NEW POST! #BigBrother Russia. Hello! As part of series requested by new followers of Konnolsky Tales Revisited I post stories tweeted earlier in year as single narrative. This is tale of Big Brother Russia 2010. Tweeted over course of week, and now with plenty new material for people who see it first time. So best read at leisure. Hope you enjoy.

Big Brother Russia 2010

PREVIEW EVENING

Tonight butcher’s shop assistant Yuri and local egghead Student Arkady come round to watch first instalment Big Brother Russia 2010, with me and my wife Irina. We plenty excite. Series always controversial.

In 2003, animal rights protestors invade Big Brother compound to free Ilan Markovitch, metallurgist and Elvis impersonator from Magnetogorsk, who lose his mind and become convinced he mountain goat. In 2005, six contestants tunnel out of compound and into Kremlin summit between Putin and Bush. (Or so rumour say. Whole thing hush up as it alleged Bush unable to answer lead tunneller Grigori’s objections to Iraq occupation.) Last year no exception. Contestant Korney Makarov claim he Messiah. Other housemates establish cult and worship him. Many Big Brother viewers convert to Korneyism and make pilgrimage to House. Schism in Korneyism lead to violence. Factions who pray to Korney images denounced as idolaters by iconoclastic purists. As believers penetrate Big Brother compound and declare it theorcratic state, brave Russian special forces storm house and restore order with only 865 major casualties. Despite massive public vote for Korney, objections from Orthodox Church mean Endemol, Big Brother Production Company, fix poll. Sasha, ratcatcher from Suzdal, win.

We prepare by stock up on tinned goods and plenty vodka. Reality shows in Russia can cause national crisis and food shortages. Pentagon set DEFCON 3 during episode of Russia Apprentice. Worth it though. Making teams find commercial use for nuclear submarines great TV.

Credits roll. We cheer! And joy! New Big Brother presenter is singer, dancer, post-op transsexual and presenter of Smolensk Is Have Talents, Binka. She look beautiful, especially as camera angles minimise her massive 2.1m frame. (Imagine all best bits of Katie Price, Nana Mouscouri and Richard Kiel in one sexy package.) Before she introduce contestants, Binka show us round House. Location is secret, but unlike 2007, when Kremlin force Endemol to provoke diplomatic incident by staging Big Brother in Georgia, it almost certainly in Russia. As Binka enter House, we gasp at extraordinary spectacle.

Binka: “So here is Diary Room. As you can see, Diary Room chair is a big red Spacehopper. The cameras are located above head height in the room, so housemates must bounce on the Spacehopper when talking to Big Brother.”

Irina: “Whose face is that on the Spacehopper?”
Student Arkady: “Can it be?”
Yuri: “Who?”
Irina: “Iosif Vissarionovitch!”
Me: “Er...”
Student Arkady: “Dzhugashvili.”
Yuri: “Oh.”
Me: “Oh.”
Arkady and Irina: “Stalin, you morons!”

Binka: “And here is the bathroom, decorate with scenes from life of Ivan the Terrible. Then, here we have small interrogation rooms.”
Yuri: “Interrogation rooms?”
All: “Shh!”
Binka: “And this is the wonderful kitchen. And look in this drawer! All the utensils double as instruments of torture down the ages, from Inquisition to Guantanamo. All in keeping with this year’s Big Brother Russia theme. Political violence and oppression. Oh, yes and outside there you can see the open-air Jacuzzi . Now: time for limousines!!!!” Huge cheers from crowd. Here come the contestants, driven in front of delirious fans in specially adapted Soviet era Zils, covered with logos of global brands: Smirnoff, Marlboro, Smeg, Trojan, Anusol.

