The Rain Maker

Radio 4 are repeating The Rain Maker on Wednesday 4th July at 2.15pm. (It was first broadcast 2 years ago.)

James Robinson, Caleb Knightley, Ken Cranham, Joe Dempsie. (From L to R)

The play tells the story of a father and son who take a trip to a cabin in some remote woods to repair their relationship. It is a kind of psychological thriller… There are references to a supernatural world – and I wrote the play after a re-reading of ‘The Golden Bough’ by Sir James Fraser.

We recorded the play in a real forest – and it was not without incident.

The Producer wrote a blog about it, at the time, that can be found HERE

Kenneth Cranham plays the Father. Joe Dempsie plays the son.

(I have previously blogged on this play HERE.)

**Update** – THE RAIN MAKER is being repeated on Radio 4 Extra next week – Wed/Thurs – 9/10th October 2013

White Noise

I have a new play on Radio 4 this coming Tuesday (10th April.)

It’s called WHITE NOISE and it is set in current day Dagenham, East London.

The details are here.

Here’s a photo from the studio during recording.

(Ricci Harnett, and Theo Barklum Biggs are the actors pictured playing ‘Danny’ and ‘Freddy’. The back of head belongs to Scott Handcock the production co-ordinator)

The play is part of the ‘Rapid Response’ series. This means that the turnaround time between commissioning and broadcast has been very short (by Radio Drama standards.) This is to ensure that the play is as contemporary as possible – which is what the strand is all about.

(This is Louise Jameson playing ‘Kath’)

Other members of the cast (not pictured) are Matthew Gravelle (Who I’ve worked with on ‘Burning Both Ends’, and ‘Gulliver’s Travels.’) And Ayesha Antoine.

The Director / Producer is James Robinson who I worked with on “The Rain Maker” a couple of years ago. (That was the radio horror play that we recorded on location in a forest in Kent.)

Writers are burglars – Jimmy McGovern – Brookside… An unconvincing Greek analogy

Another two weeks on the Writer’s Academy have gone by – so here are some more crudely formed observations and thoughts… 

(Please excuse all the dreadful grammatical and spelling horrors – this has all flown out of my noodle in one gelatinous lump.)

We’ve just completed Week 10 – we have 3 weeks to go.

We’re into the last part of the course now and, while we have collected a few scars along the way,  it seems to have flown past. We’re not at Elstree so much now.  Large chunks of our weeks are now spent writing at home.  We have started on the real work.

But, we did have a guest visit from Jimmy McGovern at TV centre this week.

Jimmy is arguably the best TV  writer of his generation. (and with work including Cracker, The Lakes, Priest, Hillsborough, and The Street – it’s a strong argument.)

Jimmy arrived and immediately bought us all charity ‘Children-In-Need’ cupcakes  – so got off on the right foot. But we soon found he was more than a provider of confectionary..  (I’m being facetious to warm you up…  I’m feeling a bit Thomas De Quincy this morning.)

Jimmy has a passion for what he does – and warned us several times that “what is said in this room stays in this room.”

During his two hours with us, I don’t think he was indiscreet at any time… Jimmy was enlightening, compelling, and inspiring. You won’t find a bad word against him here.

(He most certainly did not criticize anyone else working in the industry past or present. And he didn’t cast any aspersions about any TV dramas, genres, or ways of working.  This was purely about how JM creates his work  – his passions – his beliefs.

Although  – he did say something very funny about Coronation Street’s Ken Barlow – that made me want to carry him around the room on my shoulders.  – But my lips are sealed, gentle reader.)

Discretion seems to be in order anyway – So I’m just going to  talk about how a couple of things Jimmy  said spoke to me personally.

Jimmy talked about how he once arrived home and found a burglar in his house. The burglar had stacked things he was planning to steal by the front door – so he could take them all in one go when he’d finished going through the house.

It’s a neat analogy – Jimmy says a good writer is a burglar…  He take things from the people he knows – and stacks them by the door.

He steals character traits, feelings, habits, ways of life…

The way an old man always sniffs the milk to see if it’s off.  The way a woman has to contend with a broken chair that she can’t afford to replace.

The writer stacks these details by the door – dozens of them – hundreds – ready to take into stories – and then when their time comes… when a detail is ready to be used – he makes them connect – link together and resonate in a context – funny, climatic, heartbreaking…

The woman in the broken chair – finally losing it in furous breakdown as her father sniffs the milkbottle  for the millionth time –  did he really think that she would give him sour milk?

I think this  is fundamental to being a dramatist.

“Writer’s Steal – Shakespeare was a thief”  Bertolt Brecht.

By adding that quote i’ve made it seem more pretentious.

