Good afternoon.
Shakespeare, for most our greatest ever playwright whatever fans of Ernie Wise tell you, spent his formative professional years on London's South Bank, and the magnificently restored Globe Theatre stands in tribute to him and his folio of work. "Romeo and Juliet" provided the roots of "West Side Story", a musical tale of gang warfare in New York. "Hamlet" has not led to a west end musical but does boast a play-within-a-play, "The Mousetrap", whose namesake has graced the theatre opposite the Ivy restaurant for over half a decade. Our programme tonight takes a little from both these plays.
Shaquille Maitland-Smith, the 25th young Londoner to be murdered this year may, just may, have been a victim of gang-warfare. For "Jets" and "Sharks" (or Montagues and Capulets for the scholars among you) think E8 'London Fields' and E9 - terrorising parts of the East End. It is thought Shaquille was caught up in this internecine strife though it is, as yet, unclear if he was actually a gang member. However, he is dead. Marcus examines the death, the turf - described by Mare Street, and the role gangs may have played in another tragic loss of life.
We also explore Operation Blunt 2 - the successor to Operation Blunt 1 - which was supposed to mop up knife crime in the capital. I fear a few more Blunts will be required, but we will see.
From Guy Ritchie, we get the play within a play in the sense that we are leading on a real life gangster theme, while Guy's latest offering, the premiere of which we're at tonight, is about gangsters. He either has a fixation or an expertise: I am not sure which, but I did enjoy the first one. Can't quite remember the others: perhaps "Rocknrolla" will be different. Lucy hopes to talk to Guy but we think Mrs Ritchie is still strutting her stuff somewhere else in Europe. Who knows? Kebala permitting, she may waft in...
Mike Ashley is a bit like Falstaff in Henry IV and V - also penned by young Will S - a big, burley, boozy beast of a man, partial to copious libations who made millions from sportswear shops as we clad our little darlings in the ever changing "home, away and 'I fancy that in blue'" strips of our favourite football clubs. In Shakespeare, booze was often a sweet wine known as sack, but for Big Mike it was beer. He says NON-alcoholic, others are less sure. Anyway, he downed a pint of it in one gulp at the Emirates where his beloved Newcastle U, went down to the Glorious Gunners. He actually owns NUFC and may, therefore, have been drowning his sorrows. I'd have thought that would take more than a pint. Anyway, he did it within view of the field of play and that is not on. Glen wipes the bar and calls "time" on the Geordie visitor.
Boris says it is "time" to review the western extension of the Congestion Zone. What will you say and will he listen? Five weeks to find out.
The bears of North America may have a lot to celebrate: first the Governor of Alaska, who loves shooting them, is the Republican candidate for Vice President of the USA and may win, thus having less time to reduce their numbers.
Why a meeting in London, tomorrow, could also be good news for them will be revealed on our show tonight. Good news for bears, bad news for migrating salmon and less-than alert hunters.
Finally, the story of the night: Clues: A home counties town has a bit in common with a city, south of the Mason-Dixon line, celebrated for jazz.
It is very, very dramatic and caused one woman, from the aforementioned home counties town to utter a very nasty anglo-saxon expletive - but she was right.
All, bar the expletive, will be revealed at 6 by Ben - possessor of a cleaner tongue than you will find in most quarters.
Romilly wanted that bit about the expletive being deleted in writing for you all, and The Big Boss agreed. Faye, frisky in jeans that cannot permit circulation and a stunning dark pink top, seemed to enjoy saying the word at our meeting. Romilly blanched, Robin said "what???" and I put it down to youthful exuberance...
She has now found a picture of me, years ago, when I had more hair.
As Shakespeare said in the "Seven Ages" speech: It comes to us all when we are "sans hair, sans teeth, sans everything..." Surely not YET !!!!
See you at 6.
Alastair and Romilly.
