The Sound Of Music - June 1997

There have been many postings saying that ratucs has become depressing of late with all the posts about how poor the show is becoming. But, I prithee, remember back to not that very long ago when the sun always shone, Brian Parks was busy elsewhere and ratucs was a place of bountiful postings full of fun, warmth and humour.

Well, those days are back!

At long last, the Weatherfield Players impressario, Mr Ian Coyle, has another production ready for it's premiere. A real treat I'm sure you'll agree. Ian has asked me not to post his new e-mail address here so if anyone has any comments to make could they follow this thread! Ian 'is' reading!

So now, laideeees and gennermen, put your hands together for your own, your very own........Ian Coyle and his Weatherfield Players!!!!!

 

THE SOUND OF MUSIC by The Weatherfield Players

The performance opens at early morning mass in the chapel of the Weatherfield convent, spiritual home to the Little Sisters of the Poor. The bells of the Angelus give way to the angelic voices of the nuns which combine in a glorious, heavenly crescendo as they praise the Lord in a magnificent chorus of "Alleluia". However, the nuns' beautiful choral arrangement is rudely interrupted by the very late arrival of one of their number who crashes through the doors at the back of the chapel. The click-click of her stilettos on the marble floor echoes throughout the chamber and the nuns' chorus is thrown into confusion by the nasal caterwauling of the noviciate who has entered singing a different composition altogether.

"Sisters, Sisters - never were there such devoted Sisters.......
And Lord help the Sister who comes between me and my man!"

The nuns are horrified. "Oh no, it's Sister Elizabeth McDonald - what DOES she look like!". "She's shortened her habit *again* - seven inches above the knee is just not decent, especially with those fishnet stockings. And just why does a nun need a mobile phone?". The nuns firmly believe that Sister Liz does not belong in an established Order like the Little Sisters of the Poor, or in fact in any convent at all. "She's just not convent-ional" they cry.

The Abbess, Mother Superior Grimes, listens to their comments and groans inwardly. The Order is only voicing what she has already been thinking herself for these last few months - is Sister Liz really suited to life in the cloisters? She decides to hold an emergency meeting to clear the air and to guage the views of her fellow nuns.

Hence, later that day all the nuns (except Sister Liz) are in a large hall discussing their errant noviciate who clearly exasperates all of them. Sister Deirdre is first to speak out, "Well, I think she should be marched out of the Order for dressing like that. Last week, when we were standing on the corner collecting for the local orphans, she was nearly arrested for soliciting. Four cars stopped to ask if she was doing business! I didn't know where to look - but the car drivers certainly did and they definitely weren't admiring her wimple if you see what I mean. It's not good for the convent's image at all - in fact I hear that the locals have started calling us the Little Sisters of the Hoor!". Sister Rita joins in - "I know! What's more I've seen her go into the Flying Horse and sit at the bar downing several very large glasses of liebfraumilch while flirting with the barman. Down there they call her the original 'Blue Nun'!". "That's not all" pipes up Sister Emily. "If I see her do just one more of those aerobic exercise classes in a skimpy leotard I shall scream. Yesterday she shouted 'clench your buttocks' at the top of her voice and Sister Ena fainted".

It is clear that Sister Liz is a problem but how can things be resolved? The nuns express their opinion that it's a situation which is, in fact, insoluble.

Sung to "How do you solve a problem like Maria?"
"How do you solve a problem like McDonald?
How do you make a leopard change its spots?
How do you solve a problem like McDonald?
A horrible floozy who's always got the hots.

Many's the thing you know you'd like to tell her
"Sort out that hair" is one which springs to mind
But how do you make her see
It's really not very PC
For a nun to have skirts halfway up her behind.

Oh how do you solve a problem like McDonald?
How do you say "you're really not our kind"

When I'm with her I'm confused
And I'm totally bemused
It's her accent! - she just doesn't give a damn.
Unpredictable as weather
And she flirts with every fella
She's a demon and she's "mutton dressed as lamb"!

She out-pesters any pest
Drives a hornet from its nest
And I don't think she could be described as "pure"
She'd be happier in vice
(Though she'd have to charge half-price!)
She's a headache!
She's a slapper!
She's a HOOR!

Oh how do you solve a problem like McDonald?
How do you make a tart act more demure?"

