September 26th, 2015

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“When we agreed three camels for Mrs McKee, we thought you meant riderless ones”

So what is the theme of your Crazy Christmas Show this year?”

Talk like an Egyptian
I am always asked this question around this time of the year by those who don’t realise I have to choose a theme back in February for the Ta’ i Teatret magazine that is distributed to every household in Denmark.

My choice of theme for the next Crazy Christmas Show is never an easy one, coming as it does right on the heels of finishing the previous show, which we have rehearsed and performed at Tivoli for four long winter months. By then I am yearning for sun, sand, palm trees and … yes, why not? Egypt!

Before I begin to think of a storyline for the script or even one joke, my task is to find an amusing title for the show. Previous examples include an African-themed show being entitled ‘Below the (equatorial) Belt’ and a pirate romp being called ‘One-eyed Willy and the Quest for the Big Chest’. And so, this year, with my head full of mummies, angst-ridden archeologists and murder mystery on the Nile, I decided upon the title ‘Don’t Touch Nefertiti!’.

Her world-famous bust
Next I begin to research my subject so that I can find a hook for a storyline and, in no time, I found myself hooked. Nefertiti is fascinating! Not only is she considered one of the most beautiful woman who ever lived thanks to the discovery of her bust – a unique work of art found buried under the sands of Amarna and now in a Berlin Museum – but she was also the stepmother of none other than the most famous pharaoh the modern world has heard of … Tutankamun.

The boy pharaoh would have been lost to history if his tomb had not been found in 1922 by Howard Carter after six long years of digging in the Valley of the Kings. It was the first royal tomb to have been found intact and there were over 5,000 treasures inside.

These priceless articles were painstakingly removed by Carter and his team, ignoring the curse inscribed in hieroglyphics on the entrance: “They who enter this sacred tomb shall swift be visited by wings of death.”

Dreams of her booty
One can only dream of what Queen Nefertiti’s treasure would be like. But what happened to her? You can imagine my delight when, a month ago, Nefertiti’s face was once again on the front pages of the international press. It seems that her tomb may have been found, hidden behind Tut’s tomb! There has been a shockwave amongst eminent archeologists. Who will dare to enter the tomb?

Fully ten people connected with the opening of Tut’s tomb died within two years, including Earl Carnarvon, the owner of Highclere Castle (known to TV viewers as Downton Abbey). Three days after entering the tomb, he died from a mosquito bite that gave him blood-poisoning. Perhaps they were those “wings of death”? I would give anything to enter her tomb, but then I remember my own cautionary title ‘Don’t Touch Nefertiti!’

‘Don’t Touch Nefertiti!’, the 2015 Crazy Christmas Show, will be performed at Tivoli’s Glassalen from November 10 to January 9. For more details, visit londontoast.dk