There’s a recurring gag in Yes, Minister (and Yes, Prime Minister) which usually involves the premier of Great Britain discovering, with mounting irritation, that he is not quite as sovereign as he believed. At some point, the joke lands: for all the rhetoric of independence, Britain still depends on America to protect it from external threats. The humour lies in the gap between posture and reality. The country that once ran an empire now waits, politely, for Washington to pick up the phone.
The gag recently resurfaced in a sketch imagining Keir Starmer hyperventilating before a call with Donald Trump, as if the “special relationship” were less a partnership and more a performance review. The joke is simply a resemblance of the real nature of the Albion’s relationship with Uncle Sam.