"It's no use" thinks Abbess Grimes, "I'm going to have to speak to her on a one-to-one basis and somehow get her out of here before I have a revolution on my hands". She calls Sister Liz into her private study for a heart-to-heart. Abbess Grimes wheels herself round to face Liz, ready to offer her the wisdom of her many years' experience. "Sit down my child. Oh! and please cross your legs my child. Now listen here laydeh, I'm afraid that it looks to me as though you're not suited to life in the convent. It has been suggested that you are having problems with your vows - the vow of chastity in particular. Would you agree?". "Well, yes!" replies Liz, "but no-one at Sunliners mentioned a vow of chastity when they said that this was the perfect spot for a vacation". The Abbess snaps back "They said VOCATION - pillock!! Anyway, it's clear to me that you should leave the convent for a time, to reconsider your life-choices. In fact I have been approached by an ex-Army captain, Jim McDonald, with two children. He is looking for a governess/nanny. I have decided to send you. You start immediately. Oh, and there's one other thing. They live at No11 Coronation Street so you must be prepared for the glare of publicity since they are one of the featured families on Britain's favourite soap opera. I know that this will be a challenge for you but you must make the most of this offer, seize every opportunity, climb every mountain and all that. In fact, if I were you I'd ..."

Sung to "Climb Every Mountain"
"Grab every plotline
Hog every scene
Show a lot of cleavage
Until the viewers scream

Raise every hemline
Tease every curl
Try to fool the public
That you're a younger girl

A dream is a dream and a dream is for keeps
So just dream you're so glam though you'll give them the creeps

Snog every jailbird
Pucker each lip
Run from every henchman
Then hide inside a skip"

"Now, get thee from the nunnery!"

Sister Liz is shocked and suddenly the weight of responsibility falls heavily on her shoulders as she makes her way towards Coronation Street. This is something totally new for her and she doesn't know whether she's up to the job of being a nanny AND a household TV name. As she clip-clops over the cobbles en route to the McDonald's household she wonders whether she can fulfill this task she has been set :-

Sung to "I Have Confidence"
"A captain with two children,
What's so fearsome about that?

Oh I must stop these doubts and these worries
I'm just making it all seem so black
And if I don't grab this nanny plotline
Then they'll bring Kelly whatsername back

Somehow I *WILL* impress them
The Brits and the Canucks too
And those in ratucs, heaven bless them
They will look up to me - La Mouton!

With each step I am more certain
I'll show the Abbess who's the best
I have confidence, they're bound to be impressed
Besides which, you see, I'll be starring on TV!

Besides which, you see, I have con-fi-dence in ME!"

She arrives at No11 and knocks firmly on the door. It is opened by Jim, wearing an old, beer-stained, cut-off Toronto Blue Jays tee shirt. "Oooh nurrrr" comments Liz, "we'll have to do something about that shirt. Don't worry though - I'll run up some new ones for everyone from an old pair of curtains". After a ten minute chat with Jim she realises that this is a family who obviously need help. The father has an aggressive temper, one of the sons is a university dropout and the other one is only out of Strangeways prison for a weekend visit. The family is in the doldrums and she sees it as her task to get them on that long road to recovery. "The Lord has given me a calling and I aim to be his very best call-girl".

That evening, during a frightening thunderstorm, they all crowd into her bedroom wearing the new shirts she has fashioned for them out of the curtains. Unfortunately they only had sheer net curtains available which means that Jim's beer belly and Steve's puny, milky white torso are on full show. Jim, Steve and Andy feel like fools but at least are glad that she didn't make a shirt for herself in the same see-through material which would certainly have got the neighbours talking. Liz finds everything a tad depressing but manages to raise everyone's spirits by filling her head with joyful images of her "favourite things"

Sung to "My Favourite Things"
"Black lycra skirts and a low plunging neckline
Six inch high heels and a bottle of gluwein
Young lusty lads and a dozen stiff gins
These are a few of my favourite things

Ashley's new haircut and lines from Roy Cropper
Gary and Jude when they're acting improper
Meetings with ratucs and sharing a ping
These are a few of my favourite things

Gossip revealed by Fiona and Maxi
Thoughts of Don Brennan submerged in his taxi
Screams in the Street when we heard Hilda sing
These are a few of my favourite things

Cocktails that come with a little umbrella
Getting the eye from a rough looking fella
Watching Bet's earrings as they start to swing
These are a few of my favourite things

Steve when his eyes turn around in their sockets
Beautifully poignant scenes centred on lockets
Wondering when Des will have his next fling
These are a few of my favourite things

The Drear and her neck when it springs into action
Norris and Fred and the Square Dealers faction
Guessing at what the next episode brings
These are a few of my favourite things

When old Dirk dies, just for ratings, when I'm feeling sad
I simply remember my favourite things and then I don't feel so bad."

"Now then, we must get to bed because tomorrow is the evening when Jim's army friends are coming round. He doesn't entertain often so we must make an extra special effort to impress."

