Dai, Bubbah and Karen’s historical inaccurate play about Guy Fawkes

Dai, Bubbah, and Karen pick the scroll with the prompt ‘Guy Fawkes and the gunpowder plot’.

Dai, wearing a long blonde wig, comes onto the stage holding a sign reading ‘1605’ to establish the year.

Karen then plays a trumpet and opens a scroll, declaring that they have listened to the rich people, and that they will therefore be raising the taxes on the poor.

Bubbah then comes on stage wearing a paper Guy Fawkes mask, talking about how angry she is about the rich people raising taxes, and stating that she’s going to blow them up. She adds “-eth” to the ends of random words during her monologue, to give it that 'authentic' 17th century vibe.

Karen and Dai then return to the stage, spinning around and dancing, while Dai sings something about Parliament. The pair reach up and connect their arms to form an arch representing Parliament, while Bubbah places a mess of colourful pipe cleaners at Karen’s feet, and holds some balloons.

Bubbah then pops a balloon and throws a bunch of the pipe cleaners up into the air, while Dai and Karen pull their trousers/shorts down, seemingly to represent Parliament blowing up.

Bubbah is then seen kneeling with her hands behind her back, while Karen (playing the prosecutor) addresses Dai (who is wearing the long blonde wig again to represent being a judge), declaring that Guy Fawkes is a despicable man who has committed treason, and so must be punished.

Dai pretends to smash his gavel three times (making a popping noise with his mouth), and sentences Guy Fawkes to death. Bubbah then does an evil laugh, and they all leave the stage.

Dai then returns to the stage with a sign reading ‘Present Day’ in bubble writing (except for the ‘T’, which is really tiny and barely fits on the paper).

Bubbah and Karen then return to the stage, throwing pipe cleaners around to represent fireworks. Karen pretends to burn herself a bit, and Dai mimes a firework and starts shouting about cigarettes.

Karen then stops the fun, and the group present the moral of the story: how originally it was about a person trying to do good, but now Guy Fawkes night is all about “scaring dogs and ram-raids”. They decide that instead the celebration can just be about Matariki (a celebration of the lunar new year, in the Māori calendar, in June or July).

They then start singing something about rainbows, and skip off of the stage and towards the house.

In the studio, it is discussed that they definitely got the motivation behind the plot wrong, and also that Parliament never actually got blown up in reality, while it did in the play. Karen claims that the explosion was “metaphorical” and “just in Guy Fawkes’ head”.

When the matter of them pulling their trousers/shorts down is discussed, Karen says that it happens in Catholic churches a lot.

The team members earn 4 points each.

(Written by Will G and edited by Karl Craven)

(Illustrations collected by JoGo and adjusted by Karl Craven)