BROOKSIDE PRODUCER DEBUTS CD SINGLE
As part of a concerted effort to raise Brookside’s profile and, indeed, its viewing ratings, the double-sided CD single from the forthcoming LP of Brookside actors covering established hits, will be released this week. In the last episode summary, I revealed the content of the B-side, featuring The Scouse Girls covering their version of the Spice Girls’ If You Wanna Be My Lover, re-titled If You Wanna Be in Brookside.
Now I’ve obtained a sneak preview of Phil Redmond’s singing debut. Ever the secret lounge-room lizard, Redmond chose the old standard ‘Mr Sandman’ on which to base his rendition of ‘Mr Thompson’. He even has a backing trio of Alex Fletcher, Suzanne Collins and Diane Burke.
The video opens in the health club, by the side of the pool. Suddenly, a spotlight forms on three sequin-attired pool maidens, Fletcher, Collins and Burke, who begin to warble:
FCB: Eerm, eeem, ehhm, eerm, eem, ehhm, eerm, eeem, ehhm, eerm, eeem, ehhm, EEEEEM ...
FCB (In three-part harmony, reminiscent of The Andrews Sisters)
Mr Thompson ....
Give oos soom hope
We coom from Brookside
That mooch-maligned soap
We’re not a girl group
From Top of the Pops
Fletcher: We’re joost afraid yer’ll
Give the show the chop!
FCB: Mr Thompson
We’ve brought our boss
His name is Redmond
He knows all the goss
And so without further adieux
WE SHALL HAND PHIL REDMOND TER YEEEEEEW!!!!
Eerm, eeem, ehhm, eerm, eem, ehhm, eerm, eeem, ehhm, eerm, eeem, ehhm, EEEEEM ...
(Redmond enters wearing a silver lame lounge suit and carrying a microphone)
Redmond: Mr Thompson
Lend me your ear
I’ve produced Brookside
For near twenty years
It used to win all
Awards and some prizes
But now the girls are hired
For boob sizes!
Hey, Mr Thompson!
That’s gonna change
I’ll weed out talent
Like Cruffts weed out mange
I’ll make improvements
I’ll make’em with style
How ‘bout I sack Ben Hull
For Noah Wyle?
(FCB in the background beging to ‘ooh’ and ‘aah’. Redmond turns and asides: ‘Well, Wyle works for Channel 4 too, AND ‘e plays a bloody good doctor’).
Redmond: Mr Thompson
I’ve a new plot
It’s about Jimmy,
But it’s really hot.
His mental illness
Gets hazy and hazier
Until one day he has to
Consult Frasier!
(Aside again: Hey, we could get Jane Leeves ter visit Liverpool as Daphne Moon, yer know!)
Redmond: Mr Thompson,
Hey, listen to me
There’ll be a takeover
Down at Bar Brookie
There’ll be a new owner
And that isn’t all
The owner will be played
By Kim Cattrall!
(Aside again: A little bit o’ REAL Sex and the City, yer know. AND she’s a Scouser!)
Redmond: Hey, Mr Thompson
Listen ter this!
I know yer thinkin’
I’m takin’ the piss
I’m givin’ Lance the
Keys to a new place
His new boyfriend is Jack
From Will and Grace!
(Aside again: Whaddya think about that one, eh, Markie, baby? Stroke o’genius, stroke o’genius!)
Redmond: And Mr Thompson
Isn’t it GRRRE-A-T?
We’ll have a visit
From a Head of State
It’ll be the biggest and best
Brookie scene
When Air Force One descends
With Martin Sheen!
(Aside: Hey, and all them Brookside babes could take terrrrns snoggin’ that Rob Lowe, yer know!)
Redmond: Mr Thompson
Hey, I’ve pulled a coup
Those pricks at ‘Enders
Got nuttin’ on you
Pa Gordon’s cousin
Will be Grange Hill’s Tucker
Escaped from all those East End
Motherfuckers!
(Aside: And hey, wouldn’t he go great with RBev now?)
Redmond: So Mr Thompson
All that I ask
Is that yer say that
We’re oop ter the task
I’ll snag soom guest stars
Gandolfini and Winstone
I’ll even have Max Farnham
Meet Fred Flinstone!
Mr Thompson
Give me a break
I’ve got an big
Reputation at stake
This is my vision tried and true
This is Brookside 2002!
