After multiple distractions working on other things, I finally completed the retooled version of the 'Life Support' pilot last week. All the fantasy sequences are gone, as are most of the flashbacks and voice over. I have set myself strict rules about how the 'story within a story' aspect works, and it no longer seems overdone. The first ten pages are tighter and get to the point quicker. All in all, I hope I've learned a bit from crashing-and-burning out of Red Planet at the first round. Whether it's a saleable commodity or not, only time will tell - it's very bleak and not very high concept, not the best combo in times of recession, so says Conventional Wisdom (but I prefer his brother Norman).
Talking of RP, I assume the word will be out soon as to who's got the glittering prize; good luck to those still in with a chance! I'm glad I did it - definitely a worthwhile exercise, and now I have a hard-earned pilot script for an hour-long drama series. Everybody wins. Interestingly – alright, semi-interestingly – a 60-minute script is harder than anything else I've tried to write, much harder than 10, 30, 45, 90 or 120. I don't see why this would necessarily be, but I've heard it from other writers too (so it must be true!). Now I know why Holby City has a musical montage at the beginning and the end of every episode!
Since completion of the script, I have done another half draft tidying things up, and the script is at exactly 60 pages, which is probably a little too long for a broadcast slot, so I'll review with a mind to cut two or three minutes of dead wood. Then, it will be ready for a good duffing up's worth of peer feedback before I rewrite it again. Hooray! Onwards and upwards...
Tuesday, 17 February 2009
Monday, 9 February 2009
Going Postal
We all know about character development over the course of a drama, it's something we all strive to do, and to do well. But there's another kind of character development, a rarer, non-deliberate kind, where a character endures in a popular medium through many years, multiple writers or production teams, and through multiple trend changes in that medium and in the wider culture. Big Russell, who I seem to be referencing a lot these days, acknowledges this in The Writer's Tale. It's not so much Doctor Who I'm talking about, though there's an echo of it that series: the changes in The Doctor's look and personality are a deliberate function of an individual script, and they are used to prolong the series beyond the presence of one actor. This is more the other way round, when an actor or character stays in place, and the series changes around them, The whims of unfeeling Father Time, and even more unfeeling New Broom Producer inadvertently cause the character to change, sometimes subtly, sometimes not so much.
For example: Dot Cotton used to be a hell of a causal racist. She's not anymore. We all know why this is, and we know it isn't a deliberate change of character on behalf of any one writer, but it's nice to take it at face value and imagine that maybe life has mellowed Dot in that one particular way. Extremely long-running soap characters like Ken Barlow and Ian Beale are rare, but fascinatingly rich: we've seen them young, and we've seen them grow older, and we may even see their (fictional) death one day. The totality of the character's fiction is bigger than any single imagination, and – like life – it can't really be appreciated as a whole, it can only really be glimpsed in little half-hour shaped pieces.
Some types of shows can throw up quirks when their characters are measured against real life. For example, Ken and Ian at least age. Doctor Who fans have to face up to the inevitability that a Doctor's going to come along that's younger than they are. It'll happen to me (and loads of other people - he's so young!) when Matt Smith takes over at the end of this year (David Tennant is about four months older than me, so I've avoided this until now). The writing is clearly on the wall: the show is bigger than any one of its fans (or writers, or producers, or stars). The fictions will go on, when we're all dust. We didn't know how lucky we were when Who was off air, not to have this ever-present ticking clock to measure out our mortality.
Then, you have to feel for the poor people who work on animations, where nothing and no one ages: I remember hearing one of The Simpsons' show-runners (maybe Al Jean) bemoaning the day that he overtook Homer in the age stakes. Homer may be old, bald and fat, but he'll never get older, balder or fatter (except in the episode King Size Homer, before anyone mentions it: I am aware of King Size Homer). We aren't quite so lucky.
All this is as it should be - if a little maudlin for me, but I seem to be in a bit of a 'Oh Shit, I'm getting old' mood at the moment (must be the weather). But what about when this supra-character development makes a well-loved character less interesting and less rich. What if this process causes character un-development? What the hell – if I might be so bold – happened to Postman Pat?