First Big Brother Russia hopeful is Tanya Blok, 23, a hairdresser from Perm, married 6 times, divorce twice. Hobby is making sexy underwear for her cat.
Second Big Brother Russia contestant Viktor Nurdsky, 28, computer programmer from Orenburg, who likes Iron Maiden & collects ants.
Housemate 3 is Kara Kaplan, ballet dancer from Krasnoyarsk. 19, she weigh 30 kilos. So thin she scarcely has a reflection, she claims to have dated a series of famous celebrities, including William Roache.
4th Big Brother specimen is 20 year old glamour model Ivanna Likmen. She has Hugh Heffner's picture on all the chairs in her Orel house.
Contestant 5 is also model, icy blonde Nadia Kim, 31. She has brought unusual items into House, several bales of straw (she is on Hay Diet) and insertable vibrating vulvic stimulant in shape of her hero, Simon Cowell.
Number 6 is THE MOLE, out of work actor, Alexei Nestyev. Other contestants must expose him as imposter. To help them, he is dress and act like Rasputin.
7th wannabe is male model Boris Pilniak, 26. He is gay and lives with unnamed Russian Cabinet Minister in their Moscow closet.
Final Big Brother Russia contestant is – OH MY GOD! Mad Dmitri! He is local Smolensk eccentric who dress like 19th Century Hussar, live in park, wash in canal and believe history end in 1917. Yuri exclaim “Oh of course. I knew there something I had tell you. They asked him take part this morning and flew him out today."

Big Brother Russia contestants meet, chat and drink. Actor Alexei test his disguise, but young people not know who Rasputin is. Alexei say "I am Rasputin." They say "That’s nice. And what do you do?" However, Mad Dmitri recognise him at once. As Dmitri often speak reverently about Yusupov family, we know this mean trouble. “Vile corrupter of the Tsarina’s ear!” he screams. Then he pours Madeira down Alexei’s neck, shouting “AntiChrist”, and draws his sabre.

Big Brother call Mad Dmitri to Diary Room. Dmitri sit on Spacehopper. Bounce. "Big Brother forbids attempts to kill other contestants without Big Brother's express permission.” Dmitri return to lounge, cast menacing look at Alexei's Rasputin, but does not kill him.

Rest of first night pass with plenty conviviality. Tanya and Boris talk about feline underwear. Viktor starts to tell Alexei/Rasputin names of all his 40000 ants. Early highlight is Ivanna showing how lowcut top allow her mimic aerial view of Gianlucca Vialli & Jaap Stam in conversation. And Mad Dmitri flirt with glamour model Ivanna. Ivanna tell Dmitri "How sexy you are even though you stink." Dmitri reply with Old World charm, "I'm sexy because I stink." Alexei make many attempts to overcome housemates’ ignorance, and give them every chance of exposing him as MOLE. Over monastic habit he put on tee-shirt saying "Look F*ckwits, I'm Rasputin" and play Boney M http://bit.ly/bqtuW7. Kara ask Alexei if Rasputin his nickname, while dance around practising her English singing: “La, La, Ovaltine, get it from the drinks machine.” Later on Big Brother webcam once housemates go to bed, we see evidence of depth of talent in House this year as model Nadia display her amazing ability to smoke in her sleep.

DAY 1
We gather again in front of TV in time for opening credits.

Narrator: “Big Brother calls the contestants to the living room to announce this week’s task.”
Big Brother: “This is Big Brother. This week your task is to re-enact the Battle of Kursk.”
Contestants: “The what?” “Kursk, that’s like a facial scrub, isn’t it?” “No, Battle of Kursk’s a band.” “Religious fanatic. Rasputin? Rasputin? Tsesarevitch’s haemophilia? Does none of this mean anything to any of you?” “Kursk’s definitely a breakfast cereal. Or is it a contraceptive.”
Narrator: “The Big Brother contestants are Big Brother contestants and lack anything resembling historical curiosity or perspective. They don’t know what the Battle of Kursk was. Even old man Mad Dmitri is confused because he believe history ended in 1917. Fortunately, Big Brother has provided a briefing pack explaining the history. The Battle of Kursk was a defining moment in the Great Patriotic War. After the Soviet breakout from Stalingrad and destruction German 6th army, the Soviets began their Westward march. In July 1943, the Red Army and Wehrmacht met in the largest tank battle in history. The Soviets fortified a defensive position near Kursk. There, they weakened and repulsed a massive German attack. They then counterattacked and routed German forces. A great USSR victory.

