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Zahra Ahmadi as Nasreen and Ben Righton as Prince Richard in The King of Hearts |
What if the King’s wife was a Muslim?
Alistair Beaton, the writer behind The Trial of Tony Blair, has a new comedy which asks some awkward questions of the Royal Family, writes Tom Foot
PRINCE William’s girlfriend has been hounded by the paparazzi in recent weeks.
Happy-go-lucky Kate Middleton ticks all the right boxes for the tabloid press.
But what if the Prince was planning to marry a veiled Muslim?
Tufnell Park’s Alistair Beaton – a former-speechwriter for Gordon Brown, Spitting Image scriptwriter and more recently behind the Trial of Tony Blair and A Very Social Secretary for Channel 4 – asks that question in a new comedy at the Hampstead Theatre.
Beaton’s two recent films A Very Social Secretary – about David Blunkett – and The Trial of Tony Blair, which aired in January – have earned him national acclaim.
Blunkett publicly condemned the film in the House of Commons and in his recently published diaries, which Beaton mischievously regards as a badge of honour.
He’s up to his old tricks again with a political comedy called the King of Hears about multiculturalism and the monarchy complete with Beaton’s trademark “happy bad taste.”
He says: “What if the PM decided to bomb, say, Iran? He would have the King’s girlfriend marching for Stop the War in a hijab.
“I think the reason Britain is bearable is multiculturalism. Imagine living in London with eight million white, British people.
“The comedy attacks politicians for threatening that diversity.”
He was inspired by reading a book about King Edward VIII who abdicated in 1936 to marry the woman he loved.
“Since Iraq I’ve been wanting to write something on multiculturalism,” he says. “But I didn’t know how to do it with comedy until I picked up a book about the King and his ‘unsuitable’ divorce. I wondered what would be ‘unsuitable’ today?”
Beaton, who described Spitting Image as a “vicious satire” with “mallet humour”, prefers the more intricate approach of the playwright.
He says: “In drama you can be much more precise and explore more. It’s the scalpel rather than the mallet. Robert Lindsay didn’t try to caricature Blair – he played the inner-man. I thought he was brilliant.”
Beaton is working with Max Stafford Clark. Anyone bothered with the charge that the King of Hearts will suffer from flippancy should check Clark’s CV.
His Out of Joint theatre-company last year graced the National Theatre with the hugely popular Permanent Way, the exceptional African Macbeth at the Arcola and the biting Talking to Terrorists at the Tricycle.
“We have a vigorous working relationship,” he says. Perhaps Beaton would make a good politician himself.
Beaton defends himself against two criticisms – bad taste and flippancy.
He says: “An earnest person without a sense of humour, whether politically on the right or the left, is inherently dangerous.
“I worked in America for a while and you didn’t get many laughs from the god-botherers I can tell you.
“Good comedy can deal with serious issues. People say it is bad taste to tell jokes about a war where British soldiers are dying – I say it’s not the comedy that’s bad taste, it’s the government.”
A lyricist, who wrote an anti-war musical for the Hampstead Theatre in 2004, Beaton used to pen speeches for Gordon Brown when he was in opposition in the 1990s.
“Making Gordon Brown witty was mission impossible,” he recalls. “It was before Labour came to power in 1997. I remember Gordon telling me: ‘Hang on a minute Alistair – this makes it look like I’m supporting the strike’ – I can’t be seen to do that. It was at that point I knew we had to part.”
A lifelong Labour supporter, Beaton voted Green at the last election.
“It’s not a wasted vote,” he insists. “How could I vote for a party that has led us into an illegal war? And anyway climate change is about to become the main agenda.”
On the television series he says: “Blair polarises opinion – some people say I was too cruel to Blair, some people say I was too soft. Blunkett denounced the film in the Parliament and in his diaries. I see being denounced by New Labour politicians as something of an achievement.”
It’s not just the politicians and the monarchy that gets a rough ride. He says: “We are used to intelligence cock-ups in this country – the WMDs that were not there and shooting the wrong person on raids – we have a reputation. In the play we have intelligence services whose greatest gift is not their intelligence”
He reveals he devised a scene about the Blair Foundation three days before it was announced a Blair Foundation would be set up in reality.
He says: “Mine was even more ridiculous. It was the Peace, Tolerance and Inter-faith Foundation.”
Beaton hopes his foresightedness won’t catch him out.
“The only thing I’ve changed was Leeds to Birmingham – it works just the same – and I’m thinking of throwing in a Jade Goody character,” he reveals.
“But will anyone remember her in two weeks? And will the Prime Minister still be Prime Minister in March?”
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