If you're reading this, you probably haven't seen Postman Pat recently. Even if you have because – like me – you have a young child in the house, you might only have seen the most up-to-date version. But, through the beneficence of his older relatives, and charity shops, my boy has accumulated a collection of these things called videos (remember them?!) from every era of Postman Pat. The show has been going so long, it's like a history of children's television over the last twenty-five years. And therein lies the tragedy.
The earliest episodes are quite slow, have very basic hand-made animation, and no lip-sync. Just one male voice doing narration, and putting on all character voices. They remind one of the Sixties and Seventies stop-motion shows like Camberwick Green and The Flumps, and were clearly a continuation of that tradition. This is the incarnation that my son likes the best.
A few years later, the colours seem a bit brighter, the animation a but slicker, but it still has the same wonky charm. Pat has got married (from the episodes I've seen from the early days, it's not clear what his marital status is, but it looks very much like he's a single man who spends a bit too much time with his black-and-white cat). And on the production side, the first major innovation: a woman has become the co-narrator, voicing all the female characters. Still no lip sync, though.
As the years roll on, the show enters the caring sharing late nineties/early twenty-first century and the changes get more pronounced: lip sync arrives, with different actors/voices for each character. Pat's postal patch, Greendale, which once was a small white rural community of stereotypes (vicar, posh lady, spiv, farmer, old washer woman), is now a much more cosmopolitan town peopled by multi-ethnic and disabled stereotypes. This, depending on your outlook, is either an admirable stab at diversity or Burger King kid's meal gang tokenism, but ultimately the widening of the supporting ensemble allows a broader range of stories, so it seems to be a worthwhile thing . Also, Pat has acquired a son, and the children in the cast are pushed much more to the foreground of the stories. Fair enough, again, it is children's show after all.
The final regeneration brings us to the present day: the show has got a new name - Postman Pat: Special Delivery Service - and a new theme tune (although they still use a section of the original theme at the beginning, you couldn't mess too much with that). And now Pat has kit. With a small 'k', I mean: he doesn't have a talking car. Although that's pretty much all he doesn't have: the SDS allots Pat a van, a motorbike with a sidecar, and a helicopter. He even has a mobile phone and SatNav. If this was a podcast rather than a blog, this is the bit where I would half cough, and half say the word 'merchandising' under my breath. But again, don't think I'm being Grumpy Old Man here. Merchandising is great, kid's TV is no longer the cottage industry it used to be in my day, and my boy has lots of Pat toys which he loves. I wouldn't want it any other way. Plus, it's still a good and well-made show.
But what of the star of the show in all this? What of Pat? Reader, I'm afraid to say, he's become a buffoon. And that's the bit that I don't like. Somehow, all of the changes detailed above have had the effect, without anyone necessarily wanting it to be so, of diminishing the main character's intelligence to a very low level. At the start, Pat is a good postman, who no matter what obstacles are in his way, will always get the letters delivered. He even rises to the occasion with a healthy dose of heroism and derring-do when necessary. By the end, though, he is reduced to delivering one package at a time, which he has an alarming inability to do without losing or breaking what's inside. However, he usually improvises some compromise solution at the eleventh hour, which heavily relies on the good will of the people of Greendale, and he keeps his job by the skin of his teeth.
A favourite example is the episode where there is a film festival, and Pat has to deliver the film can of the single movie they are showing. Pat is racing to get the print to the cinema before the screening, when he drops it in a muddy field and ruins it. The package that Pat has been given responsibility for delivering has not only been opened but its contents have been completely destroyed. And for this, they give the man control of a helicopter? Luckily, Pat's son has been making a home movie during this chaos, and this is what is shown at the festival instead. (This is not like any film festival I have ever been to: I couldn't help worrying for the members of the audience sitting at the back thinking 'I paid £350 for a delegate pass for this!')
I'd love to think that there is subtext at play here: that this is a comment upon the effect of increased technology to erode common sense, or a political statement about the deterioration of the Royal Mail's service over the last twenty-five years. But it isn't. They've just turned Postman Pat into a blithering idiot, and it shouldn't be allowed. Tell someone!
