The Redcafe Nativity Play
Those of a religious disposition please read no further
ACT 1
SCENE 1 – A suburban house in Nurslereth, Southampton
LIVVIE and JOPUB are having breakfast. He reads the paper, she potters about.
LIVVIE: Darling…
JOPUB: Well would you look at that. “Pound falls dramatically”. I mean there is just no call for that kind of cynical playacting in the modern…
LIVVIE: Er, can I have a word?
JOPUB: Have you looked at the mail yet?
LIVVIE: No. Can I speak to you a sec?
JOPUB: Hmmm, something from the Inland Revenue, great…what’s on yer mind luv?
LIVVIE: Well, I know this is going to be a bit of a shock, but... I’m pregnant.
JOPUB: What? But we’ve never even…
LIVVIE: I know. But, well I was visited. By a spirit.
JOPUB: A SPIRIT???
LIVVIE: Well…something like that…
JOPUB: Well where did it come from?
LIVVIE: Salford, I think. Or Galway. Hard to tell, he was a bit worse for wear.
JOPUB: And when’s it due?
LIVVIE: Erm...tomorrow.
JOPUB: TOMORROW? So that isn’t your Complete Tolkien up your jumper after all. Well. This is going to complicate things, cos according to this letter, I have to go back to my place of birth tomorrow. For a census.
LIVVIE: Where were you born then?
JOPUB: Bethnal Green.
Song: Oh Little Town of Bethnal Green
LIVVIE: Great, just what I need, a holiday in Cockney Hell. Why are they making us do that?
JOPUB: Population studies…they want to know why the birth-rate’s falling…so do I for that matter, fecking disgrace, there was no-one near it and it just blatantly dived -
LIVVIE: Yes luv…but how are we going to get there? The car’s knackered after some idiot drove into it just cos it was sunny. Can’t take a coach in my condition and the trains are on strike…
JOPUB: Right then. There’s nothing for it… We’ll have to take the Heskey.
Song: Little Heskey
They pack their provisions onto the Heskey, mount and set off. We can hear their voices as they wobble away:
JOPUB: No Heskey, straight ahead…you can’t just keep heading backwards…move FORWARDS…
LIVVIE: Oh Lord he’s fallen over…
JOPUB: That’s an absolute DISGRACE, he’ll have learnt that from your bloody horse…
LIVVIE: Shush dear, and help me get him up again…come on little Heskey…
They exit
SCENE 2
A distant mountainside. Three shepherds tend their flocks by night. They are MARCHING, TRUE WHITE and DAVE 007
MARCHING (wistfully): Look at them all, poor little brutes, running aimlessly around, not realizing every last one of them’s going to be sold to the highest bidder…
TRUE WHITE: And even that won’t save us. Might as well face facts lads: this farm is going under.
DAVE 007: Looks like we counted our chickens before they hatched…
MARCHING: Put all our eggs in one basket…
TRUE WHITE: Mutton dressed up as lamb…
DAVE 007: Lost sheep…
TRUE WHITE: Lambs to the slaughter….
MARCHING: Fleeced, boys, we’ve been fleeced.
Their conversation dies down, giving way to a desolate silence, punctuated by the occasional distressed bleat (and some noises from the sheep too)
Suddenly, a strange light appears in the sky
MARCHING: Hold your horses boys…what’s THAT?
DAVE 007: What?
MARCHING: Up there! In the sky!
TRUE WHITE: Where?
MARCHING: There! By the Big Dipper!
DAVO: Did somebody call?
REST OF CAF: Shhh! This is a good bit!
DAVO: Poofs.
MARCHING: ’Tis a Star!
DAVE 007: A Star has come to save us!
TRUE WHITE: A new Star, full of promise of future glory!
JSINGH: wot u think he do a job 4 us?
REST OF CAF: SHUT UP!!!
Song: Hark the Herald Angel, Singh
MARCHING: It is heading West! Come, let us follow it!
