This is a man’s world

Sir David Hare’s weird new play sets out to chronicle the history of the Labour movement from 1996 to the present day. But it makes no mention of Corbyn, Momentum, the anti-Semitism row or rumours of a breakaway party. The drama is located in the dead-safe Miliband era and it opens with talk of a leadership election. The two best candidates, Pauline and Jack, are old lovers from university. Pauline is a doctor who entered politics when budget cuts threatened the hospital where her mother was being treated for cancer. Jack is a colourless Blairite greaser, a sort of Andy Burnham without the mascara, who is still besotted with Pauline despite being newly married to Jessica.

The play kicks off with an announcement from Pauline, who sits as an independent MP, that she doesn’t covet the Labour leadership. We then scoot back and watch the pair as student lovers. Jack, the doting puppy, remains faithful to Pauline even though she keeps a busy roster of alternative playmates on the go. Fast-forward, and we watch politician Pauline giving an interview in which she rashly declares: ‘I’ve nothing to hide.’ A real politician using that phrase on TV would be haunted by it for the rest of her career. Pauline is, of course, hiding two things. First, her ambition to stand as leader. Second, her Labour party membership while she was an independent standing against a Labour candidate, which she arranged without the knowledge of her constituents. Such inept mendacity would be swiftly uncovered during a leadership contest. When Jack discovers her secret manoeuvres, he fails to use this toxic information to ruin her pitch for the top job. Why? Any activist or A-level politics student could have helped Sir David to avoid these blunders.