For example: Dot Cotton used to be a hell of a causal racist. She's not anymore. We all know why this is, and we know it isn't a deliberate change of character on behalf of any one writer, but it's nice to take it at face value and imagine that maybe life has mellowed Dot in that one particular way. Extremely long-running soap characters like Ken Barlow and Ian Beale are rare, but fascinatingly rich: we've seen them young, and we've seen them grow older, and we may even see their (fictional) death one day. The totality of the character's fiction is bigger than any single imagination, and – like life – it can't really be appreciated as a whole, it can only really be glimpsed in little half-hour shaped pieces.
Some types of shows can throw up quirks when their characters are measured against real life. For example, Ken and Ian at least age. Doctor Who fans have to face up to the inevitability that a Doctor's going to come along that's younger than they are. It'll happen to me (and loads of other people - he's so young!) when Matt Smith takes over at the end of this year (David Tennant is about four months older than me, so I've avoided this until now). The writing is clearly on the wall: the show is bigger than any one of its fans (or writers, or producers, or stars). The fictions will go on, when we're all dust. We didn't know how lucky we were when Who was off air, not to have this ever-present ticking clock to measure out our mortality.
Then, you have to feel for the poor people who work on animations, where nothing and no one ages: I remember hearing one of The Simpsons' show-runners (maybe Al Jean) bemoaning the day that he overtook Homer in the age stakes. Homer may be old, bald and fat, but he'll never get older, balder or fatter (except in the episode King Size Homer, before anyone mentions it: I am aware of King Size Homer). We aren't quite so lucky.
All this is as it should be - if a little maudlin for me, but I seem to be in a bit of a 'Oh Shit, I'm getting old' mood at the moment (must be the weather). But what about when this supra-character development makes a well-loved character less interesting and less rich. What if this process causes character un-development? What the hell – if I might be so bold – happened to Postman Pat?
If you're reading this, you probably haven't seen Postman Pat recently. Even if you have because – like me – you have a young child in the house, you might only have seen the most up-to-date version. But, through the beneficence of his older relatives, and charity shops, my boy has accumulated a collection of these things called videos (remember them?!) from every era of Postman Pat. The show has been going so long, it's like a history of children's television over the last twenty-five years. And therein lies the tragedy.
The earliest episodes are quite slow, have very basic hand-made animation, and no lip-sync. Just one male voice doing narration, and putting on all character voices. They remind one of the Sixties and Seventies stop-motion shows like Camberwick Green and The Flumps, and were clearly a continuation of that tradition. This is the incarnation that my son likes the best.
A few years later, the colours seem a bit brighter, the animation a but slicker, but it still has the same wonky charm. Pat has got married (from the episodes I've seen from the early days, it's not clear what his marital status is, but it looks very much like he's a single man who spends a bit too much time with his black-and-white cat). And on the production side, the first major innovation: a woman has become the co-narrator, voicing all the female characters. Still no lip sync, though.
As the years roll on, the show enters the caring sharing late nineties/early twenty-first century and the changes get more pronounced: lip sync arrives, with different actors/voices for each character. Pat's postal patch, Greendale, which once was a small white rural community of stereotypes (vicar, posh lady, spiv, farmer, old washer woman), is now a much more cosmopolitan town peopled by multi-ethnic and disabled stereotypes. This, depending on your outlook, is either an admirable stab at diversity or Burger King kid's meal gang tokenism, but ultimately the widening of the supporting ensemble allows a broader range of stories, so it seems to be a worthwhile thing . Also, Pat has acquired a son, and the children in the cast are pushed much more to the foreground of the stories. Fair enough, again, it is children's show after all.
The final regeneration brings us to the present day: the show has got a new name - Postman Pat: Special Delivery Service - and a new theme tune (although they still use a section of the original theme at the beginning, you couldn't mess too much with that). And now Pat has kit. With a small 'k', I mean: he doesn't have a talking car. Although that's pretty much all he doesn't have: the SDS allots Pat a van, a motorbike with a sidecar, and a helicopter. He even has a mobile phone and SatNav. If this was a podcast rather than a blog, this is the bit where I would half cough, and half say the word 'merchandising' under my breath. But again, don't think I'm being Grumpy Old Man here. Merchandising is great, kid's TV is no longer the cottage industry it used to be in my day, and my boy has lots of Pat toys which he loves. I wouldn't want it any other way. Plus, it's still a good and well-made show.
