[enjoyment.independent.co.uk] – if you’re going, Dave, book me a ticket:

If Tony Blair needed confirmation that things can only get worse, the imminent defection of Alan B’Stard to New Labour will surely suffice.

When Laurence Marks and Maurice Gran created the monstrous Tory MP for the 1980s television satire The New Statesman, the Conservatives were mired in allegations of sleaze. Now the writers believe that Labour has sunk so low the time is ripe for B’Stard’s return – having switched sides to become Mr Blair’s money-grubbing henchman with responsibilities including prices for peerages.

The actor Rik Mayall will reprise the role of the principle-free politician in a touring stage play, The New Statesman – Episode 2006: The Blair B’Stard Project, which will open next month, 14 years after the original finished its run on television.

[…]

The potential damage to Labour of the revived Alan B’Stard was evidently spotted by Jack Straw, the Foreign Secretary, whose staff cancelled an invitation to Marks and Gran to tea after it emerged what they were working on. And Mr Blair should beware. When Marks and Gran were producing the second series of The New Statesman, the Tories ousted Margaret Thatcher and they were forced to delay filming to re-write the script.

The play opens at the Theatre Royal, Brighton, on 19 April at the start of a four-month 15-venue tour. It is hoped it will then go into the West End of London.