And when you drive for hours, arrive to find you nowhere gone, you’vejust been mouthing ‘brum, brum’, rocking wheel, of course you have, theheap is rusted through and off the road since you drove drunk through thirteenschoolyards, laughing like Prescott.
Then welcome, ah, oo costrinzi welcome, in Blue Jam, Blue Jam, BlueJam, Bluuuueee Jammmmmm...
Doctor: Come in [FX DOOR OPENS AND CLOSES]Ah, do have a seat.
Patient: Thanks.
Doctor: Now, what seems to be the problem?
Patient: Well, it’s a bit silly really, but I fell on this finger.
Doctor: Hmmmm, let me see.
Patient: I really bent it back.
Doctor: Yes, that’s quite swollen, isn’t it?
Patient: Hmmm.
Doctor: Can you move it? Yes, it’s not broken, but we should probablygive it a bit of support.
Patient: Right.
Doctor: I’ll get Billy Connolly to pop in and do you a nice supportbandage.
Patient: Oh, right!
Doctor (to intercom): Sarah, could you send him through with some sizetwo tubigrip and applicator? Thanks.
Billy Connolly (in hallway): ...no I didn’t, no. I got back, love. Last Thursday. Murder.
[FX DOOR OPENS AND CLOSES]
How you doing?
Patient: Hello!
Doctor: Middle finger, left hand, please.
Billy Connolly: Lets have a look. Right. OK.
Doctor: Good!
Patient: Thanks very much!
Billy Connolly: Cheerio!
[FX DOOR OPENS AND CLOSES]
OK, I’ll see you later...
Doctor: Keep that on for a week, pop back if it’s not getting any better.
Patient: Right, thanks very much indeed!
Doctor: Not at all. Bye bye!
Patient: Bye bye!
[FX DOOR OPENS AND CLOSES]
Zoe Ball, still alive, hanging from the ceiling by a flex aroundher neck. No one cuts her down, they just stand and stare and smile,then go back to their desks and giggle for a while.
Father: Alright there, love?
Jean: Uhhhh.
Father: Well done, Jean. Lovely little boy. Let’s have asmile for the camera.
Doctor: There we are. He’s a lovely, healthy baby. Eightpounds exactly. Little boy, as you can see.
Jean: Oh, Harvey!
Doctor: He’s perfectly healthy. There’s just one thing you oughtto know, nothing to worry about, but, er, we think he might be a zombie.
Jean: Oh.
Doctor: Is does happen, very occasionally. It’s just somethingto be aware of.
Father: A zombie?
Doctor: Yes.
Jean (voice over): It is shocking at first to think that you have givenbirth to a zombie, but then, you know, you do get, you just get used toit.
Father (voice over): Yeah.
Father: Alright, Harve, here it comes! Just give it a nice bigkick! Oh, bad luck there!
Jean (voice over continues): Harvey is our boy, and we regard him, really,as normal. He likes normal things, he’s like any little boy, he hasa little go at football with you, don’t he? And, um, he’s very slow,but he’ll have a bash.
Father: Go on then, kick it! Have another bash, go on! Thereit is, it’s on your . It’s just down there, look down, look down! Look at the floor! There it is! Go on, give it a kick! Good boy! Right, on the head. On the head, Harv. Ready? One, two, three, there you go!
[HARVEY FALLS OVER AND WEEPS]
Oh! Never mind, get up, you’re all right! You OK? No. S’alright, Daddy’s here, up you get.
Jean (voice over): One thing I don’t like, personally, he was, he’sbeen banned from the local newsagent. Now to me, I’m not being funny,but that is not right. They say that he’s, like, frightening theother customers, but how can you be afraid of, like, a little four yearold zombie buying a paper?
Jean (voice over continues): And his food, that is a problem. That is the biggest problem for us, because ideally, Harvey would liketo eat human flesh, you know, and that’s obviously going to be a problem,innit?
Father (voice over): Yeah.
Jean (voice over): And occasionally, this mortician bloke who read abouthim, like, in the paper, he sends us a hand or something every now andthen. But we can’t do that for school!