What Jimmy was saying was that we should be writing about the people around us.  We should use our own experience.. And be authentic.

I live in Dagenham. Partly because it’s cheap. But also because it’s like no other place.  (It’s the real Eastenders here.)  It’s a fairly poor area, there’s a lot of aggression, and transgression – and tensions – and it has its own unique flavour too… 

(Someone once told me that Dagenham is at the wrong end of the district line – but that depends on your politics.)

It is also a place that makes me laugh a lot. eg:

There was a young black guy in gold rimmed glasses and tall hair standing on the corner of the high street the other day – as people passed he called to them with phrases of religious encouragement.  ‘God is with you.’  etc

A middle-aged man in overalls walked past.   The Black Guy shouted across:  “Jesus Loves you.”

Without stopping, the man  cheerfully shouted back:  “He didn’t love me last Thursday.”

….

I have no idea why he said this – but it made me laugh.

But what happened to him last Thursday…?   Something sad that he makes jokes about?  (It makes the brain twirl and a story begin to form?)

I can’t buy an apple in the local shop here without seeing the tips of story icebergs…  This area speaks to me – I know them really well – but can see that they’re alien too…  This place makes me want to write about it.

(Excuse that moment of solipsism.)

….

Jimmy talked about his work on Brookside – the Liverpool soap. It’s easy to forget how remarkable,  compelling and important Brookside was in the early days –  Transcendent kitchen sink drama with amazing actors.

He said the script meetings were passionate, and robust – the show meant a lot to the writers – they’d argue and shout to make their opinions heard.  Keeping the quality up was a fight for authenticity.

Jimmy said that the writer’s ‘hut’ was on the far side of the lot.  So when the writer’s came in for meetings they had to walk across the whole length of the set.

Brookside’s technical crew  were local working class scousers.

As the writers made their way they would be barracked and have the piss taken out of them by the electricians, and chippies, and other crew – who’d all watched the previous night’s episode – They’d be heckling, and laughing at the writers for any use of inauthentic dialogue, the implausibility of plots, or for anymoments that didn’t ring true etc…

In other words the writers were held to account for their work by the people they were writing about –  in a very direct confrontation.  And this kept them on their toes.  (It’s not often a writer gets that kind of feedback.)

Again this is a note about authenticity.

(Jimmy joked that the quality of the scripts went down when the writers hut was moved to a place nearer the front gate – the walk of shame removed…)

Jimmy also said that we should write with our shirts out… Which is to say – stand out – be different.

(Similar to Sarah Phelps telling us to back up and spray ourselves onto our scripts – and Tony Jordan telling us to spunk on our work…  I suppose.)

Jimmy was frank, and open, and encouraging – he showed us some of a drama he wrote in 1990 about heroin users in Liverpool.  His first stand-alone piece – Fantastic little film.  He showed us the bits he now thinks he got right – and the bits he feels he got wrong…  It’s where he started on his journey creating groundbreaking drama…

This course is all about starting points.

It was a privilege to spend time with Jimmy McGovern.

The simple truth is… Even being in the same room as Jimmy McGovern makes you a better writer.

…..

As the  course reaches its endgame stage… I’m reminded of the first thing that John Yorke said on the first day.

“Good isn’t good enough.”

It’s a simple statement – but infers a lot.   It means standards are high..

There’s still a way to go and much to do…

But apropos of this I’ve been thinking about Greek Tragedy.  (The soap operas for ancient people.)

I remember reading that when Sophocles’ plays were first performed in ancient Greece – the commentators of the day described them as being not only the greatest dramas ever written – but the greatest dramas that would ever be written ever.

Maybe they were right…

But, in terms of modern TV…

It seems a lot to aim for when knocking together an episode of ‘Doctors’ for daytime BBC1…

Or any soap…

But if someone can turn Ken Barlow into Oedipus  – i’ll be tuning in.

Casualties

Here’s my fortnightly head spurt on the Writers Academy –  half-thoughts, nerve endings, impressions….

Two more weeks have passed – we’ve just finished week 8 – we have 5 more weeks to go…

What is absolutely clear to me now is that this course is a kind of boot camp for writing on series drama – (And a part of me, my instinct for hysterical melodrama part, wants to say that our office in Elstree is also the Guantanamo Bay of bbc writing – but I won’t go quite that far…)

Homework has been mounting. Demands are growing. The pressure is rising. We’re in the middle of it now.

The week  before last was the midpoint of the course – the point of no return – the moment in a story of biggest change…

We had a week at home – writing a full episode of bbc daytime drama – Doctors.

