OPEN to sounds of an economic upswing. Offstage, new departments are filing their first notions. A boxfresh monitor is ceremoniously degaussed.
CURTAIN UP on R. SUTHERLAND. Friendly and industrious. Sutherland has the air of a man you would wish to slap on the back and laugh riotously.
ROSS
Ah, what a fine day to graduate
from a mid-league table comprehensive.
Enter GIANT LETTER ‘A’. Hands protrude from each side of the letter. One clicks its fingers. The other holds a fresh Martini.
Straight into a capela swing duet: “And That’s All Ya Need To Know”
(click, click, click, click)
Wha? Eh? Whats-that you say?
We can’t hear nothing but the A! A! A!
Whether tuning a piano
Or fallin out of a window
‘A’ is all ya need to know!
Yes, that’s all ya need to know!
That’s-as-far as the conversation needs-to-go!
So just give me some cash
For that sweet Dot-Dash
And we’ll get on with the show!
One for the army, two for the taxman
Three for our dear papa!
No one tips the scale like an alpha male
So just open your mouth and go “Ah!
And, yeah, some folk talk of A-Star,
But those spacemen bin drifting too far
Those Joe-90 bro’s
got no hair down below
And they’ve never been served in a bar!
But proppin’ up the-nerds,
We’re there, surfin’-the-curve
For us there ain’t no-where to go-o-o
but back to zed!
And we won’t sleep till we’re dead!
And that’s all ya need to know!!
Enter HEADTEACHER.
HEADTEACHER
Congratulations, Ross. Plus, AS-levels
are no longer meaningless.
Diorama revolves to reveal the ziggurats of the University of East Anglia.
Headteacher dons mortar board.
ROSS
Malcolm Bradbury!
BRADBURY
Correct. Although I never taught you
directly, I was heavily connected
with this university.
ROSS
It’s an honour to be part of this
common misconception.
BRADBURY
I wrote The History Man. (exit)
Enter CHORUS OF LESSER STUDENTS
for the ensemble hymn: “A Good Command of Rhetoric is a Fundamental Skill.”
A good command of rhetoric
is a fundamental skill.
A good command of cleverdicks
Will sweeten every pill.
A good command of specifics
Will sharpen up your will.
A good command of Messerschmitts
and you can land one on a hill.
A good command of het-up-chicks
And they’ll take off their jeans.
And like a good command of exorcists
You’ll turn up in their dreams.
A good command of Pegasus
Will fly you over things.
And with a good command of rhetoric
They’ll never see the strings.
Look it up in a book.
Look it up in a book.
Look it up in a book
if you don’t believe me.
Refrain repeats as lesser students experiment with drugs and gradually lose interest.
Drumroll. Bradbury log dances on a giant scroll, which slowly unravels to reveal the phrase “With Honours”. Cymbal.
ROSS
Well, looks like I have a flawless
academic record. Gotta find an
employer fast, before I literally
explode into an rainbow of money!
Runs off, stage left.
Possibility radiates from the vomitoria, then
BLACKOUT
LIGHT UP on Ross in a suit, working behind a comically large computer terminal. Ross picks up an oversized telephone.
ROSS
Hello? Oh! Thanks for the compliment.
I’ve always felt at ease working
with the general public. Goodbye.
Enter EMPLOYER (with THEIR OWN PROBLEMS)
EMPLOYER
We at the Royal Bank of Scotland have
reduced our entire customer service team
to you, Ross Sutherland.
ROSS
I am greatful for the challenge.
Employer sweeps all of the desk’s contents onto the floor, then begins to punch Ross repeatedly in the face.
The rhythm of punches is augmented by rings from the giant phone, twitching on the floor like a repeatedly violated dream.
Enter CHORUS OF UNMENTIONABLE BOSSES, cartwheeling out of a 1970s training video
for the frenetic dance number: This is a Character-Building Experience, and Everyone Has To Do Jobs Like This, during which Unmentionable Bosses chase Ross around the stage in silence, trying to urinate up his back. Ross somersaults around the stage, trying to look on the bright side of things.
