by James Graham
Pause.
This conversation, it never happened, right?
Weatherill Sorry?
Harrison Forget it, no pairing. I didn’t ask.
Weatherill I’m offering myself here, you’re going to turn this down? –
Harrison Yeah. I am. And if you ever bloody tell anyone, I will hunt you down like a dog, understand? We keep this between ourselves until one of us pops our clogs. I have a reputation you know.
Weatherill (smiles; offers his hand) Alright. (Shakes.) I plan to long outlive you, anyway.
Harrison Bollocks.
Weatherill Fifty quid? Big Ben chimes.
Speaker The Question is . . . that this House has No Confidence in Her Majesty’s Government. Lock the doors!
The Members pile off the benches, and vote.
Speaker Ayes to the right . . . 311. Noes to the left . . . 300
. . . and 10 ! (Above the din.) The Ayes have it! The Ayes have it! Motion carried! That this House has No Confidence in Her Majesty’s Government!
Opposition Whips’ Office: Atkins, Silvester, Mather and other Tory Members dance around, cheering, popping champagne. Weatherill breaks away, ever so slightly conflicted.
Government Whips’ Office: Cocks, Taylor and Harrison, standing in their own spots. Silence.
Cocks I . . . I can’t think what to, er –
Taylor It’s alright, Chief.
Cocks Just. Can’t believe that’s it. Over.
Harrison Well. It might not be, eh? Might end up back here, / live to fight a –
Cocks Oh, don’t bloody well, bloody ‘manage’ me, Walter, I’m not one of your sheep. We’re not coming back, that’s it. We lost, I lost, I’m . . . sorry,
Harrison Oi, don’t you dare. Ann, you an’ all, chin up.
Taylor . . .
Harrison Right, you pair! Here, now. That’s a three-line whip, that is, no arguing. Here.
He pulls them together, arms around them.
Four and a half years. They only gave us four bloody weeks. Eh?
Pulling away.
Right, what time is it? I’ve, er. Got to go for a little drive.
Harrison steps into –
Lady Batley. Leading Harrison over to Batley in his chair. Asleep. Mask on.
Lady Batley You shouldn’t have driven all this way, you look like death warmed up.
Harrison I know, it’s just. I want it coming from me.
Lady Batley (carefully waking Batley) Alfred . . . Alf . . . you’ve got a visitor . . .
Batley (turns; sees her, then him . . . through his mask weakly) Did we . . . win?
Harrison . . . No, mate. I’m sorry.
Lady Batley Get to retire now, though, Alf. So that’s good, eh?
Batley . . . By . . . how many?
Harrison Doesn’t matter by how many, does it?
Batley . . . How . . . many . . .
Harrison (beat; kneels down, takes his hand ) By one, Doc. Lost by one . . .
Oi, nowt could’ve been done. Right? No bugger’s fault. Nowt to be done . . .
Batley, through his mask, starts to sob. Harrison leans in.
Announcements from the 1979 election, and Margaret Thatcher seizing power.
Government Whips’ Office. Atkins replaces the painting in the office from the opening. He exits, leaving Weatherill with Harrison, who is packing his boxes to leave. Weatherill moving in.
Harrison Majority of 43? Well done, Jack. That should see you well. Get stuff done, eh?
Weatherill Yes. Well. Shame in a way. I’ll miss the excitement.
Harrison Well, you know what you’re doing, you’ll be fine.
Weatherill Well, I learnt from the best. (Then feels awkward.) Anyway. I was sorry to hear about the uh, the Doc. Was it his lungs that went in the end?
Harrison No, actually, it was his heart. So. (Handing him some money.) Here. Fifty quid.
Weatherill No, don’t be silly, Walter, honestly it –
Harrison Oh, don’t talk so soft. I’d be taking it from you if it were other way round, believe me.
Weatherill (beat; takes it) Thank you. (Another beat. Holds it up.) Drink?