Jean: There we are, darling, Mummy’s got a little treat for you, Harvey! Nice little hand for you. There we are. No, slowly, slowly! No, what do you say, darling? What do you say?
Harvey: Gaaaah!
Jean: Good boy! Very good! Go on then, darling. Slowly,darling, slowly. That’s a good boy! No, darling! No! Darling, Harvey don’t go outside with that, darling! You’re not takingthat outside! Harvey! No, darling! No, not outside, darling! Darling, no.
Father (voice over): We send him off with, er, like a raw hand, and,er, cover it in chicken meat, and that, er, make them in the shed.
[FX HARVEY EATING FLESH]
Jean: Good boy! Put ourself down, don’t want the neighbours talking.
Woman neighbour: I don’t think they should be allowed to keep him, really,if I’m honest. But I don’t know what they can do about it. Errm. I’ve driven into him, to tell the truth, and he, well, he fallsover and he lies there, looking quite broken, and then he just gets upand toddles off. And that’s even if you hit him at, you know, fiftymile an hour or something like that.
Jean (voice over): We’ve had trouble with the papers, ‘cause the police,the police, police come round ’cause they was investigating these, theselike, erm, series of like, disappeared pets, an that, and then while theywas round he was upstairs in the bathroom, and they saw Harvey throwingup a dog’s head in the garden, so, you know, that didn’t help us out.
Jean: Alright, Harvey, alright darling, you just lie there on the tablefor a minute, that’s it.
Doctor: Yes, that’s right. Thanks.
Jean: I think he knows, you know.
Father: Yeah.
Jean (voice over): So here we are. This is what happens prettyregularly. This chap comes round after someone’s complained and giveshim a lethal injection.
Father (voice over): He’s a special doctor, in he?
Jean (voice over): Well, that’s what they say, but no one’s too carefulabout the rights of a zombie, are they?
Father (voice over): Hmmmm.
Jean (voice over): I reckon he’s probably one of them struck off one’s.
Father (voice over): Yeah. Probably from the Royal Infirmary.
Doctor: Could I just make sure that you fully understand the procedure?
Jean: Yeah.
Father: Yeah.
Doctor: As soon as all signs of movement have ceased, err, then youcan take him back and bury him at the bottom of the garden.
Father: Take him back...bury him. Again!
Doctor: Good. Alright then, do you want to say goodbye to himor are you going to leave him with me?
Father: Bit pointless, innit? We’re going to see him again intwelve hours!
Doctor: Umm, well, we hope not!
Jean (voice over): They don’t really know what they’re doing, see?
Doctor: I’m just doing what I’ve been asked to do!
HARVEY GRUMBLES
Jean: Alright, darling! I wonder who it was?
Father: ...makes a fuss!
Jean: I reckon it’s that woman over the road who keeps staring in?
Doctor: Could I just ask you to restrain him while I do the injection?
Jean: Alright, darling! You’re just going to be in the groundfor a little while, and have a little sleep, darling! We’re goingto see you in a little while! Have a nice little sleep, darling! Won’t be long! Nearly there, darling!
Father: That’s it, Harvey boy! Good boy!
Jean: Nearly there! Nearly there. Nearly there.
HARVEY’S GRUMBLING AND BREATHING HAVE CEASED
Doctor: Yep, I think that’s it.
Jean: I never like that bit.
Doctor: I’ll just clear up and be out of your way.
Jean: So, it’s always like this, really.
Father: Yeah. So what happens now is that we bury him and stayup half the night basically waiting for him to dig his way out of the groundagain.
Jean: Yeah. Otherwise he’d probably escape and we’d be held responsible,you know.
Father: Stupid, that. He’ll be back at school tomorrow.
Jean: Makes you sick, you know. One little zombie and everyonegoes doolally.
