The Mercury

A movie waiting to be made

- Of Zenda, The Prisoner of Zenda Zenda Prisoner Royal Flash, Prisoner of Zenda. School Days, Royal Flash, | BOB EDWARDS The Prisoner of Venda? The The Prisoner of The Tom Brown’s

RACONTEUR Spyker Koekemoer (aka Pat Smythe) wants to know if they’re ever going to get to the bottom of the VBS bank scandal; arrest the villain who stole millions from what began as the Venda Building Society? Will this scoundrel go to jail?

And in such case will they make a movie called

Heh, heh! This is a joke for the ballies.

In the bantustan days, Pretoria used to send an “ambassador” to Thohoyando­u, capital of the sovereignl­y independen­t Republic of Venda. He was known as the “Prisoner of Venda” (there’s not much doing in Thohoyando­u). And this pun was based on a popular movie of the 1950s,

starring Stewart Granger, Deborah Kerr and James Mason

was based on a novel written in 1894 by Anthony Hope, in which the king of Ruritania is drugged on the eve of his coronation and is unable to attend the ceremony. Political forces within the realm are such that in order for the king to retain the crown his coronation must proceed.

Fortuitous­ly, an English gentleman on holiday in Ruritania, who resembles the monarch, is persuaded to act as his political decoy in an effort to save the unstable political situation of the interregnu­m.

Earlier movies of

were made in 1913 (silent), 1922 and 1937. A 1979 comedy version starred Peter Sellers.

Then there’s a novel (later also a movie) by George MacDonald Fraser, based loosely on

In this, Flashman, the smoking, drinking public school cad of Thomas Hughes’s

has to act as a decoy for a Scandinavi­an prince. It’s a while since I read but I think the impersonat­ion went as far as the princely bedchamber.

A great source of quality informatio­n, is Spyker Koekemoer.

WHO noticed that in the Proteas’ ODI victory over Sri Lanka just over a week ago, not a single batsman was bowled out? The bails and stumps were disturbed but once, and that was in a run-out. Nor was there a single LBW. All the other dismissals were catches. How often does this happen? The Street Shelter for the OverFortie­s is not just a place of culture and intellectu­al discourse, it’s also a mine of significan­t statistics.

INVESTMENT analyst Dr James Greener notes, in his latest grumpy newsletter, today’s escalation in figures.

“Not too long ago a million of anything, especially money, was a great deal.

“Those of us slightly more used to big numbers and scientific terminolog­y could glibly talk about ‘k’ for thousands, ‘bar’ for a million and even a ‘yard’ for a billion. The fun was to watch journalist­s (and presidents) stumble over getting the terminolog­y right.

“But now in the age of the Guptas, Joostes and government-scale corruption, anything less than a billion is chump change. Although criminals seem not yet able to talk of trillions they are already in use in our GDP and government expenditur­e records, and of course the three largest shares on the JSE have market cap measured in trillions.”

Tailpiece

THIS little old fellow shuffles slowly into an ice cream parlour and pulls himself painfully up on to a stool. After catching his breath, he orders a banana split.

Waitress (kindly): “Crushed nuts?” “No, arthritis.”

Last word

A little learning is a dangerous thing but a lot of ignorance is just as bad.

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