Harrison Oh, bloody hell, yeah.
Weatherill Michael not around?
Harrison No. No, we all need somewhere to go . . .
Exits, closing the door behind him.
The Westminster Clock Tower: the face of the clock looming large and high. Hands turning . . .
Cocks stands, with his back to us, staring out through the glass. Blackout.
The Angry Brigade
The Angry Brigade was first performed at Theatre Royal Plymouth in a production by Paines Plough and Theatre Royal Plymouth on 18 September 2014 with the following cast and creatives:
Morris/The Commander Harry Melling
The Prophet/The Snitch/ The Manager/Jim/Smith/John Felix Scott
Henderson/Anna Patsy Ferran
Parker/The Expert/The Model/ The Girl/Hilary Scarlett Alice Johnson
Director James Grieve
Designer Lucy Osborne
Lighting Designer Charles Balfour
Sound Designer Tom Gibbons
Movement Director Polly Bennett
Assistant Director Hannah Banister
The Branch The Brigade
Characters Characters
Smith John
Henderson Anna
Parker Hilary
Morris Jim
The Commander
The Expert
The Model
The Prophet
The Snitch
The Manager
The Girl
Setting Setting
Scotland Yard, central London, 1970–72 359 Amhurst Road, London, 1970–72
A ‘COMMUNIQUÉ’ FROM THE AUTHOR
The play works in two parts.
One part, THE BRANCH, is the police attempt to capture the Angry Brigade terror cell.
One part, THE BRIGADE, is the cell’s attempt to evade capture by the police.
They can be performed in either order.
It’s suggested that both are performed by a cast of only four.
The style of THE BRANCH should feel rigid in its presentation. The detail in the text is deliberately prescriptive. It is a world of order and characters who carry themselves in a carefully considered way. It can be presented as painfully conventional as possible.
THE BRIGADE should be an offensive, anarchic mess. The text is deliberately non-prescriptive. A bold cacophony of music, media and physicality is encouraged.
Perhaps the four performers present one half to an audience, followed by the other.
Or, perhaps both parts are performed simultaneously by two separate ensembles of four, to two separate audiences, and then after an interval they swap.
Perhaps the two parts can have a completely different creative team.
Perhaps just do what you like.
The Branch
Scene One
A basement office, Scotland Yard. The early hours.
Smith stands near the entrance to the basement. The Commander has been waiting for him. A pot of tea waits on a tray.
The Commander Would you like some tea, Smith? It is Smith, isn’t it?
Smith Yes, sir.
The Commander ‘Yes, sir’, some tea, or ‘yes, sir’, it’s Smith?
Smith Yes sir, it’s Smith.
The Commander You don’t want tea?
Smith Tea would be – yes, thank you, tea would be smashing.
The Commander A man should have tea. This early.
Smith checks his watch. The Commander begins to prepare the tea.
The Commander Had it brought down especially. To welcome you. Your new home from home.
(Looking around.) It’s not all bad, is it, down here, really?
Smith I have to be honest, I wasn’t until a moment ago aware that Scotland Yard had
a – I suppose you would call this a basement, wouldn’t you, sir?
The Commander Oh, all public buildings have a basement, Detective Sergeant. It’s where ‘things’ happen.
Smith Detective Sergeant?
The Commander Commander, Smith. As you should be well aware.
Smith Yes, sir, you’re Commander Bond, sir, I know who you are, it’s just that – you called me Detective Sergeant, which makes me think you have the wrong Smith, sir.
The Commander The wrong Smith?
Smith I’m Detective Constable Smith.
The Commander You were Detective Constable Smith, you’re now Detective Sergeant Smith, has this not been relayed to you?
Smith I only had a quick phone call with the Chief Super, sir, at 1 a.m. He told me to come straight to the Yard, immediately, that’s all.
The Commander Yes. I’m afraid this has all had to move – rather quickly.
Something . . . has happened. And we’re at a bit of a loss at what to do.
