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TRANSCRIPT:
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(Theme music.)

(The scene starts in a courtyard outside a castle.)

Narrator:  In 1486, the second year of Richard IV’s historic reign and also the year in which the egg replaced the worm as the lowest form of currency, King Richard departed England on a Crusade against the Turks.

(Scene change - People are waiting outside the castle for the king. He rides out and into the courtyard.)

King:  As the Good Lord said, ‘Love thy neighbours as thyself unless he’s Turkish, in which case, kill the bastard!’

Narrator:  He left behind his beloved son Prince Harry to rule as regent in his stead.

King:  Farewell, dear Harry.

Prince Harry:  Farewell, father.

Narrator:  And his slimy son Edmund to the tasks most befitting him.

(Edmund smiles at the King.)

King:  Edward.

(The King rides away followed by his entourage.  Harry waves, he looks nervous.  Edmund tries to look like he cares that his father has gone to the crusades.  Baldrick his servant approaches him.)

Baldrick:  (Whispers.)  My Lord, with the king gone…

Edmund:  Of course!  At last, a chance for some real power!

(Scene change - A year has past. Snow is covering the ground.  Edmund is outside on his horse shouting and waving his sword around.)

Edmund:  Come on you scum!  Move it:  I want you back to the castle by sundown, or you’ll all be slaughtered.  Onward!

(The camera pans out and we see that he is actually herding some sheep.)

(Scene change - Inside the castle - Harry is reading by a fireplace.)

Prince Harry:  Splendid.  Splendid!

(Edmund enters the room, trying to close the door without the sheep coming in, we can hear the sheep outside.)

Edmund:  Now look!  You’re not supposed to be here!  That’s far enough.  Now get out!

(He slams the door shut.)

Edmund:  My god, just wait till I get my hands on that bastard brother Harry.

(He turns to see Harry and then tries to hide behind a wall.)

Prince Harry:  Ah, Edmund.  There you are.  Splendid news.  Father’s coming home.  He’ll be here by St Leonard’s Day.  So we can celebrate both events together.  I’ll handle the visiting royalty, the guards of honour, and the papal legate.  And you can sort out the frolics.

Edmund:  The frolics?

Prince Harry:  Yes, the Morris dancers, the eunuchs, and the bearded woman.  You know, the traditional St Leonard’s Day entertainment.  Damnation, I won’t have enough time to attend to the drains.  Edmund, you’ll have to look into those as well.

Edmund:  Um.  Yes.  Fine, fine.  Ahm, I’d be honoured.

Prince Harry:  Good.  You won’t let me down, will you?

Edmund:  No, no. I won’t.  I’m really looking forward to it already.  Thank you so very much.

Prince Harry:  Splendid.

(Harry leaves the room.)

Edmund:  Oh, no!  Twelve months of chasing sheep and straightening the royal portraits, and now this.  The bastard!  The bastard!

(Baldrick enters the room.)

Baldrick:  If only he were, my lord.

Edmund:  What?

Baldrick:  If only he were a bastard, my lord:  then you would be regent now!

Edmund:  Ah, yes!  And then one day…

(Percy, Duke of Northumberland and Edmund’s dim-witted friend enters the room.)

Percy:  You would be king my lord.

Edmund:  Ah yes, I would be King.  And then what?

Baldrick and Percy:  You’d rule the world, my lord.

Edmund:  Precisely!  It’s just not fair, you know, every woman in the Court has bastard sons, but not my mother.  Oh, no!  She’s so damn pure she doesn’t dare look down in case she notices her own breasts.

(Scene change - The Queen is sitting by the fire with her lady-in-waiting.)

Lady-in-waiting:  You must be so looking forward to the king’s return, your Majesty.

Queen:  No.

Lady-in-waiting:  No, my lady?  But think, he will come to your chamber and make mad, passionate love to you!

Queen:  Yes, and I wish he wouldn’t do that.  It’s very difficult to sleep with that sort of thing going on, you know.  Being used all night long.  Like the outside of a sausage roll.

Lady-in-waiting:  Still, my lady, we’ve got the St Leonard’s Day celebrations to look forward to.  The jesters, the jugglers…

Queen:  The great brown ox, steaming and smouldering all night long.

Lady-in-waiting:  Oh yes, the feast!