FCB: Eerm, eeem, ehhm, eerm, eem, ehhm, eerm, eeem, ehhm, eerm, eeem, ehhm, EEEEEM ...
(Repeat and fade ...)
At all good music stores from tomorrow, folks! Coxyboro’s first in line, I’ll wager ...
Another morning at Sitcom House. Brigid sits, dressed in a fluffy white Jackie Corkhill original bathrobe in the easy chair in the sitcom lounge, as little Lord Antichrist serves her a hot cup of tea.
At Bicker-Bicker House, Pa Gordon surveys with disdain his youngest son lying in bed. The other bed, which should be inhabited by Ali the Ginger, is empty.
Meanwhile, at Hotel Corkhill, the proprietor is seen smugly entering the extension with a breakfast tray for the newest (and fattest) guest - talk about fattening up a pig!
Mike Dixon and Rachel have begun the day by waiting for the post, which has just arrived. Mike grabs the bundle of post from Rachel’s witless grasp and thumbs through it. Noothink! He mutters with disdain.
Oooh, remarks Rachel, rifling through the lot again, but at least ‘tweren’t no bills!’
Mike’s face and mouth turn down in an ugly snarl of jealousy. That Medical Centre must think he’s really stupid, he remarks. (I’d say they weren’t wrong).
Pa Gordon nabs his youngest son and asks him the whereabouts of Ali the Ginger. The Brookside Bike replies shortly that Ali is staying at the house of his unfortunate, hare-lipped friend Tommo - ostensibly helping Tommo with his diction. Perhaps Ali should consider a career as a speech therapist?
Dire Muddie stands gazing lovingly down at her old mum, Brigid, who’s clearly enjoying being fussed over in the Muddie household. Dire bellows, asking her mum IF SHE’S SURE SHE’S ALL RIGHT.
Oh, yes, assures Brigid. But she had a lucky escape. Stroking Antony’s arm fondly, she calls him her little hero.
Back at the hygenically-challenged Bicker-Bicker House kitchen, Bitch Gordon sits behind her tits at the breakfast table, her feet, shod in Dr Martens’ boots, atop the breakfast table, as she munches a piece of toast. She calls out to her scurrying, snivelling mother that she sneaked a look into their old house the other day, when she went to her mate Ellie’s to retrieve her car. The new people have only started decorating, she says.
Ma Gordon stops in her endless trek back and forth around the kitchen to whisper sharply in Bitch’s ears that she doesn’t want to know what those people are doing to HER house. (Oh, still own it, do they?) Besides, she continues, isn’t Bitch going to be late for her job at the call centre?
Bitch gobs a huge bit of toast, dribbling crumbs down her cleavage, as thousands of wanking teenage boys and coxyboro and the 22 year-old ‘journalist’ who’s turned up on the Official Forum, reach orgasm. No, she’s not late, she mouths, incoherently. She’s not due in until the afternoon.
Good, quips Ma, then Bitch can give her old ma a lift to the garage in Bitch’s car.
Bitch begins the mother of all whines through her toast-filled mouth, in a bad imitation of Harry Enfield doing Kevin:
‘OHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! WHYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY?’
Because Bitch has blocked her mother’s car in, Ma Gordon replies, smugly. (Er, sorry, but why should this incredibly lazy woman drive to work, when it’s only a five-minute walk?)
At that moment, Pa Gordon enters, nagging The Brookside Bike about doing homework, and a unintelligible bickerfest begins in earnest.
Bicker bicker bicker ... Bicker bicker bicker ... SHOUT SHOUT ... SHOUT SHOUT ...
Amidst all Ali returns from lying low at Tommo’s. Just as well, he lisps. (Am I the only one who notices that Pa Gordon has a lisp? I bet he’s a London luvvie in disguise!) He wants no repeat of that business from the other night, he vows and begins to leave for work.
Ma suddenly reminds him that she managed to find the secret horde of cigarettes he had stashed in his toolbox. She got rid of them, she said.
(Oh, this ‘stop smoking’ storyline is just SO riveting and SO informative too. NOT!)
Mike Dixon is now nervously pacing back and forth at Number 7, high on a rant about the medical complaint about Gary Parr. Mike’s waiting for the official finding to arrive from the medical tribunal, but it hasn’t come yet. This is all part of their strategy, he says to Rachel, breathing rapidly and pacing back and forth. They want to make this thing long and drawn out.