But what of the star of the show in all this? What of Pat? Reader, I'm afraid to say, he's become a buffoon. And that's the bit that I don't like. Somehow, all of the changes detailed above have had the effect, without anyone necessarily wanting it to be so, of diminishing the main character's intelligence to a very low level. At the start, Pat is a good postman, who no matter what obstacles are in his way, will always get the letters delivered. He even rises to the occasion with a healthy dose of heroism and derring-do when necessary. By the end, though, he is reduced to delivering one package at a time, which he has an alarming inability to do without losing or breaking what's inside. However, he usually improvises some compromise solution at the eleventh hour, which heavily relies on the good will of the people of Greendale, and he keeps his job by the skin of his teeth.
A favourite example is the episode where there is a film festival, and Pat has to deliver the film can of the single movie they are showing. Pat is racing to get the print to the cinema before the screening, when he drops it in a muddy field and ruins it. The package that Pat has been given responsibility for delivering has not only been opened but its contents have been completely destroyed. And for this, they give the man control of a helicopter? Luckily, Pat's son has been making a home movie during this chaos, and this is what is shown at the festival instead. (This is not like any film festival I have ever been to: I couldn't help worrying for the members of the audience sitting at the back thinking 'I paid £350 for a delegate pass for this!')
I'd love to think that there is subtext at play here: that this is a comment upon the effect of increased technology to erode common sense, or a political statement about the deterioration of the Royal Mail's service over the last twenty-five years. But it isn't. They've just turned Postman Pat into a blithering idiot, and it shouldn't be allowed. Tell someone!
Wednesday, 4 February 2009
And when it fails to recoup, well maybe...
Reading too many biographies can be bad for one's self-esteem. I've now finished reading about John Lennon. I know his story so well, I think I can summarise it in much less than 800 words. Here goes: born in Liverpool, Dad left, Mum died, lived with Aunt Mimi, School, Skiffle, The Quarrymen, Art School, Rock n' Roll, The Beatles, Hamburg, The Cavern, Parlophone, secret wife, George Martin, Beatlemania, Bigger Than Jesus, No more touring, drugs, great albums, Yoko Ono, Bed Peace, split, primal scream therapy, Imagine, New York, Visa problems, more albums, lost weekend, house-husband phase, Double Fantasy, shot by a nutter.
What's scary is that, aside from the house-husband phase onwards, Lennon had done all of that stuff by the time he was my age. And he only had three and a half years left, poor thing! Now, I'm not John Lennon (though I am working on the hair and the beard), and I'm really not going to start moaning on about quitting again, I promise. I have reconciled myself with the fact that I'll never write for Skins. But the feeling that you've missed the boat is is a natural emotion, and will occur at some time to anyone trying to catch a break in any business as youth-obsessed and hard to get into as the business of show.
Screenwriters as a breed – unlike, say, actors - should worry least about these kind of things; a writer can, after all, keep going until he or she's too frail to hold a pen anymore. And even past that, there's always dictation ( if it worked for Barbara Cartland...). But writers wouldn't be writers if they didn't want to leave their mark on the world. Why else write things down? Success isn't measured in fame or money, but audience. Every writer's got some sort of audience, but every writer would like more of one: every day that that goes by searching for that audience, is a day less getting the word out there, making a mark.
Does any of this matter, though?. If one enjoys the process, indeed if one is compelled to continue with writing no matter what (as is the case with pretty much every writer I ever meet), then would a wider audience make that much difference? Is Emily Dickinson's poetry any less good because hardly anyone saw it during her lifetime? Do good writers sometimes toil away and never find that audience? Is there such a thing as undiscovered talent?
I've always believed that undiscovered talent is a myth, and that true aptitude will very rarely get completely missed by the world, if accompanied by the requisite - and much more important - effort to develop it. I don't know much about Dickinson's life, but from what I do know I believe that it was her own choice not to attempt to publish the huge amount of work she was producing. As proposed in the book I've moved onto, Malcolm Gladwell's erudite and wonderful Outliers, talent is largely mythical anyway. Talent is just a word we have for enthusiasm combined with many hours of hard work combined with the right conjunction of circumstances.
