cooler. Isn't Scouts a drag, what with our new-found maturity?

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: I am in the company of total strangers and yet... I feel cool!

MAGNET THE COAT: I, in my present state, do not exist.

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: I am, at present, suffering from the future. It is very disconcerting. I am ten years younger, but still nearing old age and senior school...

MAGNET THE COAT: I'd like to see me mates, but I don't know them yet.

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: My trousers don't exist... even my fingernails aren't the same calcium.

MAGNET THE COAT: Indeed! My fingernails are ten years growth shorter.

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: It's going to be weird, going to school with my hair the way it's grown overnight. I look like all The Rolling Stones put together.

MAGNET THE COAT: Mick said in Rolling Stones Monthly, "Long hair is good - if things get tough, you can hide in it."

NARTHOR THE NARATIVE MOLE: Hooray! I'm gonna read a Jennings book...

MAGNET THE COAT: Bob Dylan's going electric this year!

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: A lot of things in the attic don't exist... Only Afghans wear the coats...

DUNX THE MAN WHO SAYS "SCROTUM!" ALL THE WAY THROUGH SCENE I: (Voice off) Hoots Mon! Dagos!

(Narthor The Narrative Mole and Magnet The Coat break into an "Agadoo" dance routine)

MAGNET THE COAT: She Loves You, Yeah Yeah Yeah!

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: Liverpool is the centre of the universe, culturally...

MAGNET THE COAT: Bleeeurgghhh! I like Frank Ifield's "Wayward Wind"!

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: This is my big chance to watch "Ready Steady Go!".

MAGNET THE COAT: Cathy McGowan is great!

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: Stoker Henwood is stupid!

MAGNET THE COAT: BSA...

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: Norton...

MAGNET THE COAT: Carol...

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: Triumph...

MAGNET THE COAT: Royal Enfield...

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: Clapton might be God...

MAGNET THE COAT: I guess I'm pretty tough... I think, one day, I will dive into the sea - any sea - and save someone from drowning... despite not being able to swim... and will modestly walk away, without telling anyone who I am, leaving them staring in admiration...

(Magnet The Coat, without any provocation from the others, turns on a transistor radio and occasionally switches between stations, producing an interesting effect. While this goes on, three roadies bring on a large gaily-painted box which has the required number of air holes. A Houdini lookalike comes on, led, James Brown-style, by several helpers. He is handcuffed, chained up and helped into the box, then the box is roped securely. There is a dramatic drum-roll, then nothing whatsoever happens. The box remains on the stage for the remainder of the scene)