*
Three year intermission, during which Ross does things of scant merit.
*
CURTAIN up on a grey sea of meaninglessness.
A banner drops down that says “Welcome to Liverpool, during this crucial period of creative infrastructure development in the lead-up to our City of Culture celebrations in 2008”
ROSS
Liverpool, eh? Looks like my undisclosed
personal reasons might have led me
to a very exciting time and place!
Enter Headteacher, wearing two mortar boards.
ROSS
Wow! Phil Redmond!
REDMOND
Hello Ross, though I never met you, I own the
building you work in. There’s a good chance
we have passed each other in the corridor.
What is it that you do?
ROSS
I teach undergraduates about The Matrix and
Douglas Coupland. I am trying to complete a PhD.
REDMOND
I probably approve.
ROSS
Thanks!
REDMOND
I invented Grange Hill. (exit)
Enter CLASS OF UNDERGRADUATES under a spell of unparalleled intellectual transformation.
CLASS OF UNDERGRADUATES
Tell us more about what other people
have said about Douglas Coupland!
ROSS
With pleasure!
Sudden lighting change due to unforeseeable circumstances.
Enter hideous incompetent SCHOOL CLERK.
CLERK
Hiss! We forgot to confirm your impressive
MA result with the AHRC. As a result,
you won’t be able to get funding for
your PhD.
ROSS
Agh! I have no choice but to suspend
my studies!
CLASS OF UNDERGRADUATES
Tell us more about what other people
have said about Douglas Coupland!
ROSS
Grr! I hate Douglas Coupland!
Single spot on Ross, semi-translucent yet personally developed.
Ross is lifted on a wire above the audience for eyeball-busting solo ballad: “Suspended”,
during which AHRC applications flutter down from the rig.
Suspen-ded!
Suspen-ded!
But no-thing has en-ded!
It’s just not currently on.
It’s just not currently on.
The rain never ends
It’s only suspen-ded
long enough to say, “Look, no rain”
Haircuts never end
They are only suspen-ded!
Your hair even grows in your grave.
The novels of Dean Koontz
are only suspen-ded!
Even after the en-ding,
You can always read them again.
A conversation
with a charming obstetrician
has not en-ded!
It is only suspen-ded!
There are always more questions
to ask an obstetrician.
Our house never ends
It is only suspen-ded
Till more people need to get in
And then we will build an extension.
Lying on my couch
I’m suspen-ded!
About two feet from the floor,
Between the hours of three and four
Between the endless works of Shakespeare
And the endless albums of Al Jolson
And endless conversations with doctors
In a house of endless people
I…
Am…
Sus-pen-ding!
Sus-pen-ding!
But I’m always inten-ding
To carry these things on
To carry these things on
Ross lands gently on the apron to deliver his PERSONAL STATEMENT:
ROSS
(laughs to himself) So. Looks like
this highly qualified individual
is back on the road. Hard to believe,
but hey, the workplace is driven by
more factors than skill and team spirit.
It’s rainin’ dice on the stock exchange,
kids being sold off for scrap in every
playground. We all just got to keep our
heads. See, I learnt something this year:
We’re all team players. Every one of us.
Some of us are just still searchin’ for
the right team…
Enter REFERENCE ONE, downstage-left, red-faced on a pale horse.
REFERENCE ONE
There goes one helluva asset. To think,
he’d still be working for us if we weren’t
such unmitigated arseholes.
Enter REFERENCE TWO, downstage-right, grim in a suit made of lottery tickets.
REFERENCE TWO
If it weren’t for that man, I’d still be
hawking shit for sexual favours. He’d never
say it himself, but he changed the face of
Working forever.
Darkness pours in through the Gods. Ross lights a cigarette.
ROSS
And to think that I am only 29 years old.
Distant rumble of photocopiers.
BLACKOUT.
FIN..