The Shepherds follow the star. Other residents also notice the Star, and get into a heated and endless debate about whether it really is a Star, whether it’s right to head West, whether it wanted to go West all along and whether we should have let it go West in the first place. Some opine that without the Star everything is doomed, while others argue that it’s not actually as great a Star as it’s cracked up to be, is a shameless self-publicist and has a talentless slag for a missus.
But let us leave this frank and forthright exchange of views, lest our story become sidetracked and we be forced to top ourselves, and return to our heroic couple, LIVVIE and JOPUB, whom we find trying to get back onto the M3 at Fleet Services near Farnborough
SCENE 3
The Heskey has stopped dead at the turning onto the M3
JOPUB: FFS Heskey! How the hell do you expect us to get back onto the motorway if you won’t turn the corner!
LIVVIE: Come on, Little Heskey, you know you can do it!
JOPUB: It’ll take five sodding years at this rate…
PASSING COACH: Zat’s ze plan!
They finally get on the road. Around them lolls the Hampshire countryside
LIVVIE: Hey Jo, look at all these lovely woods…
JOPUB: I’m a bloody carpenter, woman, I get enough of that at home.
LIVVIE: Don’t be grumpy dear. Wow, it reminds me of ancient forests…hey, lets play a game to pass the time! I’ll be Dildo Catflap, and you be Legoland, and we can re-enact the Fall of Saurkraut!
JOPUB: And Fall’s the word! There was absolutely ZERO contact there, he just hit the deck and…
LIVVIE: Oh forget it…
They amble off into the distance, with Heskey showing the following traffic how good he is at holding it up
SCENE 4
Far away, three learned kings, King Calspar, King Melvinor and King Blythasar (retd.), sit staring at computer screens
CALSPAR: Hey! Did you guys just see a bright thing go shooting past the window? I bet you can use it to make predictions!
MELVINOR: Shut it, pothead, I’ve got to post 200 more times tonight if I’m going to complete ten million within the month!
BLYTHASAR: Yeah, and it’s not easy designing a ‘Roman Abramovich’ smilie either you know! Now, is the spunk-stain on the right or the left…?
CALSPAR(Adopts Scouse accent): Alright, calm down, calm down. I’ll see if anyone on YAWN saw it…been a while since that lot saw a shooting star…
They go back to their screens
Song: We Three Skills Reorientation Programmes Are Undergoing
MELVINOR: There we go – “
” - there, I’ve done it!
End of Scene 4
SCENE 5
The little town of Bethnal Green. Night. LIVVIE and JOPUB dismount the Heskey and enter an Inn.
LIVVIE: …no dear, I agree, it’s a lovely part of the world…those burning cars are very picturesque…and all those nice men who saw the state of our Heskey and asked us if we ‘wanted any pony’.
JOPUB: Ah, yes, a room for two please…
GRINNKEEPER THE GOONER: Sorry mate, all booked up.
JOPUB: What, you too?!! That’s six inns we’ve tried!
GRINNKEEPER THE GOONER: Sorry mate, it’s the Arsenal match – we’ve had a booking of 50 Geordies - lifelong fans since 1996 - down on extended business trips, they say.
LIVVIE: Is there nowhere in this town we can sleep for the night?
GRINNKEEPER THE GOONER: Well, there’s an old manger round the back…
They head round the back, where LIVVIE approaches a bloke standing at the traffic lights wiping car windows for a quid
LIVVIE: Er, can you put us up for the night please?
RAY PARLOUR: Sorry luv?
JOPUB: It’s a Manger we’re looking for dear, not a minger
Song: Away with the Manager (and sell Giggs)
They find the manger and settle down for the night, surrounded by braying donkeys, grunting pigs and a couple of massive cocks from Portugal.
JOPUB(looks around): What a dive!
LIVVIE: Ah it’s comfortable enough…
JOPUB: No, I mean that disgraceful display at OT…
LIVVIE: Sigh. Night then, dear. (goes to sleep)
Blackout.