Queen:  Sorry.  No, I was thinking of something else.

Lady-in-waiting:  I particularly hope they’ve got the Morris dancers, I love them.

Queen:  Yes, I like the eunuchs.

Lady-in-waiting:  Oh, yes!  The eunuchs!  I wish I owned one.

Queen:  I wish I’d married one.

(Scene change - Edmunds tower bedroom - Baldrick is on Edmunds bed, Percy is reading at the table and Edmund is watching a large woman leave the room.)

Edmund:  No, that’s all right!  Fine, fine.  Could have happened to anyone.

(He shuts the door.)

Edmund:  Oh, my God.  We’ve only got one act, and she’s shaved her beard off.

(Percy looks closely at the scroll he has been reading.)

Percy:  There are the eunuchs, my lord.

Edmund:  Oh, yes.  So?  The eunuchs and the Amazing Beardless woman.  There must be someone else, there must be!

Percy:  Well, there’s the Jumping Jews of Jerusalem.

Edmund:  What do they do?

Percy:  They jump, my lord.

Edmund:  What?

Percy:  They come in  and they…they jump a lot, my lord.  It’s a humorous act.

Edmund:  Argh!  There must be something else, surely?  The Death of the Pharaoh! 

(He snatches the scroll.)

Edmund:  Sir Dominic Prick and his Magnificent Strolling Wooferoonies perform the tragic ancient Egyptian masterpiece, the Death of the Pharaoh.  Well, that sounds funny.

Percy:  Oh, no, no, no, I found it very moving, my lord.

Edmund:  Well, it’d better be funny of Prick’ll get his come-uppance, I can tell you.  Book him.

(Baldrick gets off the bed and shows Edmund the scroll he’s been reading.)

Baldrick:  What about Jerry Merryweather and his Four Chickens, my lord?

Edmund:  What do they do?  Lay egg?

Baldrick:  Yes, my lord.

Edmund:  All right, book them.

(There’s a knock at the door, Percy opens it and takes a message from a messengers and slams the door.  He give the scroll  to Edmund.  He reads it and looks angry.)

Percy:  What is it, my lord?

Edmund:  The eunuchs have cancelled.

Baldrick:  Oh, dear.

Edmund:  Ha! I should have known, never trust a eunuch.

Percy:  What are we going to do?

Edmund:  Well, I know what I’m going to do.  Baldrick, give me an execution order.

(Baldrick pulls out a piece of paper from his belt and hands it to Edmund.)

Edmund:  I’m going to teach them a lesson they’ll never forget.  I’m going to remove whatever extraneous parts of their bodies still remain.

(He opens the door and hands the scroll to the messenger who is still standing there.)

Edmund:  Take that to the Lord Chancellor.

(He turns to face Percy and Baldrick.)

Percy:  We could have the Morris dancers, my lord.

Edmund:  Not that desperate.  Morris dancing is the most fatuous tenth-rate entertainment ever devised by man, forty effeminate blacksmiths waving bits of cloth they’ve just wiped their noses on.  How it’s still going on this day and age, I’ll never know.

Percy:  Sorry, so do you want them or not?

(Edmunds hits Percy with the scroll, just then Harry enters the room.)

Prince Harry:  Ah, Edmund.

(Edmund, Percy and Baldrick break into a kind of dance, waving the scrolls around and hit each other with them, then Edmund indicates that the dance is to finish and they all stop.)

Edmund:  And rest.

Prince Harry:  Oh! Splendid! 

(He claps.)

Prince Harry:  And how are the entertainments coming along?

Edmund:  Erm…well, very, very well indeed.  I think it’s going to have a slightly Spartan look.

Prince Harry:  What, Greek?

Edmund:  Yes, that’s right.  Yes, a Greek look.

Prince Harry:  So everyone’s turning up?

Edmund:  Absolutely everyone…so many people, in fact, that I’ve had to let the eunuchs go.

Prince Harry:  Oh, no, no, no, no!

Edmund:  No?

Prince Harry:  No, that won’t do at all!  Not on St Leonard’s Day, because, correct me if I’m wrong.  Lord Percy, St Leonard himself was a eunuch.

Percy:  Yes, that’s right.

Edmund:  Yes:  that’s why I thought it might be more tactful…if…

(He looks up as if to heaven.)