VOICE OF THE TRANSISTOR RADIO: ...And on "Kiss My Colobus" tonight... (FX - Fzzzt Squeeek)...lightly over a low gas and leave it to simmer. While this is happening, you can prepare the flan dish with a little herring butter... (FX - Phweet Zzzzzz Kkkkk Bip) ...then you hurl it up against the wall and the other guy has to catch it in a kind of wicker handbag... and that's Pelota... or as they call it in... (FX - Scree Thwippetee) Mississippi Lemon Turd Cart With Whammy Greens... (FX - Dwish Dwish Dwish) ...Oomlau! Oomlau! Ze Takeaway Meal! Ze Bread's First Rate And Ze Apricot's Real! Oomlau! Berlin's Favourite... (FX - Squich Squich Coochweeeelp) ..in-a-lifetime, Get-a-break, Piece-o'cake. Shake-a-snake, Get Down and... (FX - Fiddly Dee) ...Welcome to the Home Service... (FX - Fiddly Pea) ...an' oi'll tell yer fer whoi, Peter... You can't expect a man ter live in Croydon all 'is loif an'... (FX - Phwad Phwad) ...then from out of the lush Pumsiva foliage, I saw what no white man has ever seen before... I was privileged to see a fully grown adult... (FX - Fwiddle Deeep) ...Postman, according to a British Telecom engineer (FX - Preedle Skrutchit Kkkkzzz) ...who's in the Listening Corner today... (FX - Kwwweeeepp) ..."here comes my husband!" (FX - Whiddley Drit Ka Deedee) ...down the Cresta Run at 100mph... (FX - Flattidy Dish) ...in through yer mouth and out yer ear like a... (FX - Siddley Niddley) ...terracotta cucumber... (FX - Shreeels) ...Bell helmet... (FX - Loopala Loppala) ...useful bubo grater... (FX - Peeoowee) ...have personally won... (FX - Fazak Fazak Fazakakalaka) ...wool or acrilan in a willow pattern. Mrs Filto, does that answer your question?" "Does that include milk stains?" (FX - Quizbillet) ...You're under arrest, Simpson! You have the right to remain sile... Gibbon and a Titulated Orak and a Greville Toaster Oriole... and we keep them all in a... (FX - Fistule Kitty Kitty Kitty) ...warm oven until further notice... (FX - Bizwiggit Masterlinseed) ...fights tooth decay... (FX - Coozoozoozoo) ...shortens curtains in a flash! (FX - Vavoonmumg Luggit) "Will y'noo tak' the sproots tae Aberdeen, Hamish?" (FX - Steelbiscuit Zit) ...until 1962, when the modern building was opened by Prince Charles, then... (FX - Gozo) ...merely a turtle... (FX - Funzal Geegee) May I, Mr Speaker, draw the attention of the Right Honorable gentlemen to... tremors in the... (FX - Nattaderr Nattaderr) ...marrowbone jelly... (FX - Frrrrtttt) ...of the Prime Minister... (FX - Wadpalleeridong Tootle) "When did you first discover your incredible skills at radio mimicry, Mr Lapworth-Hewitt?" (FX - Croak Soon Wimpeygraph) "What sort of static was that, Mr Lapworth-Hewitt?" "Pardon?" (FX - Finpy Bridgeoverthee Riverpimby) ...and stretch! And bend! And breathe! And bend! And stretch! And left! Bend knee twice! And right shoulder up and over... (FX - Kikidee Kikidee) ...my dead body, Professor! (FX - Laglagalagala) Sing Something Simple... (FX - Arthritic!) ...we've got self-assembly halibuts, we've got teak-veneer tortoises... Get down now to MFI and get... (FX - Snappa Snappa) ...tied to a tree... And a late result from the Rothmans Lid-Heading Sportathon... Cherry Pip Rovers - One... (FX - Fizzagong Blot Winkys) ...Find me a squirrel. Rover! (FX - Pondgrazedimqueel) That's all oi really wanner say really, Peederr... (FX - Click) Excuse me, where is the Hogmanoony Show, please?

(The radio is silenced and conversation goes on as "normal")

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: It's a doing word!

MAGNET THE COAT: It's FAB!

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: It's gear!

MAGNET THE COAT: Smoking turnips or paper string, to see what it's like... Aye Verily! 'Tis A Play for Smoobs!

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: Fetch me my tryke-o-ethylonic, Kardinly... Sorry, only my pipe!

(A member of the Italian film crew sticks his head round the lavatory door. He addresses his unseen colleague, who we can't see because he is outta sight. A sign on the toilet door reads "AFORE YE GO - WASH YER HANDS, YA STOATIE!")

A MEMBER OF THE ITALIAN FILM CREW: Zis is ze bogs, mon army!

ANOTHER MEMBER OF SAID ITALIAN FILM CREW: (unseen) You are right, Kemo Sarby! We have been duped!

A MEMBER OF THE ITALIAN FILM CREW: Yes mon capitano! Done up like ze kippers!

ANOTHER MEMBER OF SAID ITALIAN FILM CREW: Let's film the idiots in the next studio... We can tell the Pope they are Scottish people...

(They shut the door)

MAGNET THE COAT: As you can see, this diagram holds the key to existence.

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: If you exist!

MAGNET THE COAT: No! No!

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: Yes! Yes!

MAGNET THE COAT: So after that, the limpet was blowtorched to surrender? If only Mama could see us now!