Unlike traditional ‘soaps’ -most eps of Doctors have a strong and unique guest storyline.  This is to say, that it is kind of a daytime – ‘Play for today’ with new guest characters offering something new everyday. (The balance in an average episode is 60% guest story – and 40% series story – the soapy bit.  Although some eps can be 100% guest story, and there is flexibility…)

Suddenly on our own – having spent weeks deconstructing how we tell stories – we were entering a strange world. I’ve worked as a full-time pro writer of drama for twelve years – but it felt like I was starting again… A forbidding and odd experience…

When the group gathered again on Monday – no one was happy. No one felt they’d done good. In isolation we’d all had the same experience.  We shared a sense of despair  that we hadn’t been able to put all the new techniques, structures and tricks we’d been discovering to good  use.  In essence – we all felt a bit crap.

Doctors’ is technically demanding and has clear stylistic boundaries – but it offers opportunities to write on subject  matter that wouldn’t make it onto prime time.  Like Radio 4’s Afternoon Play – you can get away with a lot in the afternoon on BBC1 – incest, murder, dead babies, raped pensioners, drug taking, men dressed as babies for sexual kicks -… all of these  have featured on Doctors in the past six months alone…

Doctors has a gamey strong flavour – and there’s scope.  But it’s tough in terms of budget.. and it’s easy to lose sight of the real joy of the story telling when blinded by the technicalities of the form…

(We haven’t got feedback from our scripts just yet – so our sense of failure is self-diagnosed at the moment. – but we’ve been told that it’s normal to feel shit at this point in the course…. – Which is a bit like saying that after a bus has hit you, it’s quite normal for your skull to feel a bit broken. All very well – but you’re still left with a headache…)

After the mid point – everything changes…

We’ve all done a bit of screaming… had dark days… banged our heads against the walls…The mid point is snapping point…

In films the mid point is often set in a forest or a dark cave…

(Some one said that Star Wars’ mid point is in a forest.  And in Passage to India it’s the Marabar caves… – but all this is a tendency rather than a rule.)

…We are all beginnng to emerge from this darkness now…

This following quote is from the Mid-point of Macbeth. (Exactly half way through the play.)

I am in blood

stepped in so far, that should I wade no more

Returning were as tedious as go’er

Strange things  I have in head that will to hand…

This is kind of how I feel about the Writers Academy at the moment…  (Only there’s a lot more blood – and Macbeth was never up against an indecipherable Holby City storyline document.)

But, anyway… just as we reached the difficult despairing moment of the course – things got more difficult…

We were onto the complicated stuff…

Multi protagonism.

A single protagonist drama is fairly straight forward.  A person goes through a journey of some sort. An incident  sets them on their way.  Things go right for them, wrong for them, there’s a mid point where everything changes, there is a crisis point,  there’s a final battle – and there’s resolution…  (all this loosely speaking – some dramas manage to dispense with these things and are still amazing – not many spring to mind though…)

Rocky is a good example of single protagonism drama – there are other major characters in the story – but there’s no doubt that the journey is his.

In Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid – both characters form one protagonist – and they share the major story beats.

But – In Multi-protagonism drama there are lots of main characters going through this journey paradigm – individually. While the characters in these dramas  may have journeys that touch each other – physically, thematically, or via shape-shifting characters – they are essentially in different stories…

Crash, Short Cuts, Amores Perros, Pulp Fiction, The Hours, Nashville, and American Graffiti are  among films that do this.

Multi-protagonism is more commonly seen on TV. And most notably on the shows that we’re about to be working on – Casualty, Holby City, and Eastenders.

It’s deceptively complex – feels natural and simple.

And It’s a bugger to get your head around.

I could try to explain it here in detail – but that would be the equivalent of passing around the poisoned Kool-Aid.

We spent three very full long days on it this week – and it’s only just beginning to sink in…

So –  just watch the 90 minute pilot episode of ER.

In that – Michael Crichton does it effortlessly and superbly – you love all the characters – they make you laugh – they have mystery – they make you curious – they make you cry – they move and uplift – they shock and surprise. It is hybrid multi-protagonism at its best.  Fill your boots.

(Having just written the phrase ‘hybrid multi-protagonism’ – I realise i’ve dodged the fact there are several different types of multi-protagonism…  Forget the kool-aid – load revolvers now and point them at your temples…)

(and hmmmm… having just re-read – i see that I use the phrase ‘shape shifting characters’ earlier too – without a shred of explanation…  It’s not meant in a sci-fi way – A shape shifting character is someone who appears in different stories in different roles…

For instance – Charlie the nurse in Casualty often has his own story of the week (his son has done something and he has to deal with it.. say .)

But Charlie might also appear, in the same ep, in a junior doctor’s story – acting as a mentor.