Ron enters the lounge from the kitchen area, announcing, satisfactorily, that he’s already got one lot on to wash. Oh, and by the way, had Mike and Rachel managed to come across that missing box of Ron’s? He asks. Only, he’s worried about its disappearance, he adds, laughing nervously. That box held half his life’s mementos as well as some very personal items.
As Ron’s talking, Mike has grabbed the phone in the background and is speaking to someone. Ron clocks his son’s intense conversation and quips to Rachel that he gathers Mike’s not on the phone to anyone about a job.
Rachel wrinkles her forehead, blinks about ten times and shakes her head, as Mike finishes the conversation.
‘There’s only been a mix-oop in the post!’ Mike announces, scathingly.
Rachel implores Mike to stop carrying on so.
Mike continues, unabated. ‘Dat Katie Rogers! I’ll bet she did it on perrr-pose! She only sent the lot ter next door! Says we never OFFICIALLY told the serr-gery that we was movin’!’
Rachel wrinkles her forehead some more, blinks and shakes her head, moving her mouth in a way that makes her look like Janice Battersby from Coronation Street. She tells Ron that she does wish M-eye-ke would stop this going on and on about Dr Parr.
He will, promises Ron, grimly, when he’s got it out of his system.
Meanwhile, back at Sitcom House, Brigid is regaling Dire and Antony, yet again, with the events surrounding her mugging and her rescue by Antony. Why, it was only because Antony go to them that they didn’t do any damage. God only knows what they would have done if she’d been on her own.
Dire is of the opinion that the act should be reported to the police. Did Ant happen to get a good look at them? She asks him.
Antony squirms and shits his pants. He didn’t, he protests.
Besides, scoffs Brigid, nothing was taken. And Antony’s OK, but he was certainly shaking after those lads ran off, she adds.
IT’S STILL AN ATTEMPTED MOOGING! Bellows Dire. THEY SHOULD GO TER THE POLICE STATION AND REPORT IT.
But the police won’t catch them, reasons Brigid. Why, the papers are full of this sort of thing, daily - people thumbing their noses at authority. It won’t make a blind bit of difference, she continues. Things weren’t as they were in HER day, when the local bobby could give a yob a clip around the ear. Nowadays, that meant assault!
WELL, growls Big Dire, SHE STILL THINKS A TRIP TO THE COPSHOP’S A NECESSITY.
Antony’s face assumes a look of panic. He doesn’t want to go to the police, he whines. And besides, footie’s first period today. (Er, this is Antony, who DOESN’T like football).
Big Dire’s on a roll now and won’t be deterred. OOOH, MAYBE THE POLICE’LL GIVE ANTONY A COMMENDATION OR SOOMTHINK!
Antony whines again that he doesn’t want to go to the police. He just hates bullies.
Tim wanders downstairs, looking for Jimmy. Calling out for him, he opens the door to the extension, only to discover Happy Smiling Roly-Poly Helen ensconced in Jimmy’s bed. Jimmy appears as Tim beats a hasty retreat and Jim starts to berate him for wandering about the house in the buff.
Tim apologises, but asks where Jimmy was.
In the bog, Jimmy replies, charmingly. NOT.
Tim can’t wait to know and asks Jimmy how the sex was.
Jimmy tries to sound tactful in saying that it was a meaningful, pleasurable experience, but ends up by saying that it was BOSS. This is supposed to be charming and endearing. It’s overbearing and witless, and the sooner Dean Sullivan is axed, the better.
The two share a laugh before Happy Smiling Helen bobs and bounces into the kitchen, wearing yet another Jackie Corkhill original bathrobe.
Tim apologises yet again, and Jimmy promises for him that the lad will be a lot more careful the next time, admonishing him to get his clobber on.
As Tim leaves, he does the old footie-commentary line: ‘Jimmy Corkhill ... He shoots ... He SCORES!’
Bitch Gordon sits with her tits and her brothers on the sofa filling their common, ignorant and shallow faces with a diet of daytime television. For his sins, Ali the Ginger has to do the breakfast dishes, but purports not to understand why he has to do them.
The Brookside Bike says he has to do them for going AWOL.
(There was no reason for this scene.)
Mike and Rachel are leaving Number 7 en route to Jacqui’s. Rachel is taking Beth, to begin her day’s work babysitting for Jacqui, and Mike is on a mission for his letter. Mike is still moaning about the mix-up.