Hmm.. What started off as a moan about getting older but still not having anything on the telly has ended with me dismissing the idea of talent altogether. Can anyone be a writer? Maybe. Anyone - crucially - that wants to, and is willing to put in the hours, has a good shot. As Piers noted last year, the magic number in the research that Outliers references is 10,000 hours. If you haven't done that much, then, in the words of the almighty Moz: you just haven't earned it yet, baby! In the book, Gladwell shoots through the mysticism of 'child prodigies' and 'overnight successes' with some persuasive examples that show that, through luck or through perseverance or both, anyone who's made it big has gained those hours, and anyone pretty impressive is on their way to that total. Lennon and the rest of The Beatles put the hours in playing in the dodgy bars of Hamburg for eight hours a night.
What's the moral of this story? It's all about choices. There's at least 16 waking hours per day: some of them will be used for other important things like day jobs, and family, and chores, and travel. Protect whatever writing time you have left, but accept that however few hours you can put in per week you're doing yourself good. You will envy your peers who have lots more free time than you, and seem to be on the fast track, but that's all just choices. If it's going to take longer to get to 10,000 hours, accept the slow path and enjoy the scenery as you go.
It would be nice though, to be able to read a biography of someone who took their time, and made their mark later in life: any suggestions gratefully received, at the usual address!
What's scary is that, aside from the house-husband phase onwards, Lennon had done all of that stuff by the time he was my age. And he only had three and a half years left, poor thing! Now, I'm not John Lennon (though I am working on the hair and the beard), and I'm really not going to start moaning on about quitting again, I promise. I have reconciled myself with the fact that I'll never write for Skins. But the feeling that you've missed the boat is is a natural emotion, and will occur at some time to anyone trying to catch a break in any business as youth-obsessed and hard to get into as the business of show.
Screenwriters as a breed – unlike, say, actors - should worry least about these kind of things; a writer can, after all, keep going until he or she's too frail to hold a pen anymore. And even past that, there's always dictation ( if it worked for Barbara Cartland...). But writers wouldn't be writers if they didn't want to leave their mark on the world. Why else write things down? Success isn't measured in fame or money, but audience. Every writer's got some sort of audience, but every writer would like more of one: every day that that goes by searching for that audience, is a day less getting the word out there, making a mark.
Does any of this matter, though?. If one enjoys the process, indeed if one is compelled to continue with writing no matter what (as is the case with pretty much every writer I ever meet), then would a wider audience make that much difference? Is Emily Dickinson's poetry any less good because hardly anyone saw it during her lifetime? Do good writers sometimes toil away and never find that audience? Is there such a thing as undiscovered talent?
I've always believed that undiscovered talent is a myth, and that true aptitude will very rarely get completely missed by the world, if accompanied by the requisite - and much more important - effort to develop it. I don't know much about Dickinson's life, but from what I do know I believe that it was her own choice not to attempt to publish the huge amount of work she was producing. As proposed in the book I've moved onto, Malcolm Gladwell's erudite and wonderful Outliers, talent is largely mythical anyway. Talent is just a word we have for enthusiasm combined with many hours of hard work combined with the right conjunction of circumstances.
Hmm.. What started off as a moan about getting older but still not having anything on the telly has ended with me dismissing the idea of talent altogether. Can anyone be a writer? Maybe. Anyone - crucially - that wants to, and is willing to put in the hours, has a good shot. As Piers noted last year, the magic number in the research that Outliers references is 10,000 hours. If you haven't done that much, then, in the words of the almighty Moz: you just haven't earned it yet, baby! In the book, Gladwell shoots through the mysticism of 'child prodigies' and 'overnight successes' with some persuasive examples that show that, through luck or through perseverance or both, anyone who's made it big has gained those hours, and anyone pretty impressive is on their way to that total. Lennon and the rest of The Beatles put the hours in playing in the dodgy bars of Hamburg for eight hours a night.
What's the moral of this story? It's all about choices. There's at least 16 waking hours per day: some of them will be used for other important things like day jobs, and family, and chores, and travel. Protect whatever writing time you have left, but accept that however few hours you can put in per week you're doing yourself good. You will envy your peers who have lots more free time than you, and seem to be on the fast track, but that's all just choices. If it's going to take longer to get to 10,000 hours, accept the slow path and enjoy the scenery as you go.