And he may also appear, in the same ep, in a guest patient’s story – acting as an antagonist.

And he might also appear, in the same ep, in the hospital porter Big Mac’s story of the week – acting as an ally…

In this sense – Charlie the nurse is a shape shifting character – and he links stories together…

but if that didn’t make any sense I wouldn’t be at all surprised…)

It strikes me now – that i’m using this blog as a kind of therapy. And as a way to try to understand what’s happenedin the last weeks – and what it all means. Which is to say…. I’m as lost as you are…

On thursday it was school trip day. All the acadamites travelled down to the set of Casualty in Bristol.

Lots of the actors were around.

Dr Nick Jordan (Michael French) was looking tall in a big black coat.

Dr Zoe and Dr Ruth-  were smiling, and short, and lovely, and hugging people.

Kirstie, Lennie, and Jay were wearing their working green uniforms and were very friendly.

Dr Adam Trueman passed me going into the toilets as I was coming out. (He seemed as friendly as anyone could while heading into the bogs.)

Everyone seemed happy, and nice, and friendly. (does it feel like i’m setting this up for a nasty pay-off?- ….i’m not.)

Moments/days like this – remind you of how much you love those characters – they’re instantly familiar – and somehow over the weeks and months and years of watching the show – i’ve grown to care about them.

Part of me didn’tt want to meet them. If you discover that they’re arseholes – it’s hard to not change your view of their character…

But that didn’t happen in this case.

Besides, I didn’t see the actors – I only saw the characters – Poor damaged Ruth. Volatile Lenny. Vulnerable Zoe. Ambitious Nick…

The sets too – incredibly familiar.

The highest praise you can give any medical drama is that you’d want to be treated by the characters in their place of work.

This is definitely true of Casualty.

We met the medical advisors on the show – Clive the paramedic expert, Ian a real live Emergency Department Doctor who works out of the Southampton hospital – and Pete Salt – a former nurse – who is the person who the character of Charlie is based on.

They talked about how important to them that the medical stuff in the show is accurate – it’s how the National Health Service is perceived… Dr Ian said that his patient’s often refer to the show during diagnosis… The show thrives best when it is being authentic…

Casualty started in 1986. It’s the longest running medical drama in the world – and nowadays its audience averages 6 million per episode.

When it was first pitched as a new bbc hospital drama back in the 80s – this was the one line pitch:

“In 1945 a dream was born in the National Health Service. In 1985 that dream is in tatters.”

Isn’t that the most perfect and awesome pitch for a show?

(The show was created by a script editor- Jeremy Brock, and a theatre director – Paul Unwin.)

–

We met the script editors, producers, researchers, and writer/showrunner Mark Cately…

Mark is the heart of the show at the moment. He told us not to worry about it all too much. It’s only telly. But he’s clearly dedicated to his work and the show.  He gave us advice. Told us how he started as a theatre writer. He talked about his vision for the show. How he was surprised by how much it mattered to him once he started on it. And how he fought to change it when he thought it was stale a few years ago.

We loved Mark. (He was a human being.)

Mark  graduated from the Writers Academy three years ago.

He is one of us.

He knows.

When we returned from Bristol – it being a friday – booze day – we hit the pub – and drank like fish for an hour or so – but were too exhausted to go on for too long….

It’s been hard work – and rough on the mind.

It must be if it’s affecting our drinking…

This ends the most difficult stage of the course.  Things can only get better from here on in.

Unless, of course, they get worse.

 

 

 

Tony Jordan creates Gene Hunt, Paul Bradley, and the Writers Academy down the pub.

Here we go again – a brain spray of the last couple of weeks on the Writers Academy.

We’ve just completed Week 6  – we have 7 weeks to go.  We are approaching the ‘Mid-Point.’

This past seven days has been the toughest so far (on Tuesday and Wednesday alone – we wrote 2 full 30 minute scripts, two full pitches for doctors, and Scene by scene documents for Holby city.) – But all 8 of us acadamites are still on board…

The mid point represents the point of no return. So we’re now John Yorke’s happy bitches… (Sort of..)

In these last two weeks lecture titles have included the ‘Middle acts,’ ‘Endings,’  ‘Money shots,’ and ‘Twists.’ As always this has been engrossing – inspiring and daunting.

Last week Tony Jordan came to speak with us. Tony has written hundreds of eps of Eastenders, he created Hustle, co-created Life on Mars, and is the man behind Red Planet and so much more. He is, arguably, one of the most successful TV writers alive in this country. And his enthusiasm is infectious and inspiring.

Tony (similar to Sarah Phelps) talked about putting ourselves in our work. The actual phrase he used to explain this was – ‘spunk on your script.’