Prince Harry:  No, no, no.  To leave out the eunuchs on St Leonard’s Day would be like, well, leaving out the Morris dancers, or the bearded woman.

Edmund:  Ah, yes.

Prince Harry:  And besides, as you know, we are expecting Father’s Supreme Commander, Lord Dougal McAngus, at the feast and, as you know, eunuchs are his particular favourite.  He’s Scottish, you see.

Edmund:  Oh, I see.

Prince Harry:  Well, I’m relying on you, Edmund.  Carry on.

(Harry leaves. Edmund is very angry.)

Edmund:  Oh, I see, so some carrot-faced, thistle-arsed Scottish orang-utan would like some eunuchs, would he?

Percy:  Apparently he’s a great warrior, my lord.

Edmund:  Oh, that’s what they all say.  These Scots are all the same.  Barbarians, half of them can’t speak English.

Baldrick:  What do they speak?

Edmund:  I don’t know:  It’s all Greek to me.

Percy:  They speak Greek?

Edmund:  No - I mean it sounds like Greek.

Percy:  Well, if it sounds like Greek, it probably is Greek.

Edmund:  It’s not Greek!

Percy:  But is sounds like Greek.  What’s not Greek, but sounds like Greek?  That’s a good one, my lord!

Edmund:  Look, it’s not meant to be a brain teaser, Percy.

(He starts to shout.)

Edmund:  I’m simply telling you that I cannot understand a blind word they’re saying.

Percy:  Well, no wonder, my lord!  You’ve never learned Greek, of course.

Edmund:  Percy, have you ever wondered what your insides look like?

Percy:  Sometimes, my lord, yes.

(Edmund pulls his dagger out.)

Edmund:  Well, then, I’d be perfectly willing to satisfy your curiosity.  Oh, God this Scotsman’s annoying me already.  I am the Duke of Edinburgh, you know!  An Laird of Roxburgh, Selkirk and Peebles.  I could make things difficult for him.  As for the entertainments, oh, I don’t know.  Baldrick, you’ve got a beard, go and get yourself a nice dress.

Baldrick:  Oh great, my lord.

(Baldrick smiles.)

(Scene change - The banquet hall - Lots of people are in the hall, lots of food is laid out.  Prince Harry stands.)

Prince Harry:  A toast, Mother, to Father’s return!

(We hear a horse approaching, the doors burst open and McAngus enters on his horse, he climbs gracefully down.)

McAngus:   Noble Harry, Prince of Wales, Dougal McAngus places at your feet the spoils of an enemy at war.

(He pulls out a sack and empties it, a head falls out.)

McAngus:  Oh, no, sorry:  That’s my overnight bag…here, behold treasures torn from the torsos of the Turks.

(He pulls out another sack and empties the contents out onto the floor, it was filled with lots of treasures.)

Prince Harry:  Oh, McAngus, it fills me with joy and hope to see you.  What news of the King?

McAngus:  When we parted, he said he would return by St Leonard’s Day or die in the attempt.

Prince Harry:  Then we pray for his return:  join us, join us, you must be starving.

McAngus:  What about young Locknivar?

Prince Harry:  Ah, yes, him too.

McAngus:  Come on, boy.

(McAngus leads the horse to the table and sits in Edmunds seat.)

McAngus:  And you must be the king’s bit of rumpy-pumpy.

Queen:  I am the Queen.

McAngus:  Aye, aye.  I’ve got a message for you.  My father sends you his regards.

Queen:  Oh, do I know him?

McAngus:  Well, you might say that.  He’s the third Duke of Argyll.

(The Queen looks shocked.) 

Queen:  Oh!

(The Queen looks really embarrassed.  We hear trumpets and Edmund enters the hall.)

Prince Harry:  Ah, and here’s Edmund.  This, McAngus, is the man who is providing the entertainments for us tomorrow.

McAngus:  Ah, the eunuch!  Pleased to meet you.  There’s a groat for your trouble.

Edmund:  I’m not a eunuch.

McAngus:  You sound like one to me.

Edmund:  I am not a eunuch.  I am the Duke of Edinburgh.

McAngus:  Oh, you are, are you?

Edmund:  Yes.

(McAngus looks over towards the Queen.)

McAngus:  Same old story, eh?  Duke of Edinburgh and about as Scottish as the Queen of England’s tits.

