Blanche Vs Finnbarre

A farcical ribald tale of life in a Cotswold village

Blanche Knight-Wankley is a minor psychotic quasi-religious mother-in-law who is intent on performing a ‘castrato’ procedure on Finnbarre, her priapically over-endowed son-in-law. By a quirk of the roulette wheel of life he finds himself promoted to the rank of Funeral Director and is subsequently elected as Town Crier of the sexiest village in ‘Ye Merry Olde England’.

As a consequence of a forced marriage our errant hero Finn (full name Finnbarre Abraham O’Keeffei) is soon struggling with the perplexities of importing a dead body from France in a broken-down booze laden Transit van and the subsequent difficulty of keeping control of a pair of rampant funeral stallions. Their rude agricultural ‘handbrake’ charm goes viral on the internet and his newly acquired Victorian Horse-Drawn Hearse business takes off.

Then follows a canine mating fracas in the village hall and very quickly we also have a couple of cuckolded husbands, as our Finn sets about repairing the damage done by his dog. A public denunciation of his character by Blanche (God bless her) is the precursor to a full-scale village dustup, leading to the hospitalisation and an overnight in the slammer for the participants. Our resident dog Ollie sunning himself on the village green can scent what’s going on, but he’s not telling just in case he becomes a victim of mother-in-law’s castrato intentions.

Detective Sergeant Idris Dawes representing the forces of law and order is an idiosyncratic Welsh ‘boyo’ blessed with a pre-prejudiced coppers nose, and he doesn’t need to be convinced that illegal perversions are being practiced in the village. Castrationist’s and foreigners with strange sounding names are involved so..... ‘it stands to reason, boyo’!

His ram-in-the-pen investigative technique comes into question by his superior officers who do not share his prejudices, and under pressure to prove he’s right he decides to send in an undercover policewoman who’s prepared to take one for the team.

As our farce unfolds the everyday events in the lives of these simple country folk will confirm a view long held by foreigners that British humour is obsessed with functions of the lower body. This is a silly romp through the surreal reality of Middle England in the second half of the twentieth century, enjoy its great sense of the ridiculous and savage fun.