He said that he could usually tell who’d written a EE episode. EG

– if it started in the dark in the rain with a young woman distraught with make up running down her face – it was usually a Simon Ashdown script.

If it had sharp witty lines – tough black surprising comedy – it was a Sarah Phelps.

Tony told us to ignore everything that John was lecturing about. (and said this with a real naughty twinkle in his eye!)

He explained (rightly) that we’d be told to write only in sub-text and to stay ‘off-the-nose.’ But… that, every so often, people DO speak on-the-nose…

– like when his wife calls him a cunt – and he replies with – ‘but you knew what i was like when you married me.’

He said that we’d be told to make sure that every scene we write moves story forward. But he liked to have some space in his scripts…  That we should have scenes where we just ‘have a wank’ – ie ‘do our stuff.’ A scene purely designed for the writer to have fun in… (Reading this back it strikes me that Tony uses sperm as a term relating to his work quite frequently!)

He gave an example (i hope I’ve remembered this story correctly) – Tony was writing a scene for Frank Butcher in Eastenders. He had Frank go into the Queen Vic, sit at the bar, and hold forth in monologue – his take on ‘women.’ Funny and provocative. It was nothing to do with the story – just five minutes of pure Frank.  When he delivered the script – the scene was cut.

So the next episode Tony wrote – he put the scene in again.  Again it wasn’t filmed.

So the next Ep he put it in again – and again – and again. Until the show’s exec called him in for a meeting.  People were getting fed up with this scene cropping up.

But this scene was what Tony was all about.  Tony believed in this scene.

So he put it in the next script….  It remained unfilmed.

Until – for one reason or another- one of his eps was running short in production – so they had no choice – they filmed the Frank scene.

He didn’t tell us whether it was any good….

We loved Tony.

Tony told us that he starts any piece of work with character. He asks 3 questions about all of his characters –

What do they always do? What would they never do? What is their paradox?

eg –

Always do -Bob goes to church every Sunday with his wife and disabled son.

Never do -Bob would never park on a yellow line.

Paradox -Bob visits Hamburg every fortnight to go to hardcore fetishist spank clubs.

You answer those three questions – and you immediately have the beginning of a story.

He said that if you apply this to the smallest character in your script it can make the whole texture more alive and interesting.  e.g that tiny character in casualty pushing a trolley load of laundry through in the background – give him the three questions and something amazing might happen.

Tony is obsessive about character.

He talked about creating the character of Gene Hunt for Life on Mars.

Tony would go online as ‘Gene’ – fill in consumer surveys – and even job application forms.  At one point ‘Gene’ applied for a job as a security guard in Essex.

The firm liked the idea that Gene was ‘Ex-old Bill’ –

But – One of the questions on the form was – ‘If you discovered an intruder late at night, how would you respond?’ – Gene’s answer: ‘I’d kick his fucking head in.’

To Tony’s delight, Gene got through to the interview stage of that job. (This may say more about Essex than it does about creating a character though.)

Tony talked about creating the Slater family in EE. They got the actors in – got them taking on camera about what they’d do if they won a million pounds. Character quickly revealled through their responses. They noticed that among the ‘sisters’ Zoe was just young enough to be Kat’s daughter – but only if Kat was very young when she was made pregnant…. The back story evolved- it would be the uncle who had raped her when she was a schoolgirl…

The Slater family was introduced with great success – but this back story was buried for 18 months -then the viewers were told the truth – but Zoe wasn’t…

The story fizzed and bubbled  – until it finally burst across a memorable, amazing ‘Slater week’ – beginning with a scene that is as iconic as anything that’s every been in the show before or since:

(The Square, Late night, darkness, two women with mascara running down their faces – Simon Ashdown script)

“You’re not my Mother!” – “Yes, I am!”

In moments like that popular drama becomes bigger than the sum of its parts. It becomes a part of the fabric of life. The Slater family were as real as any family we knew. (For a few weeks at least)

Tony runs ‘Red Planet’ – they look for new work, new writers – but not just any scripts – it has to be the script that you’d write if you only had three months left to live. It has to be that  important to you.

It was very easy to see why Tony has achieved what he has. He left telling us that now we’d met him we were at liberty to contact him any time -get advice –  go for a beer – whatever.

Careful, Tony. You may regret that.

Paul Bradley’s visit as guest speaker (last thursday) was equally interesting.

Paul is a lovely man and a lovely actor. You can see and feel his humanity and lovliness in every character he plays.  He was Nigel in Eastenders – the curly haired best friend to Grant Mitchell – the butt of jokes – an emotional centre.  And he plays Elliot Hope in Holby City.  An eccentric, brilliant surgeon – who is emotionally delicate. A bubble of real humanity. With curly hair.

