The Court of the Red Tar * **(or Carry On Stalinova)
* as in Sailor **inspired by The Court of the Red Tsar
This is the synopsis for a play set in the future, but based upon current events. The writer takes no responsibility whatever for any resemblence of the characters to real people, past or present.
Main Characters
Comrade Prescottin ("The Red Tar")
Comrade Livingstonsky
Madame Kellyrova
Madame Cooperova
Chairman Terry Mao
The New Red Tsar and Tsarina
The drama takes place in 3 acts :
Act 1 The Suburban Revolutionary Council
Act 2 Revenge of the New Bolshevik Matrons
Act 3 The Coming of the New Red Tsar/ina
Synopsis
Act 1. The "Red Tar", Comrade Prescottin, has been president of the United Kingdom for some years, with Comrade Livingstonsky in the position of prime minister. This came about following the impeachment of Comrade Blairovich for unconstitutional actions, and general agreement that Comrade Brownin was, quite simply, insufficiently red. However, Brownin is still chancellor of the exchequer, and plays no role whatsoever in the drama which follows, except insofar as his policies enabled Russia, and to a lesser extent China, to aquire effective control of the UK. The country is now ruled by "The Suburban Revolutionary Council" rather than cabinet government. The main function of this council is to facilitate the construction of as many houses as possible to underpin the UK's role as "The World's Number One Global Suburb".
This "Suburban Revolution" began some years earlier under "The Communities Plan", conceived when Prescottin was Deputy Prime Minister. At first, Livingstonsky, then Mayor of London, had been skeptical of The Communities Plan, seeing it as good old fashioned new towns policy which had been to linked under previous socialist regimes to de-centralisation from the old conurbations, such as London. However, assisted by the intellectual Madam Cooperova - who had once worked for President Bill Clinton - Prescottin convinced Livingstonsky that The Plan meant the expansion of these old conurbations into the bourgeois counties, as new garden cities etc of the kind envisaged by Comrade Marx.
Eventually, the "suburban revolution" led to the creation of two enormous conurbations. In the north of England, Prescottgrad had grown from the city formerly called Hull to cover most of the ancient kingdom of Northumbria. In the South, Livingstongrad - once known as London - occupied most of what had been Wessex, as well as areas of Middle England or Mercia. However, a third, and largely unplanned, mega-conurbation had also been constructed called Tescograd. This had recently declared itself to be an independent republic. Moreover, it is involved in a territorial dispute with Livingstongrad. This "conflict zone" is a matter of some concern for The Suburban Revolutionary Council.
Act 2. Unbeknown to Prescottin and Livingstonsky, the new Bolshevik Matrons, Madames Kellyova and Cooperova, have "done a deal" with Chairman Terry Mao of Tescograd, which they hope will enable them to provoke a leadership contest in The Suburban Revolutionary Council. Madame Kellyova has ambitions to be President and to restore the Pope as head of the Church of England (the estranged husband of the Culture Minister, Comrade Millsovin, might also be helpful here). This would leave the role of Prime Minister open for Madame Cooperova.
The new Bolshevik Matrons hope that Prescottin's recent indiscretions with his diary secretary, and participation in the bourgeois game of croquet during working hours at the grand dacha of Dornywood, will enable them to win other Suburban Revolutionary Council members over to their way of thinking.
The Bolshevik Matrons make an unplanned visit to Tescograd, the centre of which was formerly Worcester. Chairman Terry Mao had forseen the opportunity this provincial city offered when the New (then Labour) Bolshevik MP constructed a swimming pool in his garden without planning permission, although this was granted retroactively. Some years later, the company then known was Tesco embarked upon a programme of unprecedented, and unplanned, supermarket development throughout the area once called The Midlands : Tescograd. Chairman Terry (he was generally known by his first name) was delighted to recieve a visit from Madames Kellyova and Cooperova.
Chairman Terry, in turn, harboured secret plans to rest control of Livingstongrad; although he would be quite happy for Madame Cooperova to be his second-in-command. Personally, he quite liked Comrade Prescottin, but he had always been deeply suspicious of Comrade Livingstonsky, who he believed still harboured co-operative socialist tendencies. Moreover, "Red Ken" was the power behind Prescottin : the two would stand or fall together. He chuckled to himself as he remembered something he had read in Red Ken's book "If voting changed anything, they'd abolish it". How true, he thought ! He also remembered a reference to The Godfather in this book - when Red Ken despatched a political rival - the line went something like : "Personally I liked the man, but business is business". Exactly, thought Chairman Terry, business is business and Prescottin would have to go.....
Act 3 : Meanwhile, Livingstonsky awoke from a bad dream. His home had been raided by 250 armed policemen. Was this an MI5 of a KGB Plot (something to do with the rebel leader David Cameronovich perhaps) ? He was led away and taken to County Hall in Milton Keynes. The London County Council had been revived as the Capital expanded into the surrounding counties, a process that escalated after the flooding of the Thames Gateway (when Livingstonsky temporarily acquired the nickname King Kenute). With the development of Livingstongrad, of which Milton Keyne was administrative centre, County Hall was kept as a quaint reminder of the past. But why was he being taken there now ? Something to do with Chairman Terry : Milton Keynes was also a disputed territory with Tescograd ? The shadowy figure that greeted him recalled a scene from Livingstonsky's favourite film, The Godfather. But this was more like a scene from Hanibal. As Ken's soul departed from his body (the result of a fatal wounding), his corpse was suspended outside County Hall, after the fashion of the Medici Renaissance princes. Fortunately the body was only that of a double, although Livingstonsky wasn't sure where his soul had gone. Perhaps like Livingstongrad, he was souless.
Meanwhile, in the North West of England, the Red Tsars football team was practicing for a forthcoming match. The team had once been called "Manchester United", but their Russian owner, who had bought the club from an Amercian outfit, preferred the name Red Tsars. Besides, Manchester no longer existed. After Liverpool had also succumbed to flooding, a "new town" had been built called Manlivostock. Although they were still extremely well paid, there was considerable discontent amongst the footballers, and even more amongst their wives. Those with family connections in the North West were aggrieved that some kind of Yorkshireman (Comrade Prescottin) was apparently running the country, along with the slimey ex-Londoner "Red Ken" (rumour had it that Ken had received some kind of gene therapy in Moscow, and had been given the DNA of a reptile enabling him to regenerate organs, limbs and other bodily appendages in the event of any assasination attempt). In short, David Beckamovsky and hs wife Victoria, were determined that they should replace Prescottin and Livingstonsky to become the New Red Tsar and Tsarina.
Meanwhile, on board the Battleship Prescottin (named after the Battleship Potemkin) everyone was extremely well fed, courtesy of Tescograd. The cruiseliner Paulinova the Great was moored beside the Battleship and the Good and the Great (as well as the Bad and the Bonkers) were being entertained in style. Prescottin is aware of various moves to topple him, but he has his own succession plan and exit strategy (to a fine dacha on the Crimea - one of Comrade Stalin's favourites) in place. The identity of the New Red Tsar and Tsarina will be revealed soon. However, Prescottin has just received a phone call from his Chief of Secret Police, Ianoff Blairovich, in Livingstonegrad, where, based on intellligence from "listening stones" (of the kind pilotted in a Moscow Park by British agents), at Stonehenge....draft to be continued
