General Secretary review – satire of world politics misses its targets
We may all, under lockdown, have fallen prey to feelings of powerlessness. In reaction, Georgie Thomas and Cassie Symes, aka the duo Thick’n’Fast, have pivoted to the other extreme, imagining themselves “world kings”, in the infant Boris Johnson’s formulation – or world queens, given that Symes and Thomas consider global leadership through a female lens. In this comic play, streaming nightly from Applecart Arts, the pair are gifted sudden jurisdiction over the world’s affairs. So what do they – what would any of us – do with it?
It’s a catchy premise – but General Secretary doesn’t get the most out of it. There are diverting moments, as the duo send up their own naivety – and their vulnerability to the seductions of power. They multi-role capably as newsreaders, a tech supremo, and two mouthy YouTube influencers. The montage sequence that finds our fish-out-of-water heroines mugging up on geopolitics is nicely done, as they fend off incoming calls from Michelle Obama and introduce a “reciprocal orgasm tax” to penalise bad sex.
But finally, this would-be satire has little to say about our failing systems of governance or why even the best of political intentions seem to founder. General Secretary too often comes across like a first draft. From the outset, when the UN’s decision to offer them power goes wholly unexplained, the show feels remote-from-the-knuckle, its plotting slack and cartoonish even when the performances threaten something more nuanced. The show’s ear for media- and politics-speak is not acute enough, and the comic potential of the clash (more conspicuous on screen than it might be onstage) between low production values and world-straddling ambitions is not exploited.
The satire detector flashes when Symes and Thomas blame Silicon Valley for the rookie rulers’ descent into tyranny. But that idea is left very vague, as world peace is secured by an undistinguished comedy song that concludes the show. At a time when opportunities for live performers are few and far between, you can forgive Symes and Thomas dreaming for themselves the biggest opportunity imaginable. But it’s not really seized in this fitfully likable but lightweight political fantasy.