I’d like Paul to be my best friend and my Surgeon.  Although he did say that while he knows how to take a human heart out of a body – he doesn’t know how to put it back in again. So maybe I’ll settle on best friend.

Paul was funny and generous – telling us about how he became an actor, got into the industry,  made his way… and how his teacher (the late Philip Lawrence) was a major influence – a person who really believed in him.

Paul talked about his love of detail. What he likes to be in the script. How he only does up the collar button on the left hand side of his shirt – because his character ‘lives alone.’

He told us that HE is the custodian of his character -that’s how it works in series drama. He owns it.

He told us some scurrillous stories about EE cast members… A particular lady was particularly bad… (one of her best off screen lines was to a director who asked her to do something: “i’ve been doing this for twenty years so fuck off and don’t tell me what to do.”) He didn’t name her as he didn’t want to speak ill of the dead….

Paul uses different smells to help him perform in certain scenes. He has a scent he calls ‘garage’ that he wears when he’s doing surgery scenes. It reminds him that he is at a place of work.

When asked the difference between acting in Eastenders and  Holby City he said:

“Eastenders is Rock and Roll – Holby City is Jazz.”

He demonstrated his points by making us dress up as surgeons, by strangling Writer Academy dev assistant David Roden – and by getting us to play a silly game.

Although in splitting our group in two for the game he hadn’t guessedat  how mouthy and competitive we’d be – shouting abuse and needling each other.  (After a while he quietly packed the game away with a chuckle.)

Then he gave us some Halloween chocolates.

We loved Paul Bradley.

Being a thursday – and thursdays being our ‘going down the pub’ night – we went down the pub.

The Elstree club doesn’t open until later – so for the last couple of weeks we’ve been going to a local Elstree pub that nestles gently on a busy exhaust fuggy round-about in the shit part of town. (Shit part of town in Elstree is like saying worst serial killer.)

By Thursday we need a drink. All eight of us always attend. It’s an emotionally bonded group. We’re all going through this together. (I think in a previous post I mentioned how one day we’ll be like war veterans reuniting to remember neck-on-line times – I think I may have underplayed that…)

Basically we get quite drunk and review our week while taking the piss out of each other. And after about three pints someone goes and buys twenty bags of crisps.  But in this local pub there’s the added tension of the townies who drink there too.  It’s a lively place…

(Drinking a lot this week was a foolish mistake as we had meetings early the next morning at tvcentre where we were pitching our Doctors stories with a Senior Producer from the show – a large morning pint of Berocca had to facilitate this.)

At some point i’ll go through our group and tell you a bit about them. I really like them all – but we’re good at laughing at each other too.  But that’s for another time.

But… One of our small group – Natasha Langstridge won the Meyer-Whitworth prize this week.  (which is basically best play of the year and awarded at the National Theatre.) When she told us we gave her a big round of applause. Such wonderful news.

When she got back from the ceremony she told us she gave a speech that ended in her calling everyone assembled to ‘have a riot’- apparently they agreed that they would.

Apart from the prestigiousness of the award, and the opportunities it opens up for Natasha – she also won ten thousand quid. We are all so pleased for her.

It was Natasha who bought the crisps this week.

 

 

 

 

 

Planet B, the BBC Writers Academy and Richard Curtis

It’s been an exhausting time – so once again – from a tired nut –  here are some formless thoughts on the last couple of weeks.  (Excuse the chaos of my thinking at the moment – and all the silly grammatical errors.  You wouldn’t be so pedantic to worry about syntax anyway, would you?)

The bbc Academy has been hotting up. We’ve just finished week 4… That means 9 weeks to go.

Each Academy week has a clear structure.

On Mondays and Tuesdays, at Elstree, John Yorke and/or Ceri Meyrick talk about elements of  “Story.”    Act structures, character, dialogue, beginnings, subtext, story history –  etc – all explored in detailed. These ‘talks’ aren’t presented in a prescriptive do-this-and-all-your-writing-problems-will-be-solved style.  They are presented in the form of principles that tend to occur – something to be aware of…  And the argument is convincing.

(A favourite quote from these talks was from Coronation Street  actress Julie Goodyear: “This isn’t a smile, it’s the lid on a scream.”

During the talks we watch clips from popular tv drama and film (British and American) that illustrate principles – or suffer by not abiding by them…  When these examples are from dramas that we don’t rate – we moan and laugh.  When they’re from dramas we like – we cheer and laugh.  Generally, we’re a noisy group  – arguing and laughing loudly.  And sometimes agreeing too.