(Edmund makes a squealing sound.)

McAngus:  Oh, no offence.  Sorry, your Majesty.

Edmund:  I’m sorry, you’re in my chair.

McAngus:  Don’t apologize.

(Edmund gives up and goes to the end of the table and just kneels down.)

Prince Harry:  Well, now we’ve all got to know each other, I’ve got rather a special announcement to make.

McAngus:  Don’t tell me.  You are a eunuch as well?

Prince Harry:  McAngus, as a reward for you heroic deeds in battle, my father here empowers me to grant you anything you may desire of me.

(Edmund looks at the horse.)

Edmund:  If he’s got any sense, he’ll ask for a haircut.

McAngus:  My lord, I am honoured, all I ask for is a scrap of land, grant me fair Selkirk and the noble shire of Roxburgh.

(Edmunds stands up.)

Edmund:  What?

Prince Harry:  Very well.  By the power vested in me…

Edmund:  Ah, excuse me…I’m sorry to dip my little fly in your ointment, but those lands do in fact belong to me.

Prince Harry:  Yes?

Edmund:  Well, so perhaps he’d like to choose somewhere else.

Prince Harry:  McAngus?

McAngus:  No, no, I’ll have Roxburgh and Selkirk.

Edmund:  But that only leave me with Peebles!

McAngus:  Oh, and Peebles!

Edmund:  Urgh!

Prince Harry:  Splendid.  Are you trying to say something, Edmund?

Edmund:  Well, I don’t know.  I mean, some people might say, ‘Well what an absurd idea, giving half of Scotland to a kilted maniac for slaughtering a couple of syphilitic Turks’…

(McAngus grabs Edmund by the throat.)

Edmund:  …but no, au contraire, I say, let’s reward him.

Prince Harry:  Good, good.  So be it.  Granted.

(McAngus is happy, he shakes Harry’s hand and then grabs Edmund again by his collar and makes him squeal.)

Edmund:  Hurray!

(Scene change - Edmunds bedroom - Percy and Baldrick are in the room, Baldrick is dressed like a woman and is turning round and round.  Edmund enters the room.)

Edmund:  I’m going to kill him.  And I’m going to kill him now.

Percy:  Who, my lord?

Edmund:  That stinking Scottish weasel.

Baldrick:  Why, my lord?

Edmund:  Because he’s a thieving, stinking Scottish weasel.

Percy:  How?

Edmund:  I’m going to stab him.

Baldrick:  Where?

Edmund:  In the Great Hall and in the bladder.

(Edmund starts sharpening his knife.)

Percy:  But if you stab him in front of everybody, won’t they suspect?

Edmund:  Yes, a drawback.  Perhaps we need something…a little more cunning.

Baldrick:  I have a cunning plan.

Edmund:  Yes perhaps, but I think I have a more cunning one.

(Edmund starts looking through the scrolls on the table.)

Baldrick:  Mine’s pretty cunning, my lord.

Edmund:  Yes, but not cunning enough, I imagine.

Baldrick:  Well, it depends how cunning you mean, my lord.

Edmund:  Well, I mean pretty damn cunning.  How cunning do you think I mean?

Baldrick:  Mine’s quite cunning, my lord.

Edmund:  All right then, let’s hear it, let’s hear what’s so damn cunning.

Baldrick:  Well, first of all you get him to come with you.

Edmund:  Oh, yes, very cunning, brilliantly cunning, I ask him to come with me and then stab him perhaps.  How cunning can you get?

Baldrick:  No, my lord, you get this enormous great cannon…

Edmund:  Oh, I see, take him outside, get him to stick his head down a cannon, then blow it off.  Oh yes, Baldrick, that’s a wonderful idea.  No…I think I have a plan that will give us a little more…entertainment…heh-heh-heh.

(Edmund goes to the window and looks out of it.)

(Scene change - The courtyard - We see McAngus riding away from the castle, we can see Edmund watching him from his window.  Next Edmund enters the courtyard and runs up to the Queen who is on her horse, he pushes her off and climbs on and rides off.)

(Scene change - The Woods - Edmund is following McAngus through the woods. McAngus stops to do some hunting, Edmund is creeping around behind him, he is trying to sneak up on McAngus.  Suddenly Edmund steps on a noose which tightens around his ankle and pulls him up towards the tree, he is left dangling upside down.  McAngus is skinning an animal, he doesn’t even turn to look at Edmund.)