I opened the window. There’s an office block opposite Suzie’sflat. Its’ smokers skulk in the lane at the back. Sometimesthe smoke drifts up and in through Suzie’s window. Today there wasonly the smoke from next door’s incinerator. They have two dogs,and they burn their turds in it. In desperation, I ‘phoned an adinto Loot. ”Cigarette wanted”, it said. “Please ‘phone Suzie’s number.” The ‘phone rang as soon as I put it down. Suzie. She wantedher Astrakhan coat delivered to her office on the South Bank. ‘Ineed it for six. I’m meeting a playwright.’ I knew what thatmeant. She has a soggy valve for writers. ‘Oh, and could you changethe sheets first?’ I wore the coat to make sure I didn’t lose it. My arms are about a foot longer than Suzie’s. In the street, I pausedby the smokers. Standing downwind and about two yards away and breathinglike a runner, I made good use of their fumes. They stared at mewith some suspicion. I felt a little conversation would help. ‘I don’t work with you.’ I said. More stares. So I explained. ‘No one answered the ad in Loot.’ They shook their heads and wentinside. Two hours later, I attempted the same method outside thestage door of the National Theatre. There were only two smokers,and the river breeze ripped their smoke up and over my head. I leaptand gulped, breathing six times too fast, and reeled giddily into the road. A car screeched to a halt and blasted its horn. I froze in shock. It drew up to my legs and honked again. I remained confused. Therewas a shout from inside. Then slowly, the car pushed me over. AsI squirmed in the grit, trying to remember how to swear, I heard a brusquemale voice;
‘...and on the basis of that, I’d say felling a pedestrian feels moreexciting than shooting a cat with an airgun, but not a genuinely transgressiveas coming in your mothers’ handbag.’
Suzie’s laugh coiled round this pronouncement and she appeared, tuggingat the end of my arm. ‘Stand up’ she said, ‘and meet Gobi Jovvler. He wrote that play that won the awards.’ I remembered the criticshad said that it was the most devastatingly accurate play that will everbe written about sex. ‘It’s the most devastatingly accurate playthat will ever be written about sex.’ said Suzie. Jovvler lookedyounger than I had imagined, and meaty in the face. He was dressedsmart felty-brown, as if for a photo in a colour supplement, and barkingat a nervous stick with a handbook. The stick wrote everything down,including the volley of insults levelled at him, and laughed through asycophant’s fringe.
Jovvler inspected the front of my head. ‘Is this the one thatfancies you, da Suz?’ He was clearly amused. Suzie giggled. Jovvler jabbed a few words at the stick. Something like; ‘Casting note: an underdog so ugly the audience is incapable of any sympathy, no matterwhat befalls him.’ Then he turned to me and said; ‘You may followat a discrete distance, I have a plan for you.’ ‘Do you have a cigarette?’I wondered.
‘What sort of fart-skull are you?’ he sneered. ’Was I not holdinga lit cigarette in last month’s GQ?’
‘Could I have one then, please?’
‘You can have a whole box if you can tell me the name of my next play.’
His last play had been called ‘Fuckers’. ‘More fuckers.’ I said. ‘Sadly it is currently nameless, but if you do turn out to be right, thenyou may find your scroungings in Harwich.’ and he lobbed the box into theriver. Suzie and Jovvler led me by twenty yards along the promenade, withthe stick one gruff remark to the right. Twice they stopped and heldhands, gazing act the roof of the theatre while Jovvler’s name swept acrossthe light display. Once he bawled me out for blocking the view ofhis poster. When we reached the bridge, he insisted on repeatingthe stroll, because he had only been recognised by five people. ‘Yousaid you only wanted five.’ said Suzie. ‘Yeah, but three of themrecognised me from the telly.’ he snorted. And we traipsed back andforth two more times, before he announced that he and Suzie were goingto get pissed in a limo. Jovvler’s driver slung us over the river. Jovvler and Suzie helped themselves to the car bar. Watching this,the stick’s eyes bulged, and he reminded me of a featherless anorexic owlI’d dreamt about in hospital. Jovvler poured him a large colourlessone. ’What do you do?’ I whispered. ‘Neat Gin.’ he replied, but Jovvlerhad heard me. ’Daniel is a scribe, cursed with the intelligence to knowthat he will never be a first rate writer, and enough ambition to rot horriblyin this knowledge, until in twenty years he claims that he wrote all myplays, and shortly afterwards drinks himself to death.’ Daniel snivvledbefore Jovvler cut him off with; ‘No time to laugh, fuckpen, get it alldown.’ Later, I found a note in my pocket that said; ‘I don’t writehis plays, it’s the actors who do that.’ We toured London in greatrandom sweeps, Jovvler all the time extemporising on urban alienation inthe sexually malfunctioning zeitgeist. ’Look,’ he’d say, ‘look at them. Dual income, six dildos.’ And once; ‘If you’re bored of London,you’re bored of fucking, and I’m bored of fucking London because I’m boredof London fucking.’ This last the stick applauded, until he was slapped.By the time we reached Suzie’s flat, Jovvler had pronounced himself ‘Readyfor the final act.’ As he dragged her to the chamber, he called overhis shoulder to the stick; ’Tell New York I’ll be up for an hour.’ Suzie wondered if Jovvler might give me a few cigarettes so I could remainin a fug at the breakfast bar while they got torrid. ‘No, no, he’spart of the scene.’ he said. He leered at me like a randy bandit,and waved a box of cigarettes under my nose.