Our group of eight are split down the middle in terms of experience.  Four are relatively new- backgrounds based in theatre – the rest have ten years plus writing in the industry. But we’re all learning stuff. And fast.

Throughout Mondays and Tuesdays we are given writing exercises – under time strictures.  When the time is up our work is thrown onto a big screen – and gets analysed by the group.

This made us feel vulnerable and self-conscious at first –  having our precious words under intense communal scrutiny… But now we’re balls out about the whole thing – tossing out big ideas, gambling with our style, kicking ego into the corner. All very liberating.

All this is clearly good practice for when we enter the brutal machine of continuing series drama…    (more of that later…)

On Tuesday nights we’re set our homework.  This is based on severalthings  – putting into practise the aspect of story that we’ve been working on, preparing for our dry run Doctors episode (bbc1s afternoon continuing series), breaking down story documents (a first step writing for Holby, Casualty or Eastenders.) And writing scripts.

Wednesdays we write at home.

Thursdays we have guest lectures.

We’ve had some brilliant people so far.

Sarah Phelps – a former core Eastenders writer (she did lots of brilliant episodes including the moving Armistice day ep where Alfie and Nana Moon goto Normandy to visit her husband’s grave.)

Sarah was passionate and vibrant – and told us to spray our musk over our Eastenders scripts – “back up and squirt all over them.”

We loved Sarah.

Claire Powell and Jeremy Howe came in from Editorial Policy and explained their work.  No words are actually banned by the bbc -everything depends on context – but there are guidelines.

The three toughest words to get onto BBC1 are “Cunt” – “Motherfucker” and “Fuck.”

All of which now nestle together cosily on my blog in that last sentence. (And it’s not impossible to get any of them onto BBC1 – if they can be justified.)

Richard Curtis came in.  The man who is responsible for the two most successful British films of all time.  He told us a scurrilous story about Julia Roberts – but instructed us not to tell anyone about it. (My lips are sealed.) He told us how much he hated working on all his films.   What a terrible time he had working on Blackadder. And how he has enjoyed very little of his writing career.

But he said all this with such charm and good humour – that it was hard to entirely believe him.  Richard is someone who loves popular television.  (He referred to his love of the X-factor four or five times in the two hours he talked with us.) He loves Eastenders – and is committed to writing for television as much, as he is for film – perhaps more so… He said he doesn’t give a monkey’s about taught structures -(whilst writing perfectly structured scripts naturally.)

He told us that it was Emma Fielding’s idea to have a funeral in Four Weddings. It was originally going to be called “Four Weddings and a Honeymoon.”

Hmmmm.

Richard told us how important it is to maintain control of our work. Be involved in casting etc.  …Then TV writer Emma Frost came in to tell us how to ‘survive the industry’ – and we soon realised that it’s easy to have control of your scripts if your name is Richard Curtis – and almost impossible if it’s not.

Emma told us lots of nightmarish stories about writing on the big shows. How people tear your scripts apart mercilessly.

I’m looking forward to being dead on a carpet of script covered in script blood at a bloody script meeting – while writing for Holby City.

“Be the most evolved person in the room”  – was Emma’s big tip for dealing with producers/script editors etc…

Thursday nights the group go to the bar. Drink heavily. Exhausted. And laugh about the week – taking the piss out of each other. These can get quite messy – especially, last night, where we were at TV centre – the bar is more lively and we can get home more easily – so stay later… and drink more…

On Fridays we have one-to-one ‘tutorials’ with John and Ceri. Picking over the homework-  assessing how we’re doing. Then we’re set more homework… which we do on Saturdays and Sunday – this really does do our heads in…

That brings me to Planet B – the BBC Radio 7 series that I co-created and have been lead writer on since its beginning two years, or so, ago.

We’d been working on the third series since the early summer. And the studio recording took place last week. By chance the recording of my episode this series was on Sunday – so i was free to attend.

I got my head down and worked hard to do my homework for the Academy on friday night and throughout saturday. There was a lot to do. (And I couldn’t resist attending the West Ham / Fulham match on saturday afternoon – a far from exciting draw.)

Come Sunday – my head was aching with ‘work.’ But the prospect of a day doing Planet B is always a pleasure. It doesn’t feel like real work.

Planet B is a gamey world of exotic and strange soundscapes. It’s dark fun. (Dark fun, as we all know, is the best kind of fun.)  Planet B is a breathe of fresh air. I love working on it.

I arrived at the studio at 9.30. producer James Robinson greeted me with – “Can i have a word?”

…

Planet B’s cast is made up of the RDC – the repertory Radio company that changes every six months or so. (This is one of  the reasons that Planet B cast changes every series – we have to use the Rep actors as they cost us nothing to use – they are retained generally on contract – and our budget is minute.)

