Hansel and Gretel Publication

A Radio Sketch I wrote recently:

F/X: HEAVY WOOD DOOR CREAKING OPEN.

WILHELM: Jacob, I have done it. Through my travels in Bavaria, I encountered a tale. The tale, in fact, that will complete our compendium of children's literature.

JACOB: Oh, praise the heavens! Finally, our life's work may be complete. Well, do not waste another second. Regale me!

WILHELM: At once. Well, this tale is titled after its two main characters, two youthful siblings: Hansel and Gretel. They live, though one may not consider it living, in a house in a forest with their father and step-mother. Now, the father is a kind man. The step-mother, however, is a wicked woman who decides-

JACOB: Wilhelm, before you continue, we've heard content before that wasn't really age-appropriate. I should make certain before you go through this entire story, is it suitable for children?

WILHELM: Suitable? Err, yes, yes. It's one-hundred percent suitable for children.

JACOB: Very well. Continue.

WILHELM: Where was I?

JACOB: You just mentioned the step-mother.

WILHELM: Ah, yes. So, she decides to murder the children.

JACOB: She- So this story for children is about a child-murderer?

WILHELM: Oh no, no. She doesn't actually murder them.

JACOB: Thank God.

WILHELM: She persuades the father to do it.

JACOB: What? The father? The kind father?

WILHELM: The kind father, yes. Anyway, he leaves them in the forest to die. Then there's this whole bit involving pebbles and breadcrumbs that keeps being retold, but now that I consider, it really has no bearing on the rest of the tale and can be cut with no consequence. Anyway, Hansel and Gretel reach a house made entirely of gingerbread.

JACOB: Ahh, now this seems more appropriate.

WILHELM: Yes, yes. The Old Lady who lives there wants to kill them.

JACOB: Oh.

WILHELM: Kill them and eat them in fact. So, she imprisons them, until Gretel pushes her into a flaming oven. Hansel and Gretel run home, find that their step-mother is gone and they live happily ever after with their father.

JACOB: Happily ever after with their father who previously tried to murder them?

WILHELM: Yes, that's right. What do you think?

JACOB: Huh. Wilhelm, just to paraphrase, you have just pitched a story for children that involves child abuse, attempted homicide, kidnapping, cannibalism and then actual homicide.

WILHELM: Yes, I suppose I have.

JACOB: But, oh, we have a deadline and the publishers have contracted us to submit so many pages as a preliminary draft. Let's include this monstrosity and if they have any sense, they'll cut it out immediately. Now, the other matter: we have yet to give ourselves a name that befits authors for children. We must call ourselves something that appears fun, friendly and non-threatening.

WILHELM: Yes, no worries there. For I have devised the perfect alias.

JACOB: What?

WILHELM: The Brothers Grimm.

JACOB: (SIGHS) Naturally.

END

Awesome. Fairy tales are beyond disturbing.
I once wrote a skit where Aesop tries to sell his ideas to a literary agent. 'Fox wants grapes. Fox can't get grapes. Fox says, Didn't want grapes then.' Pure Graham Greene.

Angela Carter's The Bloody Chamber (1979) for her brilliant take on fairy tales.

This is a great technique, because fairy tales aren't based on logic or realism, so you can pick them apart for hours. I did a Jack & The Beanstalk one once in one of our live sketch shows - the mother of the lad who swapped magic beans for a dying cow lays into him for a bad deal - which went down well, and there was a very nice Cinderella deconstruction in the last series of JFSP (one of the very few "proper" sketches in the whole series, actually).

You've done a nice job on it, YW :)

According to Jung, fairy tales spring from the collective unconscious, which gives them their power and resonance.

Jung always cracks me up.

Your interest in Jung cracks has been well publicised, Michael.

Great stuff, Yacob! Funny and well paced.

The Jung Ones.
It's always funny to take a famous story and give it a fresh twist. I once did a Miss Marple skit where she was the murderess.

Agatha Christie wrote one where the narrator was the murderer. Can't remember the name.

Thanks for the comments so far! Will be sending some sketches to a producer soon (not for anything in particular) so it's nice to get feedback first.

Quote: beaky @ 20th February 2022, 12:18 PM

Agatha Christie wrote one where the narrator was the murderer. Can't remember the name.

Spoiler... Endless Night.