It would be nice though, to be able to read a biography of someone who took their time, and made their mark later in life: any suggestions gratefully received, at the usual address!
Tuesday, 3 February 2009
Bah! Ill and then Snow
A stop-gap post. Last week, the entire Perry clan was knocked out by the Noro (or Winter Vomiting) virus. That was fun. Then yesterday, I was snowed in. Still working from home as best I can, as the trains up to That London are still recovering.
All this means I have piles and piles of day job work building up, and not enough time (as ever). I had drafted a new blog post, but it was a bit too 'grumpy old man', so I'm rewriting it.
Hope you're all well, and got some writing done/built some nice snowmen yesterday. I might put up the picture of the fine effort that we put together yesterday (he's starting to melt now, and looks a bit too horrific for the young lad to see - a bit like the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark).
All this means I have piles and piles of day job work building up, and not enough time (as ever). I had drafted a new blog post, but it was a bit too 'grumpy old man', so I'm rewriting it.
Hope you're all well, and got some writing done/built some nice snowmen yesterday. I might put up the picture of the fine effort that we put together yesterday (he's starting to melt now, and looks a bit too horrific for the young lad to see - a bit like the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark).
Saturday, 24 January 2009
T is for Television
A lot of bloggers, and even some people in the real world, commented on The Writer's Tale a few months back; but I haven't seen anything yet about T is for Television by Mark Aldridge and Andy Murray, a brief biography and reasonably detailed career overview (so far) of Doctor Who Confidential's own Russell T Davies.
I've just finished it, and it serves as a perfect companion piece to Russell and Ben Cook's weighty compilation of E-Mail trails from last year. Somewhat perversely - but perhaps it was only to be expected - that semi-autobiography is much more searching and critical than this biography; which is not to say it pulls its punches, singling out some Doctor Who episodes, the first season of Torchwood, and a few other works, as not being up to the RTD standard. But also it's a loving tribute to the big, Welsh giant that's revolutionised Saturday night drama, etc. etc.
Russell - in one of many original interviews done for the book - comes over as passionate and contradictory as always. In one breath he is saying he hasn't ever joined the Writers' Guild because he doesn't think of writing as a job; the next, he's bemoaning the artistic temperament of some writer prima-donnas he's known who've forgotten that "it's a job" and should be done professionally. He also might frustrate the aspiring with his contention that it's easier to get into TV writing now than when he started, but he makes a persuasive case.
Obviously, any attempt to cover over forty years of life and over 20 years of career in 240 pages is going to seem a bit sketchy here and there (but that may be because I'm also concurrently reading Philip Norman's monster John Lennon biog which covers Lennon's life - shorter than RTD's, I think - over 800 pages that don't even talk about the music that much); but, there is some light shone into dusty corners of Russell's CV, like his work on Revelations and Springhill, that have not had much in the way of coverage until now.
It's also full of tidbits of advice from the mighty Rusty, as ever: don't just keep an ear out on the bus for living dialogue, check out the TV schedules too, and learn how to identify the really bad dialogue ("I feel hurt, betrayed, alone"); don't dismiss reality TV, or any genre, as somewhere where you can learn more about life, and therefore become a better writer; and, if you've sent off ten dozen scripts and not got anywhere, maybe it's worth quitting and doing something else. And many others.
Anyway, if you come by a copy, I can heartily recommend it; and I'm not even affiliated with its writers, or publisher - I should be getting a commission at least. Oh well.
I've just finished it, and it serves as a perfect companion piece to Russell and Ben Cook's weighty compilation of E-Mail trails from last year. Somewhat perversely - but perhaps it was only to be expected - that semi-autobiography is much more searching and critical than this biography; which is not to say it pulls its punches, singling out some Doctor Who episodes, the first season of Torchwood, and a few other works, as not being up to the RTD standard. But also it's a loving tribute to the big, Welsh giant that's revolutionised Saturday night drama, etc. etc.