“Big Brother divides housemates into 2 teams. Tanya, Viktor, Dmitri & Nadia will be Russian heroes, other 4 housemates the massive Wehrmacht assault. The Winners –”

Konnolsky household: “Must be Russian team! Must be Russian team!
Narrator: “... get to enslave the losing team under the totalitarian system of their choice for the remainder of the week. The teams can use anything in the house as tank, missiles, and fortifications. They have two hours to prepare for battle re-enactment in the garden.”

We watch preparations with great interest. Russian team. Big Brother play Marche Slave http://bit.ly/13KDNJ Mad Dmitri take charge. Unusually for Tsarist reactionary he immerse self in task. Awkwardly at first then getting into it he shout “comrades” and dig trench in the garden, just in front of the vegetable patch. He give orders with great confidence.

Dmitri: “Prepare defensive salient!”
Viktor: “Nadia, let’s pile some of these Sugar Puffs boxes in front of Dmitri’s trench.”
Narrator: “Meanwhile hairdresser Tanya does her nails, though at Big Brother’s insistence that she get into spirit of the contest she paints them bright red.

“On the other side of the garden, the Germans are planning their Panzer attack.”

Incredibly, Endemol avoid temptation to use Wagner, the Konniggratzer March, the Horst Wessel Song, or Lili Marlene to cover German team. Instead, they play this > http://bit.ly/bz5PqM until injunction from the former Baywatch star’s lawyers force them to apologise and explain that junior researcher had misunderstood expression “German atrocity”. Meanwhile, glamour model Ivanna lead Wehrmacht team. She get into spirit too, walking round in long leather coat with her arms out of her sleeves, and smoking out of cigarette holder and talking like Derren Nesbitt in “Where Eagles Dare”. She decides what to use for tanks.

Ivanna: “Get those office chairs on casters from interrogation rooms, Henry vacuum cleaner, and wheelbarrow.”

Narrator: “Ivanna works so hard she gets hot. She slips off her long leather coat and unbuttons her Wehrmacht jacket, revealing two perfect Panzerfäuste. Russian defenders Dmitri and Viktor completely lose interest in their work and stare transfixed by German preparations. Tanya goes to the Diary Room to complain about German tactics and Ivanna puts her weapons away.

“The German plan is to subject the Soviets to a preliminary bombardment of pasta, flour, soap, and cushions. Then ballet dancer Kara will jeté over Sugar Puff box salient and establish a forward position. Once she crosses Russian fortifications, the bombardment will intensify and Ivanna will deploy her chair, vacuum and wheelbarrow tanks. Russian plan is less clear, but Mad Dmitri will want to absorb initial German assault, wear it down and then launch massive counterattack.”

Big Brother sound claxon and signal start of Battle of Kursk. Ivanna launch German bombardment. Male model Boris throws dry pasta feebly as worried about perfect manicure. Actor Alexei little better with flour bomb. But bombardment effective enough to knock down three Sugar Puff boxes on Soviet salient and Red Army left flank now exposed. But Mad Dmitri lead magnificent defence. “To the cowshed!” he cries. He and Viktor grab House cow Denka’s dung balls to hurl at German advance. Savage bombardment. Viktor tell Tanya dung good for nails. She throw hard. But first dung volleys ricochet off Ivanna’s gun turrets. Germans intensify their pasta and flour assault and Tanya have hissy fit and say it not fair as she take direct hit from German pillow. Then Wehrmacht unleash ballet dancer Kara. She leap towards Sugar Puff fortifications and trench. Glorious jeté and clear! But wait! As only weight 30 kilos, sudden wind blow her too far. Kara fly up onto House roof and her tutu snags on a gutter. Battle of Kursk over for her! Dmitri brandishes his hussar’s sabre and calls for more dung. Bombardment intensify. Boris, covered in ordure, weeps. And as we watch, we weep too.