‘Fancy one?’
I did.
‘Then you must witness the tup.’ With that, he shoved Suzie ontoher four-poster, and started to savage her bodice. Stick sat me downon the floor. ‘It’s where they usually sit.’ he said, and wrote feverishlyas he spoke. I glanced up to behold Jovvler, now naked and kneelingbefore a slightly ripped looking Suzie. ‘Gobble my Stoppard.’ he ordered, and fell on her in such a way as to bring this about. As he pushed himself into her face, Jovvler turned to me and said; ‘Howdoes it feel to see the woman you love being plugged by me?’ An unbornscream burst in my stomach and spread like cold mercury through my chest. I put my hands over my face, but kept looking through my fingers. ‘Right that down,’ he panted to the stick, ‘visibly destroyed, but can’tlook away.’ Then he whipped Suzie round so her forehead slapped thewall and declared; ‘Mr. Stoppard will shortly be entering his box.’ Hammeringcontinued for ghastly minutes, until the mobile phone which Jovvler hadgaffered to his buttock chirruped a manic arpeggio. He ripped itupwards, listened, and interrupted; ‘Not now Mamet, I’m fucking.’ Then he beamed the hideous grin of the unreservedly successful and slappedSuzie quite hard around the face to celebrate. Now I could turn away,and to the sounds of this dubious pleasure I began to ponder a vague tumescenceof my own. Eventually, with a series of pathetic squeaks, the playwrightemptied himself in the region of Suzie’s chest and armpit. She didn’tseem to notice. By this stage she was mainly asleep. He lit a cigarette, and ordered his amanuensis to read back his notes. ‘Good.’ he said frequently, and; ‘Hmmm, Pinter.’ before droppingthe butt in my lap and pronouncing himself pleased with a decent firstdraft. Then he told the stick to leak the Mamet episode to the SundayTimes. ‘I’ll deny it in my next interview.’ he said, ‘That’s howit’s done.’ ‘Leave now!’ he said to me, and the stick prodded me throughto a large sofa, where I dragged urgently on the soggy filter. Throughthe stripped pine I could hear Suzie, awake now and softly sobbing, accompaniedby the fart of his voice, which had taken on a new, almost pleading tone. ‘I hate the slapping too,’ he was saying, ‘it’s just that, well, it reallyis the thing now, you know?’ Three hours later he was gone, and Iwas asleep in the bed next to Suzie. She’d called me in to coverthe damp patch. I slept fitfully, tormented by febrile visions of a Jovvlerrampant, until Jovvler’s voice jolted me to. It was mumbling throughthe answerphone. ‘Da Suz,’ it was saying, ’you do love me, don’tyou? Yeah, I’m sure you do. Yeah, alright, good. Err,hope you’re not too, you know, and er, hey it was er, it was er...’ A voice behind him prompted something inaudible. ‘Yeah, it was afuck supreme. You are the Marquise
of Muff. Hmmm.’ There was a loud plunk but the ‘phone didn’tring off, and for some minutes I heard Jovvler explaining to the stickhow this last phrase would work at the National, and would be quoted bytwenty percent of the audience in the interval, and he would hear it, becausehe has a special window for listening.