Russell - in one of many original interviews done for the book - comes over as passionate and contradictory as always. In one breath he is saying he hasn't ever joined the Writers' Guild because he doesn't think of writing as a job; the next, he's bemoaning the artistic temperament of some writer prima-donnas he's known who've forgotten that "it's a job" and should be done professionally. He also might frustrate the aspiring with his contention that it's easier to get into TV writing now than when he started, but he makes a persuasive case.
Obviously, any attempt to cover over forty years of life and over 20 years of career in 240 pages is going to seem a bit sketchy here and there (but that may be because I'm also concurrently reading Philip Norman's monster John Lennon biog which covers Lennon's life - shorter than RTD's, I think - over 800 pages that don't even talk about the music that much); but, there is some light shone into dusty corners of Russell's CV, like his work on Revelations and Springhill, that have not had much in the way of coverage until now.
It's also full of tidbits of advice from the mighty Rusty, as ever: don't just keep an ear out on the bus for living dialogue, check out the TV schedules too, and learn how to identify the really bad dialogue ("I feel hurt, betrayed, alone"); don't dismiss reality TV, or any genre, as somewhere where you can learn more about life, and therefore become a better writer; and, if you've sent off ten dozen scripts and not got anywhere, maybe it's worth quitting and doing something else. And many others.
Anyway, if you come by a copy, I can heartily recommend it; and I'm not even affiliated with its writers, or publisher - I should be getting a commission at least. Oh well.
Thursday, 15 January 2009
SWF 09 Launch
Lots and lots of lovely people made it to the launch party for the 2009 Screenwriters' Festival at the Channel 4 building on Horseferry Road on Tuesday.
As I stumbled along a dark road near St. James Park tube, squinting at my google-map print-out, who should loom out of the shadows like zombies but Messrs Arnopp, Barron and Clague. It was a mite scary, I can tell you, but also wonderful: it seems no longer possible for me to turn up to any kind of writing do and have to network alone. How good is that?
And as we arrived at the venue, ho - isn't that Mister Beckley, and with him, the Stackster? And Ms Lipton? Oh yes. I hadn't got in there yet, and already I was part of a veritable posse.
Inside, I met up again with Tony Keetch and Elena Fuller, non-bloggers but pitchers extraordinaire. They were both involved in the onstage pitching competition at last year's festival. Indeed most of the ten 2008 pitching finalists made it, including the fellow that later on in the evening won the raffle for a free ticket to SWF '09 (that's two years' running he hasn't had to pay, the lucky thing).
During the pre-talk convivials, I also met David Turner who's pitching this year, and bumped into (and yet again failed, alas, to have a proper conversation with) the wonderful David Lemon and Rachel (next time, I will talk to them, properly and find out Rachel's surname so I don't have to introduce them like a magic act).
Also - as far as I remember, someone correct me if I'm wrong - there was free wine.
After that, were the official talks: Mister Arnopp and David L have both summarised that stuff, so I don't have to strain to remember the details. The message boiled down to this: SWF 09 needs everyone's support to keep going in these difficult economic times, so buy a ticket as soon as you can to help their cash flow, if you want to go ,and if you care about the thing continuing. Fair enough. Sadly, because of a new production I'm involved with - which at the moment is top secret, but I shall post about it when the time comes - it is very unlikely that I'm going to be able to go to Cheltenham this year. There is only one way now open to me that I can see: become swiftly and prominently interesting and important enough to be invited onto a panel. Hey! It could happen...
Anyway, after the talks there were more opportunities for nibbles and a bit of networking and a soupcon of celeb spotting. Most exciting for me was that Michael Wearing was in the house - but I didn't get to talk to him. I'd spotted the tanned, white-haired fellow earlier on and had almost gone up to speak to him. Good thing I didn't, as at that point I thought he was Andrew Davies.
And - I may be mistaken, but I think I'm right on this - there was free wine again.
As I stumbled along a dark road near St. James Park tube, squinting at my google-map print-out, who should loom out of the shadows like zombies but Messrs Arnopp, Barron and Clague. It was a mite scary, I can tell you, but also wonderful: it seems no longer possible for me to turn up to any kind of writing do and have to network alone. How good is that?
And as we arrived at the venue, ho - isn't that Mister Beckley, and with him, the Stackster? And Ms Lipton? Oh yes. I hadn't got in there yet, and already I was part of a veritable posse.