Yuri (in tears): “The suffering!”
Me (blubbing): “The heroism!”
Arkady (awed): “The surprising historical accuracy!”
Irina glare like basilisk at us and we pull ourselves together in time to see Dmitri sense loss of morale in German forces. He shouts “Charge!” and launch counterattack, deploying secret weapon. Under suppressing dung fire, Dmitri mount Diary Room Spacehopper. He vault Sugar Puff fortifications. Germans flee terrifying sight of Dmitri with Stalin’s huge face between his legs. He surge forward through abandoned German chair/vacuum cleaner/wheelbarrow tanks, reminiscent of burnt out machines in archive footage. And he rout Wehrmacht position, brandishing his sabre, with male model Boris and actor Alexei cowering on ground in surrender blubbing “not the face, not the face”. German leader glamour model Ivanna capitulate to Dmitri with traditional German handshake, then Russian kiss, then French one.

Irina: “Hm. I think she’s going to surrender everything.”
But we hardly hear Irina as we cheer glorious Russian victory!
All: “Slava, slava, slava!”

With single Spacehopper bound, gracious Dmitri land on roof and rescue Kara.

Narrator: “Dmitri confines all of the losing team, apart from Ivanna, to an interrogation room to await their fate. Tomorrow he will tell them which form of totalitarianism he will subject them to. Meanwhile, he and opposing team leader Ivanna go to the outdoor Jacuzzi.”

We watch as Dmitri gets in fully clothed, even with his sabre and bearskin hat. After 15 minutes Ivanna removes his clothes and begins to sponge him. Then she looks down into swirling opaque waters and say "Oh dear your Ivan look dirty. Let me clean it for you." She smile, take deep breath, slip under water, then –

Narrator: “Meanwhile Tanya, Nadia and Viktor are in the kitchen having a conversation about God.”

Tanya: “I’m like not sure, if there’s, like a God, cos, like, as a hairdresser, right, as a hairdresser, I’m like, how could there even be one? Like, I mean what with war, like the one we did, right, but we won, so maybe God, was y’know on our side, so maybe there’s definitely a God, in fact I think there is, in fact, I think, I like think, I, I, I, me, yeah, me, right, me, I like, think, right, that there is, though how can anyone be sure if there’s a God, definitely. What do you, like, you know, like, think? Is there a God?”
Dmitri [from garden]: “Oh Yeeeesssss.”
Viktor: “There must have been God to create things as beautiful as my ants. Have I told you about my ants? I have –”
Nadia: “God is where I am and I am where God is.”
Tanya: “Yeah that’s like what I said.”
Nadia: “In a sense, I am God.”
Dmitri: “Oh God, yes, God, yes, Goooddd, yeeeerrrrssssssahuha hnge herf oh.”

Credits roll. What a climax! Can’t wait for tomorrow.

DAY 2

So today we gather again to learn what sort of totalitarian system Mad Dmitri will choose to repress losers.
Arkady: “I bet he choose Nazism. Give losers taste of their own medicine.”
Yuri: “No. Khmer Rouge.”
Arkady: “Too messy. What about Francoist Spain?”
Me: “You don’t think he choose, you know, Stalinis –”
Arkady: “Putin would never allow it.”
Irina: “This is a fucking stupid programme.”

Opening titles.

Narrator: “The losing Wehrmacht housemates have spent the day locked up in the interrogation room. Mad Dmitri will reveal this evening which totalitarian system he intends to use to repress them. But this afternoon, he has had them fed a meagre diet of thin soup and nettle tea. Secretly he has drugged the tea and they fall asleep. He has also drugged Nadia’s tea. He smuggles Nadia into the interrogation room and smuggles Ivanna out, hiding her in his bed. At 4pm Big Brother unlocks the interrogation room and calls all the housemates to the Living Room.”