End of Act 1
Those of a religious disposition please read no further
ACT 1
SCENE 1 – A suburban house in Nurslereth, Southampton
LIVVIE and JOPUB are having breakfast. He reads the paper, she potters about.
LIVVIE: Darling…
JOPUB: Well would you look at that. “Pound falls dramatically”. I mean there is just no call for that kind of cynical playacting in the modern…
LIVVIE: Er, can I have a word?
JOPUB: Have you looked at the mail yet?
LIVVIE: No. Can I speak to you a sec?
JOPUB: Hmmm, something from the Inland Revenue, great…what’s on yer mind luv?
LIVVIE: Well, I know this is going to be a bit of a shock, but... I’m pregnant.
JOPUB: What? But we’ve never even…
LIVVIE: I know. But, well I was visited. By a spirit.
JOPUB: A SPIRIT???
LIVVIE: Well…something like that…
JOPUB: Well where did it come from?
LIVVIE: Salford, I think. Or Galway. Hard to tell, he was a bit worse for wear.
JOPUB: And when’s it due?
LIVVIE: Erm...tomorrow.
JOPUB: TOMORROW? So that isn’t your Complete Tolkien up your jumper after all. Well. This is going to complicate things, cos according to this letter, I have to go back to my place of birth tomorrow. For a census.
LIVVIE: Where were you born then?
JOPUB: Bethnal Green.
Song: Oh Little Town of Bethnal Green
LIVVIE: Great, just what I need, a holiday in Cockney Hell. Why are they making us do that?
JOPUB: Population studies…they want to know why the birth-rate’s falling…so do I for that matter, fecking disgrace, there was no-one near it and it just blatantly dived -
LIVVIE: Yes luv…but how are we going to get there? The car’s knackered after some idiot drove into it just cos it was sunny. Can’t take a coach in my condition and the trains are on strike…
JOPUB: Right then. There’s nothing for it… We’ll have to take the Heskey.
Song: Little Heskey
They pack their provisions onto the Heskey, mount and set off. We can hear their voices as they wobble away:
JOPUB: No Heskey, straight ahead…you can’t just keep heading backwards…move FORWARDS…
LIVVIE: Oh Lord he’s fallen over…
JOPUB: That’s an absolute DISGRACE, he’ll have learnt that from your bloody horse…
LIVVIE: Shush dear, and help me get him up again…come on little Heskey…
They exit
SCENE 2
A distant mountainside. Three shepherds tend their flocks by night. They are MARCHING, TRUE WHITE and DAVE 007
MARCHING (wistfully): Look at them all, poor little brutes, running aimlessly around, not realizing every last one of them’s going to be sold to the highest bidder…
TRUE WHITE: And even that won’t save us. Might as well face facts lads: this farm is going under.
DAVE 007: Looks like we counted our chickens before they hatched…
MARCHING: Put all our eggs in one basket…
TRUE WHITE: Mutton dressed up as lamb…
DAVE 007: Lost sheep…
TRUE WHITE: Lambs to the slaughter….
MARCHING: Fleeced, boys, we’ve been fleeced.
Their conversation dies down, giving way to a desolate silence, punctuated by the occasional distressed bleat (and some noises from the sheep too)
Suddenly, a strange light appears in the sky
MARCHING: Hold your horses boys…what’s THAT?
DAVE 007: What?
MARCHING: Up there! In the sky!
TRUE WHITE: Where?
MARCHING: There! By the Big Dipper!
DAVO: Did somebody call?
REST OF CAF: Shhh! This is a good bit!
DAVO: Poofs.
MARCHING: ’Tis a Star!
DAVE 007: A Star has come to save us!
TRUE WHITE: A new Star, full of promise of future glory!
JSINGH: wot u think he do a job 4 us?
REST OF CAF: SHUT UP!!!
Song: Hark the Herald Angel, Singh
MARCHING: It is heading West! Come, let us follow it!