The next evening Jim's drinks party is in full swing. Sister Liz had been hoping for a high-class affair with lots of elegant, sophisticated couples in evening dress drinking Pimms. She is sorely disappointed to discover that the partygoers are a boozy crowd of foul-mouthed squaddie lager louts. "Oh nurr, Steve and Andy's little puppet show will probably go down like a lead balloon with this lot".

She tactfully decides against passing round the Ferrero Rocher pyramid on a silver platter and throws around some packets of beer nuts instead. The "guests" move into the front room singing raunchy rugby songs - they are told that the "entertainment" will be presented there. Of course Jim's "muckers" are expecting a striptease act and are surprised to see a homemade theatre set up, all ready for a puppet show given by the McDonald twins.

Liz acts quickly. She warns Steve and Andy "Boys, believe me, that crowd in there are not going to be interested in the Lonely Goatherd! You'll somehow have to make it a raunchier story - put some sex in it or they'll probably start throwing glasses around". The twins do their best to accomodate her request by featuring the most confusing sex life on the street.

Their rapidly revised show begins :-

"Gentlemen, the Ballad of Curly Watts"

Sung to "The Lonely Goatherd"
"Curly Watts is a lonely net nerd
Lay-ee o-dl, lay-ee o-dl, lay-ee-oo
From his Raquel he has simply not heard
Lay-ee o-dl, lay-ee o-dle-oo
Maureen was first to get under his bedspread
Lay-ee o-dl, lay-ee o-dl, lay-ee-oo
"It was the wine" - at least that's what she said
Lay-ee o-dl, lay-ee o-dle-oo

Anne Malone was his next distraction
Lay-ee o-dl, lay-ee o-dl, lay-ee-oo
She confessed to a deep attraction
Lay-ee o-dl, lay-ee o-dle-oo
But in the tent she got no satisfaction
Lay-ee o-dl, lay-ee o-dl, lay-ee-oo
Cruel revenge was the girl's reaction
Lay-ee o-dl, lay-ee o-dle-oo

Next on the scene for some rumpeh-pumpeh
Lay-ee o-dl, lay-ee o-dl, lay-ee-oo
Drunken Maxine with her front so lumpy
Lay-ee o-dl, lay-ee o-dle-oo
But the next day she was oh so grumpy
Lay-ee o-dl, lay-ee o-dl, lay-ee-oo
She had regrets and she blamed the scrumpy
Lay-ee o-dl, lay-ee o-dle-oo"

The crowd of Jim's friends starts boo-ing (instead of o-dle oo-ing!) so Jim, the twins and Sister Liz decide that the best course of action is to make a very quick getaway and bid a hasty goodbye :-

"So long, farewell, auf weidershein, adieu,
Cos back at Strangeways Steve is overdue".

Jim's friends take the hint, they leave the party and head for The Rovers. Everyone staggers down the road except Jim's oldest and best army buddy, Fraser Henderson, who stays behind to clear out the dregs of the beer cans. Things take a nasty turn just at that point because he suddenly remembers where he recognises Sister Liz from - it appears that Fraser and Liz slept together about twenty years ago, before she became a nun. He is drunk and starts to make lewd remarks about the past, when she was his "gangster's moll". After a short while he gets abusive and aggressive and starts pawing at her. She is both frightened and disgusted by his behaviour and has to take desperate measures to escape from him. She quickly slips off one of her stilettos and fiercely digs the long heel into the back of his head. "Back at the convent that's what we call a good spiritual heeling" she explains.

"Oh my God Liz! What have you done?" shouts Jim. "We'll have to escape Weatherfield now before his criminal mates come back and find him. They'll be after our blood. We'll have to think of a cunning escape plan".

Liz is at her most inventive. "I've got it!" she says. "Why don't we enter the Eurovision Song Contest as a singing family. It's being held in Weatherfield Community Centre this year 'cos the Irish got fed up hosting it. I'll just let my hair down and do one of my aerobics routines - you three can be my backing singers. Then when the judging is going on we can slip out the back door unnoticed and escape to freedom".

They decide that it's their only hope.

The big night comes and they are standing backstage. Sister Liz has her long red hair all frizzed out and is wearing a silvery mini-dress. The compere (Ken Barlow was the only person they could find who spoke French!) makes his announcement :-

"And now Ladies and Gentlemen, Mesdames et Messieurs, the United Kingdom entry, Gina G McD singing "Ooh ahh just a little bit, ooh ahh a little bit more"...

"Oh nurr, it's been changed" shouts Liz from the wings.

