I HAVE a confession to make: I admire Sir Keir Starmer. Yes, that’s correct, I admire Sir Keir Starmer. Who couldn’t appreciate the herculean levels of self-control he exhibited at the recent UK-hosted EU summit, when he proudly announced that Britain was ‘back on the world stage’? Anyone with the very briefest acquaintance with Great Britain would have dissolved into uncontrollable laughter at such an absurd utterance.
Britain, a country riven with discord, a country that cannot police who crosses its borders, a country of work-from-homers, a country happy to see its elderly forced to choose between eat or heat, a country that cannot look after its ill and most needy, a country of food banks, a country of functionally illiterate school-leavers, a country where councils cannot attend to their most basic duties and, let us not forget, a country where the successful must be punished at every turn.
I wonder what faraway theatre Sir Keir had in mind when this vacuous platitude emerged from the cobwebby backwaters of his mind. La Scala perhaps, maybe the Met in New York, the Bolshoi – although given current relations, unlikely, how about our own home-grown Royal Opera House?
Whatever grand and imposing building was uppermost in his imagination, I wonder if he simultaneously visualised what production might ideally lend itself to Britain playing a part in – leading or otherwise. Here are a few thoughts.
Samuel Beckett’s 1953 masterpiece Waiting for Godot has been successfully staged many times, but what a shame Beckett didn’t have the foresight to anticipate how Britain would develop in the following decades. If he had, he might have opted for the more fitting Waiting for Doctor.
In this alternative interpretation, Vladimir and Estragon would engage in a variety of discussions and encounters while, in a modern twist, they would be listening to a holding message from their surgery intoning: ‘Thank you for your call, we are experiencing a higher volume of calls than usual, if you are experiencing a life-threatening emergency replace the receiver and dial 999.’ The play would run for approximately 90 minutes, and faithful to Beckett’s original, the GP would never materialise.
Tennessee Williams’s A Streetcar Named Desire would benefit from a fresh makeover for British audiences. The role of Blanche DuBois could comfortably be played by Angela Rayner or conceivably by Rachel Reeves. Fortunately, the aforementioned streetcar (tram) was of the electric variety and as such would be acceptable for today’s sensitive audiences. This version would end when the lithium-battery-operated tram spontaneously combusts.
One play that our Prime Minister might have seen that resonated with Britain being on the world stage again is Ruined by Lynn Nottage. Whilst the original deals with the war-torn Congolese republic, it could easily be updated with the title perfectly reflecting today’s Britain. I feel a neat flourish would be if the striking Birmingham binmen could be persuaded to do a choreographed dance routine brandishing placards and loudhailers.
If comedy was what Sir Keir had in mind, might he have been thinking of Neil Simon’s masterpiece The Odd Couple? With Brexit now a distant memory and our renewed love affair with the EU in full bloom, what could be better than Ed Miliband taking the role of Felix Unger and Viktor Orban assuming the part of Oscar Madison. Laughs aplenty would be guaranteed.
Finally, a home-grown number, R C Sherriff’s incomparable Journey’s End. While the WWI theme would no longer be suitable, the title, for me, says it all. Great Britain has been on a long journey, centuries in the making. A journey that has given us remarkable people and remarkable discoveries.
Yet now it really feels as though we have reached the end of that voyage. The expedition hasn’t ended in a bang but in a suffocating shroud of imbecilic and incomprehensible laws, rights and expectations. A land asphyxiated by net zero laws, emasculated by mushrooming diversity, equality and inclusiveness dogma and where basic common sense has been thrown out of the window.
Great Britain back on the world stage? Pull the other one.