McAngus:  Can I help you?

Edmund:  Ehm, no, no, I’m fine, thank you.

McAngus:  Good.

Edmund:  I’m not in your way over here, am I?

McAngus:  No.

Edmund:  There is one thing, I was wondering if you could do me a favour?

(McAngus stands and walks over to Edmund.)

McAngus:  Uh…huh?

Edmund:  I was wondering if you could help us with the celebrations tonight?

McAngus:  What, by staying away, do you mean?

(McAngus takes out an axe and cuts the rope holding Edmund up, Edmund falls to the ground.)

Edmund:  The thing is, we are presenting a mystery play by one of our leading thespian troupes, but unfortunately one of their number is ill and I thought you’d be the perfect person to take his place.

McAngus:  Hah.  Well, I warn you, I’m no actor.

(He throws a knife into a nearby badger.)

Edmund:  Yes, there won’t actually be much acting required.  It’s an ancient Egyptian piece called Death of the Scotsman.

McAngus:  All right then, I’ll have a crack at it.

(He throws his knife at a bird flying over head, we hear it squawk.)

Edmund:  And you can play the Scotsman, if you like, who dies at the end of the play.

McAngus:  Acting dead.  Now that I can do.

(McAngus walks away.)

Edmund:  (Talking to himself.)  Yes, well, as I say, there may not be much acting required…

(Edmund starts to walk away.)

McAngus:  (Calls out to Edmund.)  Oh, and mind the weasel pit.

(Suddenly Edmund disappears into a huge hole in the ground.)

(Scene change - The Banqueting Hall - The group of performers called the Jumping Jews is jumping up and down on stage, there are lots of people watching them, by the looks of all the half eaten food, they have just finished a huge feast.  At the end of a large table sits Prince Harry and the Queen, they looks unimpressed.)

(Scene change - Backstage - We can hear the Jumping Jews performing on stage.  Edmund puts the contents of his bag on a nearby table. It is full of knives, he picks one up and pushes the blade, the blade pushes back inside the handle, it is a trick knife.  Edmund smiles and empties another bag which contains three knives that look the same as the fake ones.  He picks one of these up and stabs it into the table.  Edmund suddenly hears someone coming and tries desperately to remove the knife before they come.  Three men dressed as Egyptians enter the room, this is Sir Dominic and two of his troupe, they are warming up before there act, they are crouching and jumping up and down.)

Sir Dominic:  Tall as a tree!  Let’s see those branches waving and swaying in the breeze!  Tall, taller!  Now small, smaller.

Edmund:  Sir Dominic!  Have you made the necessary changes?

Sir Dominic:  Yes, my lord.

(McAngus enters the room dressed as an Egyptian.)

Edmund:  McAngus, meet your murderers!

(McAngus doesn’t look too happy, and the actors ignore him and carry on warming up.)

(Scene change - The banqueting Hall - The Jumping Jews are just finishing their performance, they hop for the last time and the crowd claps not very enthusiastically.)

(Scene change - Backstage - The Jumping Jews come off stage and walk past the Egyptians.)

Second Egyptian:  How did it go?

(The Jew takes off his massive fake beard to reveal a smaller real beard underneath.)

Jew:  Not bad, I don’t think they really understood it, though.

(Scene change - The Banqueting hall - The Egyptians walk on stage, the crowd claps, we can see McAngus standing just off stage drinking some wine.)

Sir Dominic:  We three are gathered with most bold intent.

Second Egyptian:  Here by the banks of the graceful Nile.

Sir Dominic:  Where camels ride and deserts blow.

Third Egyptian:  To spill the blood of this Scotsman vile.

(Harry and the Queen look at each other, there are a bit confused.)

Queen:  What’s a Scotsman doing in Egypt.

Prince Harry:  I’m not sure, but apparently they’ve had very good reviews.

(Scene change - Edmund and McAngus are watching from backstage.)

McAngus:  Heh, heh.  See your mother there.  I met my father on my way back through France, apparently he and her used to whey-hey-hey…

Edmund:  Oh, don’t be absurd.  Such activities are totally beyond my mother.  My father only got anywhere with her because he told her it was a cure for diarrhoea.