“This is Big Brother. This afternoon in the Diary Room, Mad Dmitri informed us that he has chosen Tsarism as his form of totalitarian oppression. Dmitri will become Tsar and other members of winning team will be his nobility, enjoying privileges in exchange for acknowledging Dmitri as Supreme Autocrat and God’s Anointed. They will also control the food budget. He has selected Ivanna as his Tsarina. The losing team will become serfs, will be owned by the Tsar and his nobility, will serve without question, will be subject to summary and unjustifiable punishments, will be backward, God-fearing, conservative, profoundly ignorant, and will survive on one potato each per month, tilled from the Big Brother vegetable patch, which they will divide into communal strips and fight over jealously and stupidly, ignoring the real harm done by their class oppressors.”

Kara: “Sorry, could you, like, repeat that please?”

Immediately, we hear shout and scream from outside Big Brother house and camera pan over security fence to huge crowd. Apparently in afternoon Mad Dmitri’s plan has leak. Extreme conservative nationalists have protested that technically Tsarism is not a totalitarian system. Also some liberals (at last count there were 43 in Russia) turn up to assert similarity between Tsarist and Putinite regime. Fortunately, combined force of conservative protestors and military police make short work of liberals, before police turn on extreme conservatives. Order restored with only minimal fatalities.

Dmitri orders his coronation as Tsar of All the Russias. Extraordinary grandeur! We awed and moved as Viktor and Tanya overturn two plastic refuse bins to use as thrones. They then drag Boris and Nadia towards them. (Nadia look like she think something wrong, but still bleary-eyed from drugging.) Viktor force them be footstools. Since he nearest thing to priest, Alexei/Rasputin perform coronation. Dmitri regal in his long, if tatty and stain Hussar coat, and even Ivanna, who also crown as Tsarina, look impressive, though she first Russian monarch crowned wearing white stiletto heel boots, mini skirt, NY baseball cap and a pink boob tube bearing legend “CLIMB THE URALS!” Yuri in tears and even Irina silent as Tsar’s Hat of Monomakh – which Alexei improvise with kitchen colander – placed on Dmitri head. Caption flash up on screen:

VLADIMIR PUTIN’S ADVISERS WOULD LIKE TO POINT OUT THAT THE BIG BROTHER CORONATION HAS ONLY VERY LIMITED CONSTITUTIONAL FORCE. PUTIN – SORRY MR MEDEVEDEV – IS STILL IN CHARGE

But this doesn’t diminish impact of ceremony. However in bad omen, Big Brother producers play Coronation Music from Mussorgsky’s “Boris Godunov” > http://bit.ly/98rL4t Irina and Student Arkady, who understand these things, exchange worried glances. I ask what is matter.

Irina: “Boris was not legitimate Tsar, but usurper, who killed Ivan’s heir Dmitri.”
Yuri (pointing at screen): “But he is Dmitri.”
Arkady: “No. It is worse. Boris was threatened by plots emanating from Poland, led by imposters, pretenders, called False Dmitris.”
Yuri: “But Dmitri is Dmitri.”
Me: “You think Dmitri is not Dmitri?”
Arkady: “Well he look a bit clean to me.”
Me: “He had bath with Ivanna last night.”
Yuri: “It’s still him. Bath or no bath, they’re all holding their noses around him. Even Ivanna.”
Irina: “Maybe he’s both Dmitri and Boris.”
Yuri: “No Boris is Boris.”
Arkady: “What?”
Yuri: “Boris. Male model. Was footstool. He is Boris.”
Arkady: “No you idiot. Dmitri is Boris Godunov.”
Irina: “And real Dmitri is False Dmitri –”
Arkady: “So doubly illegitimate.”
Me: “Just out interest, how much of this do you think average Endemol producer know?”
Big Brother: “This is Big Brother. Dmitri has decided to take a new name as Tsar in honour of Ivanna, his Tsarina. He calls himself –”
Arkady: “Boris Dmitri...”
Irina: “Dmitri Boris...”
ANNOUNCER: “Tsar Heff the First.”
All: “Oh.”