Inside, I met up again with Tony Keetch and Elena Fuller, non-bloggers but pitchers extraordinaire. They were both involved in the onstage pitching competition at last year's festival. Indeed most of the ten 2008 pitching finalists made it, including the fellow that later on in the evening won the raffle for a free ticket to SWF '09 (that's two years' running he hasn't had to pay, the lucky thing).
During the pre-talk convivials, I also met David Turner who's pitching this year, and bumped into (and yet again failed, alas, to have a proper conversation with) the wonderful David Lemon and Rachel (next time, I will talk to them, properly and find out Rachel's surname so I don't have to introduce them like a magic act).
Also - as far as I remember, someone correct me if I'm wrong - there was free wine.
After that, were the official talks: Mister Arnopp and David L have both summarised that stuff, so I don't have to strain to remember the details. The message boiled down to this: SWF 09 needs everyone's support to keep going in these difficult economic times, so buy a ticket as soon as you can to help their cash flow, if you want to go ,and if you care about the thing continuing. Fair enough. Sadly, because of a new production I'm involved with - which at the moment is top secret, but I shall post about it when the time comes - it is very unlikely that I'm going to be able to go to Cheltenham this year. There is only one way now open to me that I can see: become swiftly and prominently interesting and important enough to be invited onto a panel. Hey! It could happen...
Anyway, after the talks there were more opportunities for nibbles and a bit of networking and a soupcon of celeb spotting. Most exciting for me was that Michael Wearing was in the house - but I didn't get to talk to him. I'd spotted the tanned, white-haired fellow earlier on and had almost gone up to speak to him. Good thing I didn't, as at that point I thought he was Andrew Davies.
And - I may be mistaken, but I think I'm right on this - there was free wine again.
Wednesday, 7 January 2009
New Year, New Meme
Happy New Year! I didn't expect to stay away from the blog for the full twelve days of Christmas, but it was a fantastic and furious time: lots of fun, lots of relatives visiting, lots of damn-the-recession fine food and wine, and my son (two and a half years old, so just this year getting what the season means) is still not sleeping properly at night because he is still so excited. I'm exhausted.
It's been mostly a holiday: I've nibbled at various pieces of script work over the last two weeks, but not chomped down hard on any one thing yet (this is a nice analogy isn't it?! Erk!). So, there hasn't been much to post about really. I've produced a whole five pages to reach 25 out of 60 on the Life Support pilot. So, I'm buckling down (or buckling under - whichever's good) to do a bit more before the big bad day job starts again on Monday (when, no doubt, my screenwriting effort will go up, but then I'm a contrary bugger, clearly).
Anyway, Piers has memed me with the 'what are you good and bad at' question: I'd say, from all the feedback so far that I'm better (I wouldn't claim to be good at anything necessarily) at characters and dialogue. I need to work harder on pitching my work, and on handling notes better in a rewrite. I won't pass the meme on, as I think everyone I know has already been passed it by someone else I know. Hello all of you people I know, by the way; you're looking well - is that top new?
P.S. A nice bit of luck - I was one of fifteen Shooters picked out of the hat for the Screenwriters' Festival launch party next Tuesday. Anyone else attending?
It's been mostly a holiday: I've nibbled at various pieces of script work over the last two weeks, but not chomped down hard on any one thing yet (this is a nice analogy isn't it?! Erk!). So, there hasn't been much to post about really. I've produced a whole five pages to reach 25 out of 60 on the Life Support pilot. So, I'm buckling down (or buckling under - whichever's good) to do a bit more before the big bad day job starts again on Monday (when, no doubt, my screenwriting effort will go up, but then I'm a contrary bugger, clearly).
Anyway, Piers has memed me with the 'what are you good and bad at' question: I'd say, from all the feedback so far that I'm better (I wouldn't claim to be good at anything necessarily) at characters and dialogue. I need to work harder on pitching my work, and on handling notes better in a rewrite. I won't pass the meme on, as I think everyone I know has already been passed it by someone else I know. Hello all of you people I know, by the way; you're looking well - is that top new?
P.S. A nice bit of luck - I was one of fifteen Shooters picked out of the hat for the Screenwriters' Festival launch party next Tuesday. Anyone else attending?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