He tries to laugh this off, a little, but isn’t convincing. A moment.
Did you get in alright?
Smith Yes, sir, I live near the Elephant, caught the night bus.
The Commander The 33 isn’t it; Elephant?
Smith 33 will get you here no problem, sir, yes, but it was the 92 I took, arrived first.
The Commander 92 is a good bus – milk?
Smith Yes please, sir, just a splash.
The Commander You’ve been teaching at Bramshill.
Smith Yes, two-year secondment.
The Commander Sugar?
He drops one cube into his own cup.
Smith Thank you, sir, two please.
The Commander briefly stops at the mention of ‘two’, a slight air of disapproval, before placing two cubes into Smith’s cup. He stirs the cups gently and methodically.
The Commander Teaching what?
Smith At Bramshill? It’s – well it’s sort of new, sir.
The Commander That’s enough of the ‘sirs’, Smith. This is Special Branch. You’re one of us now.
He hands the cup and saucer over to Smith, smiling. Smith takes it.
The Commander What was new? The teaching.
Smith It’s called ‘Association’, it’s sort of my speciality – I mean it’s DCS Habershon’s speciality, I didn’t mean to imply that it was mine entirely.
The Commander Tea, don’t let it get cold.
Smith Right – (taking it) sorry –
The Commander Them’s what do without, and all that.
You were with DCS Habershon in S Division.
Smith That’s right, sir. (Winces at using ‘sir’.)
The Commander (offering) Biscuit?
Smith (taking one) Thank you.
The Commander He speaks jolly highly of you. Something of a protégé, by the way he talks, I’d say.
Smith Oh, well that’s very cheering to hear, I must say.
The Commander (holding up the biscuit) My wife. She cannot stand a good dunk. Says I’m bringing home all these ‘common ways’, she imagines, from the ‘canteen’. Reading a newspaper at the dinner table and dunking biscuits, that sort of thing. ‘As though we hadn’t even won the bloody war,’ she says. I say to her, ‘Emily, I think that’s a bit far, it’s only a biscuit’. ‘Cup of tea is what this nation was built on,’ she says, no need to dunk anything into it. No need to do anything of the sort.
(Dunks his biscuit.) So this is – is a little rebellion.
‘Association’, then. In a nutshell.
Smith ‘Connecting the dots’, my missus calls it.
The Commander Share police business with your wife, do you? That what constitutes pillow talk in the Smith household, ey? I’m teasing, Smith.
He lifts his biscuit from the tea to his mouth – it flops back into his cup.
Damn.
He places his cup down. And presses a button on the intercom.
The Commander Could you come down with a spoon, please, WPC Henderson. (To Smith.) You’re about to meet WPC Henderson.
Smith Right.
The Commander WPC Henderson is one of my recommendations for your team.
Smith For my . . .
The sound of walking on the floor above them, echoing. Both men listen.
. . . my team?
The Commander You were saying, about association.
Smith Well, the beat of S Division, sir, it’s what shady characters might call a ‘don’t mind if I do’ kind of area; nice houses, nice things. Something of an easy target, you might say. Problem was –
Henderson, a uniformed officer, opens the door and walks over to the table clasping the spoon. The Commander takes it.
The Commander Thank you, Henderson.
Henderson turns and walks back. She sees Smith – they’re about the same age. Perhaps a very slight moment that disrupts their flow, until she’s gone.
The Commander clasps the teaspoon and begins to fish the biscuit out.
Smith The problem was, no one was talking to one another. There’d be a B-and-E up on Cedar Avenue, some jewellery half-inched maybe, and then on the other side of the Heath a BM Whathaveyou gets nabbed from the front drive; local uniforms jot that down in their crime book as motor theft, start looking for car thieves. What . . .
The sound of feet returning to a desk upstairs. They both listen, briefly.