Tim now takes his leave of Jimmy and Happy Smiling Helen, leaving them the place to themselves for the rest of the day.
Mike and Rachel find Jacqui putting a wash on in her new kitchen. Mike comes straight to the point and asks his sister if any post arrived addressed to him yesterday.
Yes, Jacqui confirms, loading the washing machine, there was something addressed to Mike. What was he expecting?
‘Joost confirmation about the findings about me coomplaint against yer mate, Gary,’ sneers Mike, as Jacqui retrieves the letter. Mike opens it and reads, an ugly look of disgust crossing his features. Just as he thought. No reason for complaint. No misdiagnosis! It was a stitch-up all along, and they took him for a ride. Well, he laughs, grimly, they wouldn’t be so keen ter back their mate, Dr Parr, when they find out he’s a man who goes about taking a pop at all and sundry.
Jacqui blinks in disbelief at what Mike’s just said and glances between her brother and sister-in-law, arms akimbo holding dirty laundry. And just where did Mike here that? She demands.
Rachel blinks too - hard and several times, widening her eyes and wrinkling her forehead. Oooh, she replies. She were the one what tole M-eye-ke bowt Dr Paaaaaah hittin’ soomone.
Now Jacqui’s really narked. ‘Oh,’ she begins accusingly, turning to a shit-scared Rachel, ‘and just where exactly did YOU hear this?’
Rachel, who has no brain and is therefore incapable of lying, admits that she overheard Jacqui and Katie talking about the incident in the surgery.
This is well out of order, Jacqui informs a sneering, smug Mike. If he goes bandying that piece of gossip about, then Gary will hear it and know its source, and as for Rachel, she turns to the jibbering wreck who’s straining to hold her legs together in an effort not to defecate from fright, Rachel has no right to eavesdrop on other people’s conversations!
Tim, who was supposedly leaving Hotel Corkhill, but who hasn’t managed to leave yet, stands in the upstairs corridor bantering with Dr Nikki at the door to Dr Nikki’s room. He informs her that Happy Smiling Helen stayed over the previous night, and - as a result - received the full pleasure of Jimmy’s extension. (Yuch!)
Tim should talk, Nikki scoffs. The walls in Hotel Corkhill were, indeed, thin walls. She’d had about enough of listening to Tim’s and Emily’s nocturnal sexploits.
Tim teases Nikki by calling her ‘Lady’, Jerome’s pet name for her, although I must say, I would have credited Jerome with more imagination - something like ‘Sugar Britches’ or the like. ‘Lady’ reminds me of a bitch on heat.
Tim suggests that everyone upstairs should syncrhonise their watches for pleasure. Nikki asks him what he would do for the next 58 minutes or so, after achieving orgasm. (This is such GREAT conversation for a family audience).
Big Dire has bullied everyone into going to the police station and now they stand at an unattended desk, waiting for a policeman to appear and take their details. As they wait and wait, Brigid notices a flyer on the wall with a picture of Imelda Clough.
Hmph! She remarks. Someone will have a long wait for her to come home, in response to Dire’s moanings about their long wait to report a crime. Brigid motions to the picture again. That IS a picture of the girl who was bullying Antony at his school? She asks the boy.
That WAS a picture of her, Antony quips.
WAS? Repeats Brigid. That makes it sound as though Imelda were dead.
Jacqui is concerning herself with a leaking washing machine, whilst Mike and Rachel discuss the contents of the letter that Mike’s received. Mike tells Rachel, explaining to her in words of one syllable or less, that the tribunal found that there was no case for which to answer in the question of Dr Parr’s negligence.
Too right, calls Jacqui from the kitchen, with finality. In her opinon, Gary Parr is a good doctor. Mike makes this whole shoddy ordeal sound like a cheap conspiracy.
That’s exactly what it is, affirms Mike, belligerantly. Everything was all geared oop against it and him.
The doorbell rings and Rachel answers it. It’s Lance. He explains to Jacqui that Max was in a meeting and realised that some papers he needed were at home. He sent Lance to fetch them. But suddenly Lance notices Jacqui’s leaking machine. He offers to help Jacqui, whilst Rachel volunteers to look out the papers.
