So you might imagine BBC One's Doctors to be a cosy little drama, full of loveably eccentric physicians riding around country lanes on bicycles and treating lovely old ