It's enough to strike the fear of God into any theatre producer. After more than a century of neglect, they've discovered a play written by William McGonagall, the prodigious Dundee writer celebrated for being the world's worst poet.
According to Chris Hunt, editor of the forthcoming William McGonagall Collected Poems and quoted in The Sunday Times, the writer's melodrama Jack o' the Cudgel (or The Hero of a Hundred Fights) is just as dire as poems such as The Tay Bridge Disaster.
Fortunately, today's theatre producers are a robust lot, well versed in salvaging disastrous commissions from the hungry mouths of critics. All they need do is select one of the following options and wait for the plaudits to roll in...
1. McGonagall the Musical: Trevor Nunn mounts an epic staging of the play written by Boublil and Schönberg. No one can follow the story, but the closing number, Hero of a Hundred Fights, makes everyone feel important.
2. Cudgel/Pussycat!: New York's Wooster Group combines elliptical texts from McGonagall's play with scenes from Russ Meyer's Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! in a multimedia collage inspired by the writings of Gertrude Stein.
3. The all-star staging: Robert Altman returns to The Old Vic to direct Madonna, David Beckham and someone out of Sex and the City in a performance so glitzy nobody notices the play.
4. The site specific version: Edinburgh's Grid Iron draws out contemporary relevance by performing the play in a US army base in Iraq. Weaker moments will be obscured by the noise of explosions and the sound of dying innocents. Stars Thelma Barlow from Coronation Street.
5. The McGonagall Project: One-man show by Canadian wunderkind Robert Lepage. Set in 15th century Japan, it explores the remarkable coincidence of McGonagall's play being written in the same year as the opening of the first shoe shop in Quebec City. Music by Laurie Anderson.
6. The community opera: Featuring a cast of 780 ex-convicts, the Young Vic's spectacular interpretation will have its shortcomings overlooked because everyone likes the new theatre.
7. The dance interpretation: Michael Clark draws on his Scottish roots for an all-nude extravaganza featuring the Dundee United squad and former members of the Clash.
8. La trique de Jack (héros d'cent combats): 16-hour production in French directed by Olivier Py who draws out the Catholic symbolism of McGonagall's misunderstood masterpiece. Contains nudity and puppets.
9. The complete works: Dublin's Gate Theatre performs Jack o' the Cudgel as the centrepiece of an 18-day continuous performance of McGonagall's oeuvre, thereby deflecting criticism that it's not very good. Features stars of Father Ted and Westlife.
