England People Very Nice

Richard Bean

• Publisher: Oberon Books
• Year: 2012
• Print ISBN: 9781840029000
• eBook ISBN: 9781849431736
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: British Drama
• Index: Literature

'Fucking Frogs! My grandfather didn't die in the English Civil War so's half the population of France could come over here and live off the soup!' A riotous journey through four waves of immigration from the 17th century to today. As the French Huguenots, the Irish, the Jews and the Bangladeshis in turn enter the chaotic world of Bethnal Green, each new influx provokes a surge of violent protest over housing, jobs, religion and culture. And the emerging pattern shows that white flight and anxiety over integration is anything but new. Written with scurrilous bravura, Richard Bean's great sweep of a comedy follows a pair of star-crossed lovers amid cutters'mobs, Papists, Jewish anarchists and radical Islamists across four tempestuous centuries. England People Very Nice enjoyed a sell-out run at the National Theatre.

Act Four

Summer 1941. The Blitz. An air raid siren. A Bethnal Green street, the Britannia Pub as was. The street of Victorian workers’ houses is now overlooked by the Rothschild Buildings. All buildings are blacked out for night and war. In a doorway, Mohammad Sona Rasul aka MISTER MUSHI, beside him a large cooking pot full of clothes, etc. MUSHI is the boy lover. Two wet Bangladeshis run on chased by a policeman, they go off. Enter two STRETCHER BEARERS. They discover a body in a doorway. They are joined by a POLICE CONSTABLE.

CONSTABLE: Indian Lascar. Merchant navy. Stoker? Donkey wallah? Who knows?

STRETCHER BEARER 1: Who cares? He’s dead.

CONSTABLE: He’ll have jumped ship at Tilbury. They swim the dock.

STRETCHER BEARER 2: Criminal then, ain’t he.

CONSTABLE: As a citizen of British India, he has the legal right to come ashore. So come on lads, show some compassion, he’s a human soul, and some mother’s son.

STRETCHER BEARER 1: You alright officer?

CONSTABLE: I’ve been on a course.

MUSHI is loaded onto the stretcher. He sneezes/coughs.

STRETCHER 2: That’s all we need.

STRETCHER 1: Oi Mush! Hop it!

MUSHI is tipped off the stretcher and the bearers move off to find a corpse.

MUSHI: (Giving CONSTABLE a bit of cardboard.) Uncle friend! Big man barriwallah!

CONSTABLE: (Reading.) This address is Aldgate.

MUSHI: England people very nice!

CONSTABLE: There’s good and bad in all. Come on Mush! This way.

They walk off. In the pub. IDA, LAURIE, and RENNIE. BENNY and HUGO sat away from them.

IDA: Fucking Yanks! Where are they? I’ll betcha they swagger up when it’s nearly over, pick up all the dead men’s hats, and make an ’ollywood film about how John Wayne won the fucking war on his whatsaname.

RENNIE: Horse?

IDA: Na!

LAURIE: Tod.

Enter HARVEY KLEINMAN in the uniform of a volunteer ARP warden. He is IDA’s husband.

HARVEY: Ida, get your blackouts sorted will yer.

IDA: You might be my husband Harvey Kleinman, but I’m at work, you don’t fucking tell me what to do, not in here, alright!

LAURIE: Ida, get your blackouts sorted will yer.

IDA complies. RENNIE laughs.

RENNIE: See Solomon’s shop took a hit Harvey!?

HARVEY: Yeah, they’re all dead, yeah, tragic.

HARVEY joins BENNY and HUGO.

D’yer get anyfin outa Solomon’s place?

BENNY: Cutlery. Silver boxed sets. Hugo flogged ’em up West.

HUGO: Here you go Mr Kleinman…

HUGO empties his pockets of a bundle of notes. HARVEY takes the money and pockets it.

HARVEY: Now gimme the rest of the money, or that’s the last you’ll see of my daughter.

HUGO produces a five pound note, which HARVEY takes. In MASTER ATTAR’s house. Night time. ATTAR is a middle-aged Bangladeshi, dressed like Noël Coward. ATTAR is writing in a big ledger.

MUSHI: Why do you want all the lascar names Sahib Master Attar?

ATTAR: Merchant navy captains do not know the names of our people. It’s only port serangs in Calcutta, and me, know the names. Serangs are all bastards, so when a ship is torpedoed the Indian Embassy talk to me. I am the only man who can tell a father whether his son is alive or dead.

MUSHI: Abdul Quereshi, coala wallah; Ashraf Miah, agwallah; that’s it. Except, young boy, Taz, don’t know family name, sorry, sahib.

ATTAR: Don’t call me sahib, I’m a socialist. SS Clan Macarthur. Thirty one lascars, and little Taz. (He closes the book.) Is your room to your liking?

MUSHI: Oh yes. Very nice. But you said I had to share the bed?

ATTAR: Don’t worry, he’s not English. Hasmat Miah, he works nights boiler room Savoy Hotel. I think you have attractive personality. I want you to run my chocolate raffle. Easy money for the right man.

MUSHI: Easier than renting beds?

ATTAR: That’s it! Personality! The English love a joke! You buy a chocolate bar from me for a ha’penny –

MUSHI: – buy from you, the socialist!?

ATTAR: That’s enough personality. Sell seven tickets at a penny each. Easy money. But first you must think of a new name. Clan Line give ten pounds for information about lascars who have swum the dock.

MUSHI: I come England one reason. Father say must find half Christian, half Jewish g...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title page
• Copyright page
• Epigraph page
• Characters
• Contents
• Prologue
• Act One
• Act Two
• Act Three
• Act Four (Prologue)
• Act Four
• Act Four (Epilogue)