Margaret Thatcher Queen of Hollywood sees Matt Tedford get into character as the titular Iron Lady, the UK’s first female prime minister and the grandmother of neoliberalism. Except this time, she’s not restricting her ambition to leading the Conservative Party and quashing collective action. Instead, she’s recounting her Hollywood ambitions and belting out a number of original songs (very loudly).
Below, Tedford (as Thatcher) selects a movie magic numbers plucked from the soundtracks of TV and film to help you get in the Hollywood mood.
Irene Cara – Fame (from Fame)
I’ve always said that people should never cap their ambition. After absolutely smashing being Prime Minister for ten years, I’ve had a new lease of life as a global cabaret superstar. And I’ve hit the heights of showbiz success: the Fringe, the West End, the Dublin International Gay Theatre Festival, hosting Porn idol at G-A-Y in London, playing to silence in Maidstone – but this song tells you that, no matter how much you achieve, you always need to strive for more. I DO want to live forever and I DO want to learn how to fly. That’s why I went to America to become a Hollywood icon – and I’m coming back to Edinburgh to tell the tale.
Madonna – Don’t Cry For Me Argentina (from Evita)
Now it would be easy to assume that I picked this song because of my relationship with the Falklands – but you’d be wrong. I find Madonna so inspiring. Anyone who’s that tone deaf and can still lead a Hollywood musical is my kind of delusional. When I told my director that I didn’t want to sing preexisting songs anymore, he told me I hadn’t been “singing” them in the first place. I promptly fired him and now Matthew Floyd Jones has written brilliant original songs such as “Prime MiniSUPERSTAR”, “Thank You Me” and “Fuckable” for me to perform the only way I know how: loudly.
Kenny Loggins – Danger Zone (from Top Gun)
This song may bring to mind fighter jets and topless volleyball (what song doesn’t) but the lyrics really say something about what it means to be a woman in both Westminster and Hollywood. Both systems are “danger zones” where women have to fight every day just for acceptance and often the only way to get ahead is by stabbing each other in the back. That’s why I’ve always thought it’s extremely important… to be the one wielding the knife. That’s how I became the first female Prime Minister! And also how I made sure there wasn’t another for ages and ages.
Meryl Streep – The Winner Takes It All (from Mamma Mia)
Although I obviously loathe the singer (my arch nemesis and the worst actor in Hollywood, Meryl Streep) I’ve always had a soft spot for this song and the positive story about capitalism it tells. Trust the Swedes to make it so mournful! Don’t they understand this is a happy story? They played the game, there has been a winner, and so of course he (or she) should take it all. What are you not getting, Agnetha?!?! The wealth will trickle down eventually (don’t ask me how, I haven’t thought it through yet) or do you really think the winners will just keep on winning whilst hoarding the winnings they’ve already won until there’s no way for someone who’s not a winner already to win enough to take anything let alone at all… oh wait, I think I just realised capitalism’s broken.
Stealers Wheel – Stuck In The Middle With You (from Reservoir Dogs)
Looking away from Hollywood to more local issues, I feel this song very much sums up the last twenty years of British politics. We’ve always had clowns to the left of us, but now it appears that the jokers to the right may actually be fascists. I say Britain needs big, radical ideas, and yet… Keir we are stuck in the middle with AnDREW (…Burnham). Oh, but I’m forgetting Kemi… for good reason.
Isaac Hayes – Theme From Shaft (from Shaft)
Finally, do you ever hear a song and think, “Good lord, this could have been written about me!” Well, that’s what I feel when I listen to Isaac Hayes’ funk celebration of that private dick who’s a sex machine to all the chicks. I just say: “But he’s talkin’ bout Mags.” You dig?
Margaret Thatcher Queen of Hollywood, Assembly George Square Gardens, 5-30 Aug (not 18), 8.40pm