McAngus:  Don’t you believe it.  There are some letters I found in my father’s tent and, by God, they’re hot stuff.  I tell you they certainly cast a wee shadow of doubt over the parenthood of young Harry for a start!

Edmund:  Look, don’t be absurd…what?

(Scene change - The Banqueting Hall - The Egyptians are still performing.)

Second Egyptian:  A bagpipe strums, behold this way our victim comes, for never was there tyrant, this dusty desert here amid, as him born beneath the shadow of yonder mighty…Ben Nevis.

(Scene change - Backstage - McAngus and Edmund are talking.)

McAngus:  Oh, that’s my cue, I’m on.

(Edmund looks panicky.)

Edmund:  Letters?  Letters?  Where are these letters?

McAngus:  Och, they’re hidden away.  I’ll show you them later.

Edmund:  All right.

(McAngus walks onto the stage.  Suddenly Edmund realises that McAngus will be stabbed for real at any moment.)

(Scene change - The Banqueting Hall - McAngus joins the Egyptians on stage.)

Third Egyptian:  Tutankhamun Macpherson, you come not at whit too soon.  Say, is not the weather fair for this, the Ides of June?

(He elbows McAngus slightly.)

McAngus:  Aye, it is.  What business do you mean?  Delay me not, for I am bound for Aberdeen.

(Scene change - Backstage  - Edmund runs up to Percy and Baldrick.)

Edmund:  Quick!  Help!  Oh, my God!  McAngus is going to die.

Percy:  And not a moment too soon, my lord.

Baldrick:  Carrot-faced orang-utan!

Percy:  Thieving Scots weasel!

Percy and Baldrick:  Death to the Scot!

Edmund:  No, look, he knows too much.

Percy:  That is why he must die!

Edmund:  No!  He mustn’t!  He mustn’t, he has vital information…I’ve change my mind…oh, my God, what are we going to do?

Baldrick:  Stop the show, my lord.

Edmund:  How?  How?

Percy:  Well just say ‘Stop!’

Edmund:  What’s our reason?  What’s our reason for stopping the show?

Percy:  Because the knives are real and McAngus is just about to get killed.

Edmund:  Oh, you bastard.

(Edmund takes the fake knife and tries to stab Percy, but the blade disappears into the handle. Suddenly Edmund has an idea and runs to the stage. Baldrick calls after him.)

Baldrick:  My lord, quick!

(Edmund picks up a Egyptian headdress and a fake knife and rushes onto the stage.)

(Scene change - The Banqueting Hall - Edmund rushes onto the stage, the other Egyptians have their knives ready to stab McAngus.)

Edmund:  Stop!  Sorry I’m late.

(Edmund stabs McAngus with the fake knife, McAngus just stands there, Edmund stabs him again, still no reaction so Edmund pushes him down, the crowd clap.)

(Scene change - Night - Edmund is sitting next to McAngus, he is reading the letters.)

Edmund:  Good, good.  Excellent.  It’s certainly my mother’s writing.  When did you say these were written?

McAngus:  1460.

Edmund:  The year my brother was born.  Heh, heh!  Baldrick, get in here.

(Baldrick enters the room, he is still dressed as a woman.)

Edmund:  Get out there and tell everyone the rest of the entertainments have been cancelled.

Baldrick:  Why?

Edmund:  Why?  Because I’ve told you to, you snivelling little rat.

Baldrick:  No, why have they been cancelled, my lord?

Edmund:  Oh, I see.  Because I have a very important announcement to make.

Baldrick:  Does that mean I have to take the dress off?

Edmund:  Oh, get out!  Get out!

(Baldrick leaves the room.  Edmund starts to laugh.)

McAngus:  You know, if you played your cards right, you could be king.

Edmund:  Yes, one day.

McAngus:  It might be sooner than you think, last time I saw your father, he’d just charged into Constantinople when they shut the gates on him.

Edmund:  No!

McAngus:  Yes, there were ten thousand of the Turks in there, armed with scimitars.  And your father with a small knife for peeling fruit.

Edmund:  Oh, God!

(Edmund smiles to himself.)

(Scene change - The Banqueting Hall - On the stage is a man shooting chickens.)

Prince Harry:  Jerry Merryweather, another nail in the coffin of variety.

Queen:  I liked Bernard the Rabbit Baiter.