She has decided that Europop disco fever will not go down well with the international juries so she opts to sing a melodic song of hope with a message for us all. She steps forward - "I have become a major TV star/fitness guru after having led a brief life of crime in my past. I managed to break away from the evil clutches of petty criminals and I offer the following advice to any budding actress nuns/hoors out there who hope to do the same. It's the secret of my success...."

Sung to "Edelweiss"
"A life of vice
Wasn't nice
It was villains who paid yer

Twasn't fun
With Henderson
Mad "Fraser the Razor"

I shall stay far from that Hoorglass bar
To be a star forever

My advice
Is concise
Just sleep with your new director"

In the ensuing confusion over the voting, the McDonalds slip out the back door as the final figures are being announced.

"United Kingdom, nil points" rings in their ears as Liz calls Weatherfield Cabs on her mobile phone and within two minutes they climb into the back of a taxi driven by Don Brennan.

"Everyone onboard? Right then, Weatherfield Quays is it?" says Don, cheerily.

"Nurr, take us to the convent of the Little Sisters of the Poor"

"What?! But my contract with Granada says that I get a big finish and some very dramatic scenes in Weatherfield Quays"

"Well, that must be your next fare - this one's a family's flight to safety in the convent"

"But what about the big suicide drowning scene I was promised!"

"Oh, shurrrup Don! Think about someone else for a change. This is *MY* storyline - yours will just have to wait. Take us to the convent NOW"

Don is furious. He feels that he has been victimised by the writers and the production staff. He blames everyone else for all his troubles. Not only does he appear to have lost out on his big "sinking car" scene but now he has to drive to the convent which is miles out of his way! He gets angrier and angrier. His face turns red with sheer fury and he starts swearing and shouting incoherently. "No-one cares about ME! It's all that Baldwin's fault - you're all the same - the lot of you!!"

The McDonalds crouch in the back, terrified that Don will do something crazy. He has totally lost his head and his driving becomes reckless, careless and positively dangerous. He speeds alarmingly, runs through red lights and screeches round hairpin bends at 80 mph. Liz screams at several points and the whole family heave a collective sigh of relief when he finally does a tyre-burning handbrake turn to stop outside the convent doors. He is still seething with pent-up rage and is thumping the steering wheel with his forehead.

"Thanks Don, keep the change and drive carefully now" shouts Liz as they scramble over one another in their attempts to leave the madman's taxi as quickly as possible.

"Thank God that's over" says Jim, "What a wild ride. That man's a maniac. I thought for one minute we were all goners, so I did. I reckon we're all lucky to get out of that cab alive".

Liz agrees in a song :-

Sung to "The Hills are Alive with the Sound of Music"
"It's brill we're alive, cos that Brennan's manic
Did you see the way he crashed through the gears?

I have to admit I feel kind of carsick
I haven't felt this unwell for years.

I wanted to scream when he raced like young Damon Hill in his first Grand Prix
My tum was in knots when he braked so hard I thought I'd pee!
I thought I'd be sick when he bumped and stalled over stones on his way
When he spun the car I thanked God the nuns taught me to pray

And poor Alma's next, I'll bet she gets seasick
I hear that they go for a swim in the quays
And Don will be left with a soggy dipstick
And he'll drive no more"

"Anyway, that's someone else's problem now. We're safe at last". Now that their ordeal is over Jim realises that he has fallen in love with spunky Sister Liz and in a fit of spontaneity he proposes marriage, a proposal which she is happy to accept. "I'll let the Abbess know that I'm leaving the Sisterhood, or 'kicking the habit' as we call it".

The McDonalds all hold hands forming a long chain and run uphill to the top of the red rec singing their hearts out. Liz is happier than she has ever been before and bursts into song..

"Everything's coming up roses,
Everything's coming up Cadbury's Roses..."

before realising that she has mistakenly stumbled into the wrong musical. The Little Sisters of the Poor had a grand party to celebrate Liz's departure and were last seen in the exercise video section of Woolworth's in Manchester drawing a moustache and devil's horns on a large cardboard cutout of Beverley Callard and laughing maniacally.

THE END

A selection of recent reviews for The Players' Sound of Music
The Weatherfield Players have hit rock bottom (and have started to dig) Northern Theatre magazine
The songs are very hard to forget - but we're trying Musicals Today magazine
It's rubbish - the Spice Girls aren't in it Just 17 magazine
It sounded very familiar - Rodger S. Hammerstein
It will run and run (and so should Liz McDonald) - Fraser Henderson
The lead role should have been mine! - spokeswoman for BRW productions


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