We look in rapture as Heff and Ivanna process towards bedroom and retire for two hours of blissful Tsarist ceremonial congress. Meanwhile, Viktor makes losing serfs toil in vegetable patch. As serfs, they initially surprisingly passive, except Nadia, who start to realise something is wrong and has broken nail digging furrow with spoon. Tanya begins process of enserfing losers and making them her chattels. She expropriate Kara and Nadia’s make up and copies of Heat Magazine Russia. This cause first moment of inter-class strife as Kara mouth “bitch”.

Announcer: “After two hours of glorious love making, Dmitri/Heff and Ivanna emerge from bedroom. Dmitri/Heff tours his kingdom. Though Tanya has tried to mask reality of vegetable patch with screens depicting beautiful villages with happy serfs, IT geek Viktor shows Dmitri production statistics. Zero crops. Famine looms in Big Brother Garden.”

Viktor: “Sire, using a computer model I’ve developed based on productivity within my ants’ nests, I think I can make these stinking vassals work harder.” But as Boris boots up laptop, his Tsar is enraged.
Dmitri/Heff: “Avaunt, Satan, what is thy box of vile trickery?” In surprise move, Tsar Heff the First expels Viktor from aristocracy and makes him till the land. To keep team balances, he invites Alexei/Rasputin into his court.

Irina: “Bad sign.”
Student Arkady: “Bad sign.”
Irina: “Dmitri was hostile to Rasputin at first, like most of aristocracy. But now he’s Tsar, he’s changed.”
Arkady: “Hm. Decadence.”
All: “Hm. Decadence.”
Arkady: And it’s interesting he’s rejected technological innovation.”
Me: “Why?”
Arkady: “It’s possibly a brilliant attempt to stave off revolution. According to orthodox Marxism, agricultural feudalisms must progress to mechanisation and capitalism for revolutionary overhaul to be possible. This requires productive forces – machines, division of labour, deployment of capital – to develop and mature, allowing maximum expropriation of labour’s surplus value.”
Irina: “But by persisting with ancient strip system and not allowing Boris to use his computer...”
Arkady: “The Tsar is restraining capital’s progress.”
Irina: “For moment I thought I saw productive forces maturing –”
Arkady: “Emerging –”
Irina: “But then they vanished.”
Arkady: “Vanished.”
Yuri: “I must have missed that.”

But they are right. In attempt to get productivity moving in vegetable patch and avoid famine Tanya takes Kara to kitchen. They try attach two spoons to stick to create more efficient plough. But Dmitri/Heff run in kitchen, break plough over knee (third attempt) then heads to Jacuzzi with Ivanna, where he dictates to Alexei the first part of his 19 volume account of his achievements as Tsar.

Kara: “Isn’t this all, like, a bit boring?”
Tanya: “Yeah, like, I thought we would, like, be exchanging fashion tips and flirting and that?”
Kara: “Should we, I mean, could we, like, do anything?”
Tanya: “Well we on the winning team could make a temporary and unstable common cause with you losers and effect a new order with a (hopefully bloodless) coup d’etat.”
Kara (uncertainly): “Erm. Okay. Erm – ”
Tanya (unsure of herself): “What did I just say?”

As Tanya and Kara wonder where Tanya idea come from, there big development. Nadia break another nail. Increasingly irate at arbitrary absurdity of her situation, she stand up, hurl down her tools and run to bathroom. There she shave head and, using cigarette ash, draw on goatee beard. With paper bag, she improvise flat worker cap and shout “Get me to the Finland Station.”

Irina/Arkady: “Aha! Nadia’s going to give history a shove!”