As Rachel wanders off and Lance attends to the washing machine, Jacqui continues her argument with Mike. Look, she explains, Gary Parr made a mistake by punching a man who was harassing his wife. Surely, Mike would have done the same if someone had been hounding Rachel like that.
Mike accuses Jacqui of never knowint what it was like to look at her child and have a doctor take that child away. Mike starts the old hearts- and- flowers- on the fiddle routine of telling her how he actually went to the hospital chapel when Beth was ill and prayed, even though he doesn’t believe in all that tosh.
But it’s not Mike Dixon, but Gary Parr, Mike’s trying to destroy, remarks Jacqui, seriously. Trying to destroy someone else’s life wouldn’t make Mike’s life any better, she adds.
Meanwhile, outside Ron Dixon is taking a stroll across the Close when he’s hit in the gob by a football kicked deliberately at him by the Brookside Bike. Ron grabs the football and marches up to the cocky lad, who’s such living evidence that Ma and Pa Gordon are pure white trash who know nothing about bringing up kids. Ron tells the Brookside Bike that he knows full well that the football was kicked at him on purpose, with the intent on hitting him.
All the stupid, little prick can do is demand that Ron ‘gizzit’.
Ron refuses, holding onto the ball. In his opinion, Ron says, the Brookside Bike should be grounded for doing that to someone in the neighbourhood he barely knows. Why, Ron is of a good mind to have a word with Pa Gordon. If the Brookside Bike were one of his kids, Ron continues, he’d shove that bleeding ball down his throat.
Suddenly, the Brookside Bike recognises Ron, remarking that Ron looks oddly familiar. He scoots off, with Ron calling him a no-mark. Riveting scene.
The Brookside Bike enters Bicker-Bicker House, to find his lazy sister and her tits sitting on the sofa with Ali the Ginger participating in the family pastime.
Bicker bicker bicker ... Bicker bicker bicker ... SHOUT SHOUT ... SHOUT SHOUT
Ali the Ginger is refusing to go to the ubiquitous JobCentre, which seems to be the only place in Liverpool which advertises jobs. Scousers have obviously never heard of employment agencies. As Ali the Ginger rises from the couch, the Brookside Bike enters proclaiming himself a power star.
He’s followed by Pa Gordon, who’s clearly annoyed to see Ali the Ginger swanning around jobless, so he shoves the lad roughly against the wall, proving in more ways than one that he’s really a Mitchell with a lisp who couldn’t make it in the East End, ‘suggesting’ that Ali the Ginger go to the JobCentre the following day and reiterating that he wants no more repeats of Ali’s visit to the copshop. Is that understood?
Ali the Ginger, his throat in the hands of his father, gives a bulging-eyed nod and is released.
Later on, Rachel is tidying Jacqui’s house, the oh-so-silent children playing quietly, as Madame Farnham is busying herself to go out. She stands and watches Rachel intently for a moment, as it’s obvious that there’s something on Jacqui’s mind which she wants to discuss. She clears her throat awkwardly and begins.
Eeem, she knows that Rachel’s family, but she also points out that Rachel DOES work for Jacqui and Max.
Rachel looks up from the floor, where she’s bending down, tidying something up.
Rachel works for Jacqui and Max, Jacqui reiterates, and as such, anything private that Rachel hears Jacqui and/or Max discussing either here or elsewhere is NOT to be repeated to anyone.
Rachel blinks her eyes about five times in an effort to comprehend what Jacqui has said, wrinkles her forehead, shakes her head and claims that she only told M-eye-ke bowt what she heard Jac-keh’n Ka-teh say.
All the more reason she shouldn’t repeat what she hears, Jacqui snaps. Especially since Mike wants to listen to that sort of gossip and get himself more and more wound up about nothing. In her opinion, Jacqui states, it’s more important that Mike concentrate on getting himself a job in order to support his family.
Rachel gets to her feet, blinking furiously and smiling ingratiatingly at Jacqui. If she’d been a cat, she would have rubbed against Jacqui’s legs and purred. ‘Ack’shleh.’ Begins Rachel, hopefully, ‘I wuz goin’ ter ask yer bowt that ...’
Jacqui anticipates what Rachel’s about to say and cuts her short. If it’s about a job for Mike, Rachel can forget it, Jacqui says, shaking her head. She’s already been down that route with Bev, suggesting a job for Mike in the bar. In reality, there weren’t any jobs available in the bar, and if there were, she wouldn’t be keen to hire Mike. She’s come to the conclusion that business and family don’t mix.