The Shepherds follow the star. Other residents also notice the Star, and get into a heated and endless debate about whether it really is a Star, whether it’s right to head West, whether it wanted to go West all along and whether we should have let it go West in the first place. Some opine that without the Star everything is doomed, while others argue that it’s not actually as great a Star as it’s cracked up to be, is a shameless self-publicist and has a talentless slag for a missus.
But let us leave this frank and forthright exchange of views, lest our story become sidetracked and we be forced to top ourselves, and return to our heroic couple, LIVVIE and JOPUB, whom we find trying to get back onto the M3 at Fleet Services near Farnborough
SCENE 3
The Heskey has stopped dead at the turning onto the M3
JOPUB: FFS Heskey! How the hell do you expect us to get back onto the motorway if you won’t turn the corner!
LIVVIE: Come on, Little Heskey, you know you can do it!
JOPUB: It’ll take five sodding years at this rate…
PASSING COACH: Zat’s ze plan!
They finally get on the road. Around them lolls the Hampshire countryside
LIVVIE: Hey Jo, look at all these lovely woods…
JOPUB: I’m a bloody carpenter, woman, I get enough of that at home.
LIVVIE: Don’t be grumpy dear. Wow, it reminds me of ancient forests…hey, lets play a game to pass the time! I’ll be Dildo Catflap, and you be Legoland, and we can re-enact the Fall of Saurkraut!
JOPUB: And Fall’s the word! There was absolutely ZERO contact there, he just hit the deck and…
LIVVIE: Oh forget it…
They amble off into the distance, with Heskey showing the following traffic how good he is at holding it up
SCENE 4
Far away, three learned kings, King Calspar, King Melvinor and King Blythasar (retd.), sit staring at computer screens
CALSPAR: Hey! Did you guys just see a bright thing go shooting past the window? I bet you can use it to make predictions!
MELVINOR: Shut it, pothead, I’ve got to post 200 more times tonight if I’m going to complete ten million within the month!
BLYTHASAR: Yeah, and it’s not easy designing a ‘Roman Abramovich’ smilie either you know! Now, is the spunk-stain on the right or the left…?
CALSPAR(Adopts Scouse accent): Alright, calm down, calm down. I’ll see if anyone on YAWN saw it…been a while since that lot saw a shooting star…
They go back to their screens
Song: We Three Skills Reorientation Programmes Are Undergoing
MELVINOR: There we go – “
” - there, I’ve done it!End of Scene 4
SCENE 5
The little town of Bethnal Green. Night. LIVVIE and JOPUB dismount the Heskey and enter an Inn.
LIVVIE: …no dear, I agree, it’s a lovely part of the world…those burning cars are very picturesque…and all those nice men who saw the state of our Heskey and asked us if we ‘wanted any pony’.
JOPUB: Ah, yes, a room for two please…
GRINNKEEPER THE GOONER: Sorry mate, all booked up.
JOPUB: What, you too?!! That’s six inns we’ve tried!
GRINNKEEPER THE GOONER: Sorry mate, it’s the Arsenal match – we’ve had a booking of 50 Geordies - lifelong fans since 1996 - down on extended business trips, they say.
LIVVIE: Is there nowhere in this town we can sleep for the night?
GRINNKEEPER THE GOONER: Well, there’s an old manger round the back…
They head round the back, where LIVVIE approaches a bloke standing at the traffic lights wiping car windows for a quid
LIVVIE: Er, can you put us up for the night please?
RAY PARLOUR: Sorry luv?
JOPUB: It’s a Manger we’re looking for dear, not a minger
Song: Away with the Manager (and sell Giggs)
They find the manger and settle down for the night, surrounded by braying donkeys, grunting pigs and a couple of massive cocks from Portugal.
JOPUB(looks around): What a dive!
LIVVIE: Ah it’s comfortable enough…
JOPUB: No, I mean that disgraceful display at OT…
LIVVIE: Sigh. Night then, dear. (goes to sleep)
Blackout.
End of Act 1