Events now move fast. Sensing unrest, Dmitri/Heff leap naked from Jacuzzi and order new round of repression. Ivanna suggest he could fire on serfs with water pistol. There unfortunate moment for Kara when Dmitri/Heff misunderstand this. Partly to clean up resulting mess, Tanya open fire on serfs with hose. Tsarina Ivanna order serfs to be placed on diet of dung. Sensing this may be against even Big Brother Russia rules, Tanya refuse. Instead, with minimal violence – and by promising them unlimited time in Jacuzzi – she deposes Dmitri and Ivanna, invalidates their titles and Dmitri’s new name, and establishes Provisional Government. Nadia incensed. As Tanya is humane and Dmitri is permit make cup of tea, she bully Kara and Boris into echoing her denunciation of Tanya’s “bourgeois sentimentalism”. Nadia seize power, placing Dmitri and Ivanna under arrest and armed water pistol and toasting fork guard in interrogation room. She then go to Diary Room. She refuse indignity of sit on Spacehopper. Instead, with only top of her bald head visible on TV, she shout “I declare Big Brother House a worker's Soviet. I will collectivise vegetable patch and seize control of Denka the cow.”

Nadia then order Dmitri be subject to sleep deprivation. Ivanna use her own special way of ensuring Dmitri not get sleep. Dmitri stoical. Nadia purge Tanya, Kara, and Alexei/Rasputin, sending all to naughty step. Viktor put on round spectacles, also paint on goatee beard and call for Permanent Revolution.

Nadia and Viktor commence household collectivisation. However, rapidly fall apart. It clear vegetable patch will not grow anything for months and unsettled by Battle of Kursk, Denka not produce milk. So Nadia announce New Economic Policy. Here competition for winning tasks and getting control of food budget will be used as incentive to modernise Big Brother House. Winners will keep 10% of food budget, with only 90% confiscated by Nadia’s new state and redistributed equally across winners and losers. In amazing development, Kara sell futures in food budget and make money on side. Boris, who has stuck on a moustache made of black synthetic bristles on broom and is starting to smoke pipe, looks on darkly. Nadia starts to cough and goes for lie down.

Credits roll.

Irina: “Quite predictable really.”
Yuri: “Yes. Just like last year.”

What will happen next? Endemol in crisis talks on how take back control of house from Communist insurgency.

DAY 3

Throughout day there rumours Endemol very concerned about Big Brother communist revolution. In particular, they worry that if Nadia too sick, dangerous power struggle inevitable between Boris and Viktor. As precaution, they remove ice-picks from house.

But when we settle down in evening to watch programme it very strange. First, Russian National Anthem play. We stand and sing. Well, actually, anthem words change so many times in our life, we just bellow kind of “Da-DAAA-da-d-DAAA-da-da-DAAA-da-d-DAAA-da”. http://bit.ly/3VxaYA Then Kremlin spokesperson appear.

Spokesperson: “Good evening loyal citizens of Russia, Vladimir Putin and Dmitri Medvedev’s managed democracy, where no one need trouble themselves with electoral outcomes or even bother to vote.”
Me and Yuri: “Hoorah”
Irina and Arkady: “Idiots”
Spokesperson: “Today there have been wide-ranging developments in the Big Brother House. Producers Endemol were concerned that establishment of Dictatorship of Proletariat in House would lead to visible critique of global capitalist model on which they depend, evolve into Stalinism, and induce massive viewer loss, owing to stultifying uniformity and dullness of Communist regimes. Accordingly, they invited a US private security task group, led by Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, to invade the House, overthrow the regime and impose democracy. This was done without prior consultation with Kremlin authorities.

“The force consisting of Xe Services, supported by Halliburton (who were contracted to reconstruct the Big Brother Russia House after the invasion), stormed the House at 9am this morning. By 9.03 they announced “Mission Accomplished” as Nadia’s communist forces capitulated immediately.

“However, occupation proved challenging for American forces. Though defeated quickly, the Housemates soon broke up into squabbling factions and resisted occupation. US forces accordingly adopted “enhanced” techniques. Regrettably, Endemol’s decision to turn off its cameras for the duration of US invasion mean we can’t bring you any footage. However we are taking allegations of human rights violations just as seriously as we always do.”