Surrounded by screaming sick children, Kevin Greening farts likea sax and laughs to see the air full of chemotherapy wigs and bald children.
Caller: (Rasberry)
Man: Yep, speaking!
Caller: (Rasberry, rasberry)
Man: Um, we can do that, yes.
Caller: (Rasberry)
Man: If you like, yeah.
Caller: (Rasberry)
Man: Right, Wednesday morning...
Caller: (Rasberry)
Man: It’s a pleasure
Caller: (Rasberry)
Man: OK, bye bye!
Caller: (Rasberry)
[FX RECEIVER IS REPLACED]
Molly Padley: Excuse me!
Lucy Tiseman: Yes?
Molly Padley: Um, could you help me?
Lucy Tiseman: What’s the matter?
Molly Padley: I’m stuck!
Lucy Tiseman: Sorry?
Molly Padley: I’m, I’m stuck on this.
Lucy Tiseman: Stuck?
Molly Padley: Yeah, to this door!
Lucy Tiseman: Oh!
Molly Padley: Someone must have put superglue on it, or something.
Lucy Tiseman: Oh dear! I’m Lucy Tiseman.
Molly Padley: Er, could you call the Fire Brigade?
Lucy Tiseman: Oh yes, yes. And you are?
Molly Padley: Er, Molly Padley.
Lucy Tiseman: Molly Padley. Hello!
Molly Padley: Hi.
Lucy Tiseman (voice over): I’ve found bikes are quite easy to bringdown at night, with a wire. They don’t know what hit them.
Robert Stavey: Uhhhh!
Lucy Tiseman: Here’s one!
[FX BIKE RIDING PAST AT SPEED]
[FX LUCY PULLS THE CLOTHES LINE TAUT]
Robert Stavey: Arrrrggghhhh!
[FX BIKE FALLS ONTO TARMAC]
[FX LUCY RUNS OVER]
Robert Stavey: Arrggghh! Ah, shit! Oh, God!
Lucy Tiseman: Are you all right? OK?
Robert Stavey: It’s my leg!
Lucy Tiseman: What’s your name?
Robert Stavey: Robert Stavey. Ah!
Lucy Tiseman: Lucy Tiseman. How do you do?
Robert Stavey: Could you get me some help, please?
Lucy Tiseman: Oh yes, you’ll need that!
Robert Stavey: Thanks!
Lucy Tiseman: Do you like grapes?
Robert Stavey: What?
Lucy Tiseman: I could bring you some grapes in hospital.
Robert Stavey: Awwwwwwww!
Lucy Tiseman (voice over): After we lost Diana, I stayed in the housefor about six weeks, and then one day I just flipped and stormed out, straightto the shopping centre, and I knocked this bloke over the edge of the carpark, and he sort of landed on his head. He was very seriously injured. He’s through here actually.
[FX KNOCKING ON BEDROOM DOOR]
Andrew! Andrew! Someone here to see you!
[FX BEDROOM DOOR IS OPENED]
Andrew: Uhhhhh! Uhhhhh!
Lucy Tiseman: Andrew!
Andrew: Perrruhhhhhh! Uhhhhhhh!
Lucy Tiseman: I think if I did have any friends, they would say I wasgetting worse. The other day I floored a bloke by short-circuitinghis shopping basket onto the fridge, and I decided to prolong the conversationby telling him I’d done it. It worked, but I’m not sure if it wasa good idea. The police came round the other day.
Mark Goodyear, bloated much fatter than Elvis, heaves his bulk ontoa railway and with a sigh devastates the nineteen-forty from Paddington.
Rosa: Thank you.
Paul: There’s a fiver in there from last week as well.
Rosa: Thank you very much
Paul: Right. Rosa, could I ask you something?
Rosa: Yes.
Paul: You don’t think it’s a very good job that you do?
Rosa: Yes.
Paul: I just wondered if it would be easier with another hoover.
Rosa: Another one?
Paul: Well, a new one.
Rosa: I don’t need a new one.
Paul: It’s just the one you use is very small.
Rosa: Yes, very small. Very good.
Paul: I mean, six inches is very small indeed.
Rosa: Is very small inch.
Paul: Six inch hoover.