(Suddenly Edmund appears on the stage.)

Edmund:  Thank you, thank you.

Prince Harry:  Is this announcement going to take long, Edmund?  I haven’t seen hide nor hair of a eunuch yet.

(Edmund steps off of the stage and onto the banqueting table, Percy follows him, he is carrying the letters.)

Edmund:  No, don’t worry, Harry. It will soon all be over.  My dear mother, my dear brother, Lords and Ladies of the Court.  Today there came into my possession from the hands, my lord, of your faithful servant Dougal McAngus, certain letters, rather extraordinary letters, concerning the lineage of Prince Harry.

(The Queen looks really embarrassed.)

Queen:  Letters?  What’s so extraordinary about them?

Prince Harry:  Letters?

Edmund:  Well.  They were written, Harry, by your mother, to…your father!

(Some people in the crowd laugh, Prince Harry looks relieved.)

Edmund:  Your father, Harry, being of course Donald, Third Duke of Argyll.

(Harry looks furious.)

Prince Harry:  I beg your pardon?

Edmund:  These letters are of quite an intimate nature.

(Percy hands some of the letters to Edmund.)

Edmund: Let me give you an example…Arundel, Thursday.  ’My dear hairy-wairy.  Often as you sit at the table with my husband probing deeply into the affairs of state, I long for the day when you will probe…

(The Queen suddenly faints, Harry jumps up.)

Prince Harry:  Edmund, are you sure you know what you’re saying?

(Percy gives Edmund another letter.)

Edmund:  As sure as our mother was, Harry, when she wrote these words, ‘Dear Bigboy, sail south.  As you know, your galleon is always assured a warm welcome in my harbour.’

(At the same time as Edmund is reading the letters Percy is mouthing the words behind him.)

Prince Harry:  Bigboy!  Mother, do you know anything about this?

Queen:  What chance did I have?  I was a little foreign girl.

Prince Harry:  Then I must renounce the Regency, and hie me to a monastery.  Edmund, you shall be regent until your father returns.

Edmund:  The king will not be returning.

Prince Harry:  What?

(The Queen does not look worried.)

Queen:  Oh, dear!

Edmund:  No, the last time McAngus saw him he was facing half the Turkish army only with a small piece of cutlery…Percy, if you’d like to start things off.

(Edmund gets off of the table and walks towards the throne. Percy smiles and starts to repeat…)

Percy:  The King is dead!  Long live the king.

Everyone:  The king is dead!  Long live the king.

(As Harry walks out of the room he turns and speaks.)

Prince Harry:  Probably dead.

Percy:  The king is probably dead…

Everyone:  The king is probably dead, long live the king.  The king is probably dead, long live the king.

(Suddenly we hear trumpets and the king bursts through the door, he is covered in blood, but he doesn’t look like he is injured. Percy looks a bit worried so he moves closer to were Edmund is sitting.  The king is holding a spear and looking very menacing.)

 King:  Blood! Death!  War!  Rumpy-pumpy!  Triumph!  McAngus!

(McAngus jumps up and stands next to the king.)

King:  My companion in blood and most trusted friend.

McAngus:  You made it!

King:  Yes!  I made it.  Thanks to my trusty fruit knife.

(The king looks around and sees Edmund sitting on the throne.)

King:  Wait a minute, what’s going on here?  Who are you?

(The king climbs onto the table.)

Queen:  It’s our son.

King:  What?  Oh yes, or course…Enid.

Edmund:  My beloved father, certain letters have just come to light which I think might…change things a bit.

King:  Letters, what letters?

Edmund:  Well, they speak of acts of love between your wife and Donald, the Gay Dog of the Glens,  ‘How I long to be in that kingdom between the saffron sheets where you and your ruler are the only ruler.’…

(The Queen faints.)

Edmund:  …And then acts of love consummated, ‘Oh you enormous Scotsman’  etc…and these letters are dated November and December 1460, which, Harry, in relation to your date of birth is precisely nine months…

(Edmund looks at Harry, he has just realised that his plan has suddenly gone wrong.)

Prince Harry:  …After I was born.

(Edmund looks really shocked and scared now.)

McAngus:  But about nine months before your birth, Edmund.

(Edmund shoots McAngus a filthy look.)

Edmund:  You bastard!