[Inevitably, in months following series there were many rumours about torture. UK Guardian newspaper ran story that dispute between one US security officer and Mad Dmitri over Ivanna (who interested to know if anyone in Xe services knew real Hugh Heffner) lead to occupying force waterboarding Dmitri, parading him on dog lead, attaching electrodes to his extremities and putting pointy hat on his head. However, when Wikileaks publish documents from house invasion, main scandal was Xe attempt to say Kara and Boris hairspray was weapon of mass destruction and Halliburton’s exploratory drilling for oil under Denka cowshed. But there was no evidence of torture. Apparently however Mad Dmitri show occupying forces his pioneering technique of vodkaboarding. A towel is impregnated with vodka, placed on face and continuous supply of vodka poured on it. Victim feel drowning terror and drunken ecstasy at same time. A retired US General made extensive notes as Dmitri deliriously confessed everything he knew about himself to himself while shouting “No, no, please, continue, please”.)

Spokesperson: “By 4pm it was clear occupying force was unable maintain order. After formal ceremony in which they hand Big Brother Housemates US flag and Housemates hand them dishcloth, they leave. At this point, our glorious Vladimir Putin restored order. Russian security forces entered Moscow offices of Endemol and demanded changes. Putin ordered that walls of Big Brother House should be decorated using posters of his face over words “Big Brother’s Big Brother Is Watching You”. Within minutes of this happening, the House was restored to orderly, natural, Russian condition of quiescent, centralised surveillance state.

“So tune in tomorrow when Big Brother housemates will nominate each other for eviction.”

POSTSCRIPT

Well after this it all bit anticlimaxing. Nomination pass without surprises. All housemates, including his lover and former Tsarina Ivanna, nominate Dmitri, though not because of his abuse of Tsarist power but because of his tendency to eat hairgel, the terrifying discovery of polecat living in his hat, and because he stink. And though Alexei, driven mad by utter failure of most housemates to recognise him as Rasputin, try nominate himself, almost all housemates vote for Nadia. Again this less to do with how her Leninist regime of actually existing socialism worked in practice, and more because of her unnerving decision after US invasion to lie perfectly still in glass box.

However, economic and political realities meant these first and last nominations. Endemol spend almost entire budget for series on US intervention. Viewing figures between first night and first nominations fall from 13 million to 435. Endemol want out. Kremlin, concerned straight run off between Tsarist and Communist candidate might lead to national unrest, and also realising full power of Putin as Big Brother’s Big Brother, agree with Endemol to stop show. Instead of public vote, Putin choose victor. On basis of his victory in Battle of Kursk, and on condition he renounce all claim to dormant Russian throne, Smolensk’s own local loon Mad Dmitri declared winner!

Losers leave House and are interviewed by brilliant presenter Binka. She handle fact budget pressures mean interviews cut to 30 seconds per contestant with typical grace, skill and occasional necessary violence in pushing fame hungry wannabes off camera. As winner, Dmitri get five minute interview. In incoherent remarks – he call repeatedly for viewers to relieve Siege of Sebastopol – Dmitri called Ivanna the love of his life. Sadly for him, she board plane for California straight after her interview. Sadly for her, she was considered too pushy, crass and vacuous even for the Playboy Mansion.

Endemol consider show great success. There were fewer casualties than in previous years and, by reducing Dmitri’s prize from advertised $1m to a bottle of Rostov wine, they even make small profit. Plans are already being made for next year’s show. One rumour point to an outer-space theme, with housemates suggesting weightlessness through continuous use of bouncy castle. Another, which shows Endemol’s ruthless understanding of viewing figures, say housemates will be placed down mineshaft. But best of all is rumour of plan to house contestants in visual representation of mind of UK Deputy PM Nick Clegg. Endemol believe psychotic confusion of contestants produced by contradictions, paradoxes, changes of opinion, betrayals of principle, the mazes, dead ends, wheels within wheels of Clegg mind will make great television.

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