[SFX: Hubbub . Door opens and closes sharply, talking stops]
MANAGER: [Sweetly] So then, lads, all having a nice rest after the first half?
[Half hearted agreement]
MANAGER: [Shouting] Well, you bloody well shouldn't be! That was a disaster. You had them there, you had them right there, just sitting back and taking it, and you let it slip! It was embarrassing, most of the time half of you weren't even moving. I could barely watch. And you, Balham.
BALHAM: [Resigned] Yes
MANAGER: I nearly bloody died, with your antics. There you were, play all to yourself, and what did I see? I tell you what I didn't see: passion! Drive! Passionate...ness. You dawdled, Balham, like it was a stroll in the park with your nanny's butler. Rubbish. You barely deserve to go out with that oboe. Anything to say in your defence?
BALHAM: It was a legato passage.
MANAGER: Speak sense! God, I managed a team from all over Europe, Spaniards, Frenchies, the bloody lot, and I could understand more of their lingo than I can your soft talk.
BALHAM: That section of the symphony - my solo - was a legato passage
DEMMICK: Which means you play it smoothly. If you don't, err, dawdle, it means you're probably doing it wrong.
MANAGER: That's enough out of you, Demmick! Don't think I didn't spot you: doing bugger all the whole time, then bursting into life for the last two minutes. That's an old trick, I'm wise to it
DEMMICK: It's sort of the timpani player's curse to stand still till the end.
MANAGER: No excuses! They might have washed when you were on trial for the Doncaster Youth Orchestra, but they won't now. Wash, by the way, being something you lot need to do as you didn't even break a sweat out there.
BALHAM: Listen, erm, coach...we follow the score. What the composer wrote. It's all written down here, don't blame us if you don't like it.
MANAGER: Oh right. Yeah, silly me. Stupid old Barraclough, he only knows about 2nd division football teams, not classical music. You follow the score, I get you. Except [roaring] symphonies aren't played on paper they're played on...well, not grass. Trumpets. Violins. Those other kind of big violins that you stick between your legs. Now, I want you to go out in the second half, and I want to see each and every one of you playing as hard as you can from start to finish, otherwise you're off this orchestra team. Clear?
[SFX: Door slams shut]
DEMMICK: Well, that's that, then. We can hardly go out there and all play forte all evening without stopping.
BALHAM: Oh, I wouldn't worry; it's all Philip Glass in the second half.
[Fade]
VOICEOVER: Following the success of the 2012 Olympics, many successful managers and trainers from the world of sport have found their skills in demand from a failing and underfunded arts sector.
INTERVIEWER: What was it like having Mr Barraclough in charge of the Royal Opera House's production of Barber Of Seville?
SINGER: Well, he may not know anything about Italian pronunciation, libretto editing, colouratura, music in general, or basic social skills, but he's still the best director we've ever had.
INTERVIEWER: Why?
SINGER: He gave us so many oranges. Between each act! I tell you, with some of these long operas, I was up to my 5 a day before I'd even left work. I love oranges! And we could even take them onstage, because it sort of fits with Seville. Oranges, yum.
VOICEOVER: We asked art critic, Elijah Batmyst, about his experiences with the new managerial regime.
BATMYST: Do you have any oranges?
INTERVIEWER: No. Now, what have been your experiences with the new managerial regime?
BATMYST: Well, it's been swings and rond-ponts, in a very real sense. I'll admit to having my reservations about pro-celebrity ballet - Tarby didn't really have a plie in his arsenal, bless him - but I'd say the new Capes prize is a vast improvement on the Turner prize: why not see which artist can carry Carl Andre's bricks round Millbank the quickest, and then drag a van full of Modiglianis with your teeth? It's more sympathetique.
VOICEOVER: But has this new relationship between art and sport changed the views of the man in the street? We visited a lively pub to gauge opinion.
PLEB: Well, I don't really see the point of it. They all dress stupid, they get paid all this silly money to do hardly anything, just arsing about for a while, and before you can say "hang on, this is a waste of bloody time", there are people all over the TV and papers waffling on about how great it is. Emperor's new clothes, mate.
INTERVIEWER: And, footballers aside, do you have any opinions on contemporary artists?
PLEB: Oh, they're alright. Sometimes there are women with their boobs out and everything.