James told me that one of the actors was a guy called Adeel Akhtar – a hugely inventive, completely brilliant, comic actor. He played one of the terrorists in Chris Morris’ films “Four Lions.”

James: “I wouldn’t dream of saying this to any of the other writers… but…”

Adeel’s character in my ep was tiny. We didn’t know he’d be so good.

SO…. in short… on Sunday morning – I rewrote thirteen scenes to give him a bigger part.

Maybe it was the Academy that gave me the bottle to have a go at this. Or maybe it was James’ faith. Or maybe I was inspired by having a great performer the other side of the studio glass.  But whatever it was – it made the script better. And I spent all afternoon crying with laughter. (We finished that night at 8pm ish – and went to the pub – I then had to return home negotiating the tube strike.  It is my corpse that is writing this blog.)

The best line I wrote that morning: “I’d have been a sausage roll.”

But you’ll need to hear it in context – Planet B Series 3 Episode 5 – the series finale.

(and R7 will repeat the first two series before then too, I think.)

I’m babbling on now… there’s probably no one still reading… ??

I could probably get away with telling that Julia Roberts story now…

Elstree studios / Eastenders / Holby City

We’ve come to the end of week 2 of the BBC Writer’s Academy. 11 weeks to go. Here are some thoughts – blasted down in no particular order – thrown out of a tired nut, just impressions.

There are eight of us on the course – and last night, after class, we had our first beer together in the Elstree Club bar.  We’re now a bonded gang. (we’ll talk about this course for the rest of lives like traumatized war veterans.)

It’s exhausting – but satisfying. In the bar we were taking the piss out of each other about how tired we were – Andrea was so tired she was hallucinating – she kept seeing grass growing everywhere. It was cold and dark out as we prepared to leave wearily.  Then someone noticed that the time was only 6.55pm.  What felt so late in the night was so early…  So we stayed for another…

In 2 weeks it feels that we’ve come a long way.  Day 1 was new and exciting.  We had a tour of the Holby City set.  It might as well be a real hospital. The authenticity is sharp. (and is based on the floors above where our offices are. We saw Jac Naylor on her motorbike from our window – And all day long people wander around in dressing gowns -extras – it’s not unusual to be queueing behind a man in pjamas in the coffee bar.)

We also went on the Eastenders set. Familiar and strange at the same time.  The square itself is tiny – but has an immediately energizing atmosphere.  (There’s a plaque in the middle: “Frank Butcher, Father, Husband, Pilchard.”)  Most of the houses on the square are merely facades – false fronts – inc the Vic.

But the market is basically real – all the stalls authentic – and Beales chip shop is real it actually works.  We went into the garage, and betting shop, and Indian restaurant – and out onto the allotment area – all tiny.

Then we went onto the studio sets – the launderette, the cafe, the houses, and the Queen Vic interior.  It was like returning home – to a place you’ve never lived – except in a kind of waking dream…

The Vic was post fire refurbishments – when it’s next on screen we’ll see a new downstairs kitchen area for pub catering  – and leopard print covered bar stools.

So -Visiting Eastenders was a real highlight.

We get lots of ‘homework’ – and writing exercises –  but it’s a means to an end. A great opportunity to fail – and when I say ‘fail’ – I mean try stuff out, experiment – and push forward with new writing techniques / structures / ways of telling stories and creating characters….

And we’re getting to meet, and hear, and speak with, lots of visiting lecturers. We had the brilliant Irish director Dearbla Walsh in yesterday.  And  I’m particularly looking forward to Richard Curtis and Emma Freud coming in.  And Jimmy McGovern’s visit will be a great treat, I hope.  But there are so so many more.

It has been compelling and challenging so far. And there’s a long way to go.

We’re now beginning a trial episode of the bbc afternoon continuing drama “Doctors” – We had to pitch them to the Exec producerWill Trotter the other day – he came in and beat us up.

We’re also writing other scripts based on archetypal stories.

Eventually – all this is building to our writing episodes of Holby, Casualty, and Eastenders…  Scary but exciting.

I suppose – all this – is just to say – it’s great.

A last thought – memory, for now…

Yesterday – when we were coming back from the canteen – we passed Dot Cotton. We’d seen the actress June Brown in the canteen days before – but this wasn’t June – it was the character – this was the real Dot Cotton – in full costume, wig, make up, coat… smoking a fag outside – in a fuggy haze of blue smoke…  It was a breathtakingly iconic sight to behold.

Totally took me by surprise.  It’s moments like that… moments that make us go ‘wow’ – that make this whole experience bigger than the sum of its parts.  And long may it continue.

First time

So I wonder how often I’ll actually use this….