Rosa: Yes.
Paul: It does take a bit long, doesn’t it?
Rosa: A long time?
Paul: Well, you know, it seems to take you two days.
Rosa: One day and the next day, yes.
Paul: Ummm, hoovering all the big carpets with that tiny little machine.
Rosa: Yes very small, very good for dust.
Paul: Dust?
Rosa: Dust is very small.
Paul: Dust is very small.
Rosa: A big hoover is very big. No good for little dust becauseis too much to get done, the dust, huh?
Paul: But it’s much quicker, isn’t it?
Rosa: Is no good for small dust. Dust is small.
Paul: Yes, but you have to crawl up and down on your knees.
Rosa: Finding the dust.
Paul: Yes, but we could get you a bigger hoover, Rosa.
Rosa: You don’t like my work?
Paul: No, no, it’s very good! Very, very good but, umm, with abig, with a normal hoover you’d be finished in half a day.
Rosa: There is something wrong with my small?
Paul: No, it’s just a time thing. If you have this [FX SMALL HOOVERSWITCHED ON] that noise in the house for two days a week, it’s difficultto work.
[FX SMALL HOOVER SWITCHED OFF]
Rosa: You want me to go?
Paul: No! No, no. Look, Rosa, we just want the cleaningto be done on one day, not two. It doesn’t need two.
Rosa: Well, I don’t know.
Paul: What do you mean?
Rosa: I don’t know.
Paul: Rosa?
Rosa CRIES
Paul: Rosa? What’s the matter?
Rosa: I must use it! Very good!
Paul: Look if you want to, yes, but really we want you to get your workdone in one day.
Rosa: Three days.
Paul: Three days?!
Rosa: I need three days to do, for proper job.
Paul: Three days?
Rosa: Is not possible two days, no more. Not with this and allsmall.
Paul: Rosa.
Rosa: I buy twenty of these!
Paul: What, what are those?
Rosa: Little dusters for the small mess.
Paul: It’s no bigger than a stamp!
Rosa: Please don’t be cross! I do my best! I buy these specialfor the house. Please, I like it here very much, I do good work! Please, for three days is no problem for me!
Paul: OK, I know...
Rosa: Please, Mr. Paul, I do very good with all the dust.
Paul: Oh, all right!
Rosa: Every little bloody dirt!
Paul: Yes. Three days?
Rosa: Yes.
Paul: OK, ok.
Rosa: Thank you.
Paul: Right.
Rosa: I go now?
Paul: Yeah.
Rosa: Bye!
Paul: Bye!
[FX DOOR OPENS AND CLOSES]
Rosa EXITS.
[FX TELEPHONE RINGS]
[FX RECEIVER PICKED UP]
Paul: Sirs? Oh, hello! Hi, have you finished? Howdid it go? That’s good! Good. Yeah, yeah she’s gone. Well, um, well, no, no. She’s actually going to do three days now.No, I know, I know, I know! I couldn’t, I couldn’t, she had abouttwenty miniature dusters. Well, alright. See you later, bye!
[FX TELEPHONE RECEIVER IS REPLACED]
I can see Steve Lomacq as a frail old man in a wheelchair, tryingto shake hands with an elephant.
Interviewer: Are you sure Beethoven enjoyed ten-pin bowling?
Michael Hargreaves: Well, not really. They didn’t really havebowling in his time, but he’s certainly enjoying it now, but through me.
Interviewer: And do you enjoy it?
Michael Hargreaves: No.
And when you drive for hours, arrive to find you nowhere gone, you’vejust been mouthing ‘brum, brum’, rocking wheel, of course you have, theheap is rusted through and off the road since you drove drunk through thirteenschoolyards, laughing like Prescott.
Then welcome, ah, oo costrinzi welcome, in Blue Jam, Blue Jam, BlueJam, Bluuuueee Jammmmmm...
Cast: Chris Morris, David Cann, Amelia Bullmore, Julia Davis, Mark Heap,Kevin Eldon & Sally Phillips.
Produced by Chris Morris
Blue Jam © BBC 1999
Transcribed by Stephen Lafferty
Mandelsoned by Matt Honeyball