Oooh, observes Rachel, boot she were fam-leh.
Yes, agrees Jacqui, but Jacqui could rely on Rachel, and she couldn’t rely on Mike for anything. As a matter of fact, she continues, Mike would be better off updating his skills than going around picking fights with Gary Parr. She knows too well what Mike’s like. He’s got university qualifications and thinks the world ought to be knocking on his door with job offers. Look at her. She’s got no qualifications and look what she’s got through graft.
Sorry, she finishes, but Mike’s on his own on this one.
Now we see the worst scene of the night, with the Brookside Bike seated at the Gordon’s state-of-the-art Apple Mac computer. He’s scanning and downloading the nude pictures of Ron and Bev and he remarks in a stupid, exaggerated, phoney French accent voice: ‘No one gets ze bet-tah of Ste-WART Gor-DONNN.’ Followed by a silly ‘heh-heh-heh.’
Shitty scene. Shitty actor.
Across the Close, Happy Smiling Helen is bouncing like a tub of lard around the Corkhill kitchen, bobbing her head. As Dr Nikki and Tim enter, the Sage beatifically announces that Happy Smiling Helen is fixing them all a meal. Tim jokingly asks Jimmy what he needs all his energy for.
Feeling that she should show friendly, Dr Nikki offers to help Happy Smiling Helen prepare the food, and starts working on the spuds - something which Happy Smiling Helen appears to have eaten a lot of lately. Tim is hungry, but says that he’s going to take Emily for a drink after the meal.
Happy Smiling Helen bobs her head and bounces about, shooing the menfolk from the Hotel Corkhill kitchen.
The Brookside Bike is sending some sort of e-mail to a mate, vowing in the contents to give Ron Dixon a good kicking. (I do SO hope Jacqui/Max/Mike find out who is responsible for providing Jimmy with the pictures which caused Ron’s heart attack, and I hope the Gordons duly are made to eat shit and die).
Dire and Brigid are walking along The Parade, discussing Brigid’s would-be mugging for the umpteenth time. Brigid is amazed at Antony’s reaction. Why, she’d never seen the child that way before.
Big Dire reckons that IT’S ALL DOWN TER THAT THING WITH IMELDER. SHE WOONDERS HOW HE EVER LET HIMSELF BE BULLIED BY GERRLS.
(That’s easy, Dire. He’s been bullied by you since he was a tyke. And Brigid can be pretty frightening too.)
Surprise, surprise. The couch potato Gordons are glued to the television when Ma Gordon traipses in from the garage. As soon as she enters the house, she starts to whinge about Leanne gossiping at work and Adele mooning over some boy. Guess what? The Brookside Bike, Ali the Ginger and Bitch all start to ... BICKER.
Bicker bicker bicker ... Bicker bicker bicker ... SHOUT SHOUT ... SHOUT SHOUT ...
As Dire clears the sitcom table at Sitcom House, she remarks to Brigid that Antony appears to be off his food. Brigid announces that she’s off to - back to her flat. Better sooner than later, she remarks reluctantly. Dire protests, but Brigid says that she can’t feasibly remain at Sitcom House until her own home is renovated.
Dire remarks that Brigid can at least stay there where she was safe, but when Brigid won’t hear of it, Dire offers to take Plank’s car and drive Brigid to the flat. (Dire can drive - now that’s a surprise).
As Dr Nikki works deftly in the kitchen with Happy Smiling Helen, she lies and tells Helen that she’s really made oop fer her and Jimmy. Happy Smiling Helen smiles, bobs her head and tells Dr Nikki that she’s grateful Dr Nikki made sure Happy Smiling Helen understood the Sage’s condition.
Dr Nikki hangs her head in modest pride and admits that both women were uncertain of the other’s motives, and Happy Smiling Helen admits that Dr Nikki actually did her a favour, and it was all out in the open now. Oh, and by the way, when were Dr Nikki and Jerome Mandingo-Head off?
Nikki says it won’t be long before they were off on their travels. (They’d better hurry. Damn! It’s almost time for her to begin her fifteenth year at university).
Happy Smiling Helen promises to look after the sacred Sage in Nikki’s absence. Why, she continues with wonder, she never thought she’d ever be lucky enough to meet someone like Jimmy, being a single parent and all. (Lucky? To meet an ex-con drug addict, thief, scally, fraudster, who’s unemployed and living on borrowed time in a house his wife owns?)
