Sir William Hunter can be a little highly strung, but as the British ambassador in Moscow, wouldn't you be?

Aided by his much cooler-headed secretary Mortimer, Hunter enjoys the perks of the job - cocktails, dinner parties and balls - so long as there's nothing he can be mocked over, such as England losing at cricket.

Quietly awaiting the arrival of a visiting British pop group, the usual work-eschewing peace of the ambassadorial residence is thrown into disarray when the third tuba player in the Moscow State Symphony Orchestra arrives with a particularly unusual request for political asylum.