Prince Harry:  No, I think you’re the bastard, Edmund.

King:  Silence!  I will have an explanation.

Edmund:  My liege, the reason I have gathered you all here today is to try to get some proper justice meted out against this Scottish turd who has clearly forged these obviously fake letters.

King:  Let me see them…

(Edmund tears them up.)

Edmund:  I rip them up in his face so no hint of their filthy slander can remain.

(He throws the remainder of the letters into the fire.)

Edmund:  You come in here, fresh from slaughtering a couple of chocos when their backs were turned, and you think you can upset the harmony of a whole kingdom?  I challenge you…to a duel!

(Edmund throws down a gauntlet.)

McAngus:  To the death!

Edmund:  Erm….yes, all right.

King:  Excellent idea, after all it is St Leonard’s Day, there’s meant to be some entertainment.

(He jumps down from the table.)

King:  Take your places!

(Edmund takes out his sword which is thin and light and McAngus takes out his massive broadsword, Edmund looks really scared, the king and McAngus are laughing and the king points to his fruit knife and then at the broadsword.)

King:  Good to see old Glenshee again, McAngus.)

McAngus:  Yes, my lord, remember the night with Glenshee and the Turk and the human kebab!

King:  Yes, how could I forget it.

(Edmund is getting even more scared.)

King:  Very well, let the killing begin!

(Edmund waves his sword around bravely until McAngus takes one swish of his broadsword and breaks Edmunds sword in two.)

McAngus:  Right now, let’s see the Black Adder wriggle out of this one.

(He goes to kills Edmund.)

Edmund:  No, wait!

King:  Come on, what’s the hold up?

Edmund:  I’ll give you everything I own.  Everything.

McAngus:  Uh-huh?

Edmund:  Yes.  I’m hardly a rich man.

King:  You’re hardly a man at all.

Edmund:  But my horse must be worth a thousand ducats.  I can sell my wardrobe, the pride of my life, my swords, my curtains, my socks, and my fighting cocks, my servants I can live without, except perhaps for he who oils my rack.  And then, my most intimate treasures.  My collection  of antique cod-pieces.  My wigs for state occasions, my wigs for private occasions, and my wigs for humorous occasions.  My collection of pokers, my grendle stretchers, my ornamental pomfries.  And, of course, my autographed miniature of Judas Iscariot. 

McAngus:  Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.  No, that’s nowhere near enough.

(He raises his sword to kill him, then stops, he lowers it.)

McAngus:  I’m only kidding.  (He whispers.)  I’m quite interested in the wigs.  I hope life doesn’t get too dull for you, not being able to pass laws over Scotland any more.  Ha, ha!

Edmund:  (Whispers to himself.)  Yes.  Ha ha ha ha.  I wouldn’t pass water over Scotland.

(Scene change - The king is looking out of his window, Harry is in the room with him.)

Prince Harry:  We’re so pleased you’re back, Father.

King:  I’m not.  I miss the smell of blood in my nostrils, and the queen’s got a headache.

Prince Harry:  But we do have a fascinating week ahead.  The Archbishop of York has asked me if you’d care to join his Italian formation dancing class, and I really ought to give him an answer.

King:  Do you want me to be honest or tactful?

Prince Harry:  Oh, tactful, I think.

King:  Tell him to get stuffed!  Has that little hooligan McAngus left?

Prince Harry:  No.  Edmund’s just giving him a last look around the castle.

(Scene change - Top of the castle - Edmund is giving McAngus a tour.)

Edmund:  While this…

(He points to a very large cannon.)

McAngus:  Yes, very interesting.

(He bends over and puts his head inside the cannon.)

(Scene change - The Kings chamber.)

King:  Well I’ll be sorry to see him go.

Prince Harry:  Yes, so will Edmund.  He and McAngus have become quite firm friends.

(Suddenly we hear a large explosion.)

Prince Harry:  What the devil…?

King:  The Turks!

Prince Harry:  The drains!

(Edmunds suddenly enters the room.)

Edmund:  Father, Harry, you must come quickly!  There’s been a rather messy accident!

Prince Harry:  Oh, my God!  I shall need my plunger!

(The king and Harry leave the room in a hurry.  Edmund smiles and leaps excitedly into the air.)

(Theme tune plays.)

== THE BLACK ADDER ==
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