Nick Clegg will be portrayed as a tragic hero with hip hop swagger in a new musical play.
The Deputy Prime Minister is the main character in Nicked, which opens on Friday.
Using a book with some 18 rap and urban music songs, it charts the creation of the coalition after the 2010 general election up to the referendum on the Alternative Vote.
The play’s artistic director, Steven Atkinson, 26, said: “There’s almost something Hamlet-esque about Nick Clegg, he’s trapped in an impossible situation and that makes for great drama.”
Mr Atkinson said hip hop tunes are a good way to tell the coalition’s story because the verbal sparring of rappers is similar to Prime Minister’s Questions.
And he believes political leaders keen to play down their public schoolboy background would naturally turn to urban sounds if they were musicians to prove they are cool.
But the play, written by performance poet Richard Marsh with music by Natalia Sheppard aka MC Rogue Nouveau, is keen not to demonise its controversial protagonists.
Mr Clegg will be played by actor Jason Langley, 26, who says he has come to sympathise with the Lib Dem leader since taking the part.
He said: “It’s about getting under the skin of these characters that we all know so well because we see them every night on the news in our living room.
“Throughout the play there’s a really interesting struggle for Nick between doing what he believes in and doing what the system wants him to do, the dodgy deals and the backroom handshakes.”
Mr Langley sees a similar struggle in the lyrics of many hip hop stars.
“They are constantly torn between the violence and sexism and drugs and gangster lifestyle on the streets and wanting to lead a better lifestyle.
“Sometimes the system does not allow you to do that and there’s definitely a reflection of that in the play.”
Other politicians who make an appearance include Gordon Brown, Vince Cable, William Hague, the Miliband brothers and David Davis.
One of the musical numbers tells the story of former chief secretary to the Treasury David Laws’s resignation following an expenses scandal.
The play also asks the audience to take part in a live referendum on the Alternative Vote, and has different endings depending on the vote’s outcome.
Nicked will play at the HighTide Festival in Halesworth, Suffolk until May 8 but Mr Atkinson hopes it will receive offers to move to London’s West End. He said: “There’s been a lot of interest and I can imagine it being very successful.” The HighTide Festival will also feature the former poet laureate Andrew Motion’s debut as a playwright with Incoming, about a soldier killed in Afghanistan.