The window of the new shop was as brightly coloured as a circus entrance, and stuffed full of items bearing no relation to each other, from chocolates and candles to vases and old chairs. The unusual name, too, made the place seem like it might have some mystical, hidden purpose.
The builder boyfriend wandered over the road from our house to explore this latest niche store to open up in the village.
When he came back he said: ‘Do you remember Papa Lazarou from League of Gentlemen?’
I do indeed remember the demonic circus character who featured in four episodes of the TV show. He would bang on people’s doors and kidnap women declaring: ‘You’re my wife now!’ He ought to have had no basis in fact, but sometimes things occur in this curtain-twitching corner of Surrey that put us in mind of him, if only because of their discombobulating randomness.
Papa Lazarou has been declared haram now, because he wore face paint. The writers of the hit series tried, I think, to explain that it was a circus costume, like a clown. But in June 2020 The League of Gentlemen was withdrawn from distribution on Netflix due to the character being considered ‘blackface’. I despair.
Papa Lazarou is a genius character because, as ridiculous as he is, he and the rest of the strange members of his ‘pandemonium circus’ have some sort of resonance in the daft but unnerving things that happen every day in small towns.
Like when a new shop opens with a very odd name and a feature window full of disparate objects.
We keep driving by this place staring at it because we long for some ordinary shops to open where we can actually buy stuff we need.
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