Dr Nikki observes solemnly that the sainted Sage loovs kids.
Happy Smiling Helen observes that Jimmy doesn’t see as much of his son as he’d like to.
He will once he sorts things properly with Jackie, Nikki promises.
Happy Smiling Helen is curious to know what Jackie was like, as she makes a pot of tea and ditches the teabags in the sink.
Dr Nikki admits truthfully that she never really knew Jackie. Oh, and Jimmy hates teabags in the sink, she adds.
Happy Smiling Helen self-consciously removes the offending bags (of which she is the most offensive) and the two toast a new beginning with cups of tea.
(Actually, wouldn’t it be nice to see Sue Jenkins come back and sort this fatarse out with a few home truths about Jimmy?)
Rachel and Mike are still talking about the fated letter from the surgery. Mike is still ranting about Dr Parr when Rachel tells him that he can’t drop his problems at Jacqui’s door and expect her to sort them out. Ron arrives and they tell him that the letter dismissing Mike’s claim against Dr Parr had been mistakenly sent to the Farnhams’.
Ron’s more concerned about the whereabouts of his missing box, and asks Rachel if she managed to ask Jacqui if she’d come across it. Oh, and Jacqueline was to be told NOT to open the box.
Rachel says she never asked Jacqui and didn’t like to nose around her house.
Pa Gordon is sitting beside Bitch’s tits and Bitch on the sofa, as Bitch moans about her job at the call centre. She’d had a barny with some kid who reported her to the supervisor for her attitude and her boss ticked her off. Now the kid was strutting around the place like he was king of the call centre, she whinges.
Pa Gordon, who’s supposed to be in management and probably takes no shit off his own workforce, encourages Bitch in her surly attitude and tells her not to take anything off her supervisor.
Ma Gordon comes in and starts bleating about going on a diet. Ali the Ginger has a whinge about the Brookside Bike farting in the room at night. This is oh so charming.
The Dixons have finished their evening meal, sans the Hiltons, who are nowhere to be seen, and Ron and Rachel clear up. Oooh, Rachel remarks, M-eye-ke’s all wound oop bowt let-teh.
Ron grumbles that he isn’t surprised. Those professionals make a point of watching each other’s backs.
Ooh, whines Rachel, it joost get so haaad soomtimes ter mek marriage work. Go no moon-eh. She looks at Ron hesitantly, wrinkles her forehead and bats her eyes furiously. Ack’shleh, she begins, she were goin’ ter ask him fer lo-an. (This is the way Rachel lives - from loan to loan).
Ron shakes his head. Sorry, loov, he says, but Maxie Farnham’s taken the solicitors’ fees out of the 25K Ron made on the house sale.
Ooh, witters Rachel, boot how they gonna pay bills? (BILLS? WHAT BILLS DOES THIS COUPLE HAVE?!) No moo-neh.
Ron raises an admonitory finger and wags it in Rachel’s direction. ‘Our Michael seems ter be more interested in war than lookin’ fer a payin’ job,’ Ron says. ‘Yer can’t expect me or Our Jacqueline ter soobsidize yer both.’
Ack’shleh, Rachel begins again, blinking, she were’o-apin’ Ron give M-eye-ke job in laundry business.
Ron shakes his head again. He couldn’t afford to do that, even if he wanted to. Besides, Mike’s not responsible enough to work even for Ron.
Oooh, groans Rachel, ‘ow M-eye-ke gonna get bre-ak when fam-leh woan give’im one?
Dire, accompanied by Brigid and the Antichrist, arrive in the dodgy sink neighbourhood where Brigid has temporary accomodation. Brigid tries to make light of the estate as the trio walk toward her ground floor flat. Really, she says, it’s not much different from the place she and her husband lived after Dire was born.
They unlock the front door and open it to find that someone has broken in and trashed Brigid’s flat.
All three exchange horrified looks.
THAT’S IT, Big Dire announces, shaking the whole estate to the core with the volume of her voice. YER COOMIN’ HOME WI’OOS!
David A Young wrote this. He’s leaving. Couldn’t you tell he doesn’t give a damn?
Summary © 2002 Marion Watts
Brookside and all related materials are © Mersey Television 1982-2002