(Enter The Stuffed Fillmore Seal)

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: React to my nasal sounds, The Stuffed Fillmore Seal! Slide wet banana geese between my shiny potassium puree!

MAGNET THE COAT: I and only I know what the Navee wanted... Quickly I removed the raccoon cage that stole surreptitiously toward my mother, purely on the off-chance of seeing a loaded soap creature...

(Exit The Stuffed Fillmore Seal)

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: You see, Gentlemen... That sentence has carried us to the edge of the world... Only The Marble Civet Cat can answer the thrice-requested question... Am I really The Photon Digitoid?

(Enter The Marble Civet Cat and The Opulescent Stirrup)

THE MARBLE CIVET CAT: Beau Tie is in the eye of the bee holder...

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: (screams) I'm loaded!

THE OPULESCENT STIRRUP: (retorts tartly) Even better!

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: (screams) Tetrylchlorocaribou Leoleo! Carnex of plates!

(Exit The Marble Civet Cat and The Opulescent Stirrup. Enter Rory McGroon)

RORY McGROON: (sings)
Frae Scara Brae
Tee Ben McDwae,
Frae Fort McCraig
Tee Edinbraig
Och! Come all ye
And bide awhile
At the dear ol' Hogmonoony!
(spoken) Hellooo! My name's Rory McGroon and I'm your compere for tonight, live from Newbury in the heart of the Trossachs... That's right, Missus! Trossachs! We've got a greet line-up of acts to welcome in the New Year... 1991... Just think of that, nineteen-bloody-ninety-one... Let's check the clock to see how far we've got to go 'til nineteen-bloody-ninety-one...

MAGNET THE COAT: Dogger bite of slime, Toad! The ever ready Ed, crapit lizard stringer to a nation... We'll see about this, when Daddy's rotund profound geodexcaligraph... Onerous, did you say? Dixie Dixie! My banjo container's been bitten by a snark baiter's son...

RORY McGROON: Ladies and gentlemen, lairds and lasses... The Glamis Castle Ceilidh Cavalcaders!

(A ramshackle dance routine ensues in which the protagonists hop to the left, stop, waggle their arms, hop to the left, lie on the floor, stand up again and shout "Dennis, where's yer trooosers!". There are also accordions involved. Dissecto saws his own arm off. The candle moulder lerbs with the grace of a shrimp-net, then snaps off at the face. The giant sodium lamprey cries, "Leggins The Cat! Leggins The Cat!")

MAGNET THE COAT: Crimp McCoy erected the goal apparatus, then bent double... then limped badly, before the court...

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: (passing out) I'm not a well...

MAGNET THE COAT: Excuses, excuses!

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: This is an ordinary toy balloon... (squeak balloon) This balloon is the same colour... (squeak)

MAGNET THE COAT: Wrong pantomime, Mr Glowplug!

(The audience showers them both with bits of screwed-up paper, crying "Abdul, where's yer troosers?" - Enter Ken "Carwash" Grindle again - For the best effect, this bit should be delivered very loudly whilst standing in a dustbin)

KEN "CARWASH" GRINDLE: I can talk in confidence, can't I? Eeh, Ah've got such a boil on me backside! Ah 'aven't sat down fer a moonth! 'Ave you ever 'ad one, Missus? A boil, I mean... heh heh heh! Ooh, Ah should be at 'ome, cleanin' me car... Ah said to the doctor, "Doc, Ah've got a boil on me backside the size of a small volcano... Can yer do owt for it, Doc?" ...'E said "Ken... Ken... Go 'ome an' tell the wife to rub three pints of bitter on it..."So I went 'ome... the Missus rubbed three pints of bitter on me bum... Nothin' 'appened! So I went back to the Doc an' he said, "Make it a gallon, Ken... and a packet of pork scratchings..." ...Ah tell yer, ah smelled like a bloody pub carpet! Didn't work... Wife 'ad t'knit me special pair of trousers!

(The audience become visibly disinterested. One man crunches loudly on crisps.)