. . . what no one at the respective stations was doing, Mister Bond, was connecting one crime with the other. It was the same people, you see. And they were getting away with murder. Not literally murder, you understand, murder is one of the few crimes they weren’t actually committing –
The Commander Figuratively.
Smith Exactly, sir, figuratively speaking, that’s exactly it. That’s where me and Roy – DCS Habershon – that’s where we came in to our own, as it were; I became a student of it, if you like. Connecting the key players of a syndicate or gang and we brought the whole ruddy lot of them down. ‘Association’. Drawing lines, weaving a web.
The Commander Blimey. Weaving a web.
He lifts the offending biscuit up on his teaspoon.
He stands and marches to a bin in the corner and empties the contents.
Well, one of the things about you, Smith . . . is that you’re young.
Smith I – I’m not as young as I . . . but no I suppose relatively speaking there is a youngness to me, yes.
The Commander May I . . . may I ask you something?
He shifts uncomfortably. About to embark on new territory . . .
How are you?
Smith . . .
The Commander How . . . how do you – feel? About . . . your life. About the country. How . . . how do – haha – how do you feel about me?
The older generation, the people in – ‘power’. About what we’re leaving you, as our legacy. The society we have built. Are you particularly . . . I don’t know, disappointed?
More than disappointed, would you say that you were ‘cross’, even?
Come on, we’re all friends here. It’s been the prerogative of the young to tut tut at the older lot for as many generations as there have been generations. You can say it. You can be cross. You might, might even go as far as to say you . . .
He wobbles a little.
That you were angry. Are you angry? Smith?
Smith I don’t feel particularly angry.
The Commander Do you ever get angry? Gosh, I know I do. Bloody hell. I stubbed my toe earlier this week, you know, no, it was Monday last, I had brushed my teeth, about to get into bed, whack. And I was just – grrrrrrrr. ‘Why me?’ Hah.
Ever feel like that?
Silence. . . He buzzes on the intercom.
Send her in.
Footsteps upstairs.
Someone is trying to kill us, Smith.
Smith Kill who, sir?
The Commander . . . All of us.
&
nbsp; The Expert enters, wheeling a trolley containing popular branded products.
The Expert Commander. Detective Sergeant.
Smith Tea, and breakfast? I could get used to Special Branch.
The Expert takes out a pointing stick and references:
The Expert Weetabix. A popular breakfast cereal made by the Kellogg’s company in America. A healthy choice at any breakfast table.
Smith I confess I do put the odd spoonful of sugar onto my Weetabix.
The Expert Careful, Mr Smith. Carry on like that –
She removes the package to reveal – a bomb.
And it’ll be the death of you.
This particular box was sent to Paddington Police Station.
Smith . . . We were the targets?
The Commander Yes we were.
The Expert Crude, yes, all domestic products; mix of sugar and sodium chloride, two batteries wired to a North Sea gas lighter element, and a bog standard wrist watch you could purchase from your average Woolworths or the Coop. Thankfully it failed to detonate due to it being something of a botch job by, we thought, some loopy amateurs. But – viva la difference. I take it you are familiar with this item, Mr Smith?
Smith Surf, it’s a washing detergent.
The Commander Course he’s familiar, look at that white shirt, clean and pressed. Your wife’s a credit to you, Smith.
Smith Well, that she is, Mister Bond, but without taking anything away from my Susan, I happen to press my own shirts.
The Commander Press your own shirts, stone me. A brave new world.
The Expert removes the Surf box to reveal a more sophisticated bomb.
The Expert On 10 May last year, an Iberia Airlines flight landed at Heathrow. All luggage was removed from the runway except one bag, and in the bag was this box. The fundamentals are the same but the execution is markedly improved, not enough for a successful detonation, but nevertheless. They’re learning . . .
Smith You’re sure it’s from the same person or people?
The Expert The gelatin they use is French, same in each. And we obtained a sputum match from the cellotape.
Smith Sputum?
The Commander Spit, Smith, from the perpetrator’s gob.