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Working Class Playwright
A Scotsman on a Horse
VOICE OVER John Cleese
MUM Terry Jones
DAD Graham Chapman
KEN Eric Idle
MAN Michael Palin
(Opening Scene : A sitting room straight out of. H. Lawrence. Mum, wiping her hands on her apron is ushering in a young man in a suit. They are a Northern couple.)
MUM
Oh dad... look who's come to see us... it's our Ken.
DAD
(without looking up)
Aye, and about bloody time if you ask me.
KEN
Aren't you pleased to see me, father?
MUM
(squeezing his arm reassuringly)
Of course he's pleased to see you, Ken, he...
DAD
All right, woman, all right I've got a tongue in my head - I'll do 'talkin'.
(looks at Ken distastefully)
Aye ... I like yer fancy suit. Is that what they're wearing up in Yorkshire now?
KEN
It's just an ordinary suit, father... it's all I've got apart from the overalls.
(Dad turns away with an expression of scornful disgust.)
MUM
How are you liking it down the mine, Ken?
KEN
Oh it's not too bad, mum... we're using some new tungsten carbide drills for the preliminary coal-face scouring operations.
MUM
Oh that sounds nice, dear...
DAD
Tungsten carbide drills! What the bloody hell's tungsten carbide drills?
KEN
It's something they use in coal-mining, father.
DAD
(mimicking)
'It's something they use in coal-mining, father'. You're all bloody fancy talk since you left London.
KEN
Oh not that again.
MUM
He's had a hard day dear... his new play opens at the National Theatre tomorrow.
KEN
Oh that's good.
DAD
Good! good? What do you know about it? What do you know about getting up at five o'clock in t'morning to fly to Paris... back at the Old Vic for drinks at twelve, sweating the day through press interviews, television interviews and getting back here at ten to wrestle with the problem of a homosexual nymphomaniac drug-addict involved in the ritual murder of a well known Scottish footbailerˇ That's a full working day, lad, and don't you forget it!
MUM
Oh, don't shout at the boy, father.
DAD
Aye, 'ampstead wasn't good enough for you, was it? ... you had to go poncing off to BarnsIcy, you and yer coal-mining friends.
(spits)
KEN
Coal-mining is a wonderful thing father, but it's something you'll never understand. Just look at you!
MUM
Oh Ken! Be careful! You know what he's like after a few novels.
DAD
Oh come on lad! Come on, out wi' it! What's wrong wi' me?... yet tit!
KEN
I'll tell you what's wrong with you. Your head's addled with novels and poems, you come home every evening reeling of Chateau La Tour...
MUM
Oh don't, don't.
KEN
And look what you've done to mother! She's worn out with meeting film stars, attending premieres and giving gala luncheons...
DAD
There's nowt wrong wi' gala luncheons, lad! I've had more gala luncheons than you've had hot dinners!
MUM
Oh please!
DAD
Aaaaaaagh!
(clutches hands and sinks to knees)
MUM
Oh no!
KEN
What is it?
MUM
Oh, it's his writer's cramp!
KEN
You never told me about this...
MUM
No, we didn't like to, Kenny.
DAD
I'm all right! I'm all right, woman. Just get him out of here.
MUM
Oh Ken! You'd better go ...
KEN All right. I'm going.
DAD
After all we've done for him...
KEN
(at the door)
One day you'll realize there's more to life than culture. There's dirt, and smoke, and good honest sweat!
DAD
Get out! Get out! Get OUT! You ... LABOURER!
(Ken goes. Shocked silence. Dad goes to table and takes the cover off the typewriter.)
DAD
Hey, you know, mother, I think there's a play there .... get t'agent on t'phone.
MUM
Aye I think you're right, Frank, it could express, it could express a vital theme of our age...
DAD
Aye.
(In the room beneath a man is standing on a chair. bangning on the ceiling with a broom.)
MAN
Oh shut up!
(bang bang)
Shut up!
(they stop talking upstairs)
OIl, that's better.
(he climbs down and looks at the camera)
And now for something completely different ... a man with three buttocks...
MUM and DAD
(from upstairs)
We've done that!
(The man looks up slightly disconcerted.)
MAN
Oh all right. All right! A man with nine legs.
VOICE OFF
He ran away.
MAN
Oh... Bloody Hell! Er ... a Scotsman on a horse!
(Cut to film of a Scotsman (John Cleese) riding up on a home. He looks around, puzzled.
Cut to stock film of Women's Institute audience applauding.
Cut to the man with two noses (Graham Chapman); he puts a handkerchief to his elbow and we hear the sound of a nose being blown.
Cut to Women's Institute audience applauding.
Cut to cartoon of a flying sheep.)
VOICE OVER
Harold! Come back, Harold! Harold! Come back, Harold! Oh, blastl
(The sheep is shot down by a cannon. Cut to film of an audience of Indian ladies not applauding.)
Continue...
    
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© 2003 Ireneusz Siwek