KEN "CARWASH" GRINDLE: ...Bugger-all 'appened! So I walked to that Lourdes... with a boil so big, I 'ad to support it in a bloody shoppin' trolley... A priest came up t'me an' ah said, "Look chum! Ah've 'ad no luck with me boil, ah think ah'll become an 'Indu!" ...'E said, "Ken... Ken! Look on your boil as a gift from God... You use it to your advantage and reap the reward!" So I 'it 'im over the 'ead with it an' pinched 'is Visa card! Thank you! Thank you!... Ladies and gents, please don't welcome on stage, The Humming Goatherds of Bavaria!

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: (murmers) Stab your goat...

MAGNET THE COAT: ...And the Luddites marched on yesterday's dinner, smiling gently to the demolished crowd of auto mollusc salesmen.

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: Hebbit the lozenge peddlar bid us Good Day, then plunged his genetalia into crushed Swahili voyeur soup.

MAGNET THE COAT: The Mouthy Robol Carnel Boot attempted but failed... We all died together!

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: (shrieks) No! The only place for a Babbitt is a crutch!

MAGNET THE COAT: Jasmine perfume has seeped into my Nolan gland... Touch the Galactile Lozenge to escape the cortege!

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: (bleating in the style of Exonule Rapier Onyx Gorgon) Pune! Pune!

MAGNET THE COAT: (retorts in the style of a squid fisherman) Piss off! Out the door, first on the right, ya stoatie!

(We hear the continuing strains of "Agadoo")

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: Firmly, we grip the wailings of a dove's mother, heating The Barren Nights slowly over a picnic stove... Is that any way to treat apes?

MAGNET THE COAT: Deep deep is my only crayon's face! If only Bryans was here, the cargo would be contained in his omnipresent pouchorographica!

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: (inflates the unique toy rat) It looks at me and grows a blue wing, it flies up to the roof... I buy it for three shillings, but it doesn't quote even numbers... so I play it Gas Chamber Music... and it grows as tall as a tower and flames shoot five hundred yards from its blue wing... So Craven Nesbit is crowned "Miss Tea Vymura Garage Accessory 1977"? ...which is enough to make a quince wince... or a Plantagenet exaggerate... or a certificate defecate... or a comet vomit! Hello Jam lies back, thick on my plate, like a hot-wattle sonnet in your Jasper- covered scream...

MAGNET THE COAT: Three dead moths of detention barned out the cable cart infirm-marionations. Come on, baby, unzip the French Prime Minister's oval cuttlefish with me!

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: (stoons as Eamonn) It may be my life!

MAGNET THE COAT: Violent Carson hangs upright from a military pole, craving the wet kiss of the pompous stadium. Prehistoric caveholders, well-known by themselves, with their names spelled out in geraniums across their infertile chests, weep purest phosphates when they can, as a stimulant to the groaning ground... Spiny beer on the cast-iron throat of Redundancy, payments made out of the hand of the land, to crush or caress...

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: (Eamonnly stooning) You unnecessary device of a nyfe-craners bolus! Grapple with me, would you... Would you? You you you you... if only you want!

MAGNET THE COAT: Every picture waits to taste the queue relentlessly... (breaks into song)
Eleven electric
Anti-Christ Madonnas
Parade bizarre,
It's seen by four
Surreptitious cranes...
Nice!
Tick tack!
Ladder rack!
Choke a bird for real!
Lull the crate of awaiting herd styles,
Matching strains in an Unread Book,
Yon thrice!
Wire coating
Tune of bats
Faithful!
"Collington Crescent!"
Said the psychedelic brush salesman,
"Warburton Avenue!
Pass the multicoloured adhesive,
That I may build a fire
Out of copper-bottomed secretaries' bricks!"

NARTHOR THE NARRATIVE MOLE: (resignedly) Chrome your scooters, blokes! It's 1965!

(Exit both, on children's red-plastic scooters, about which there is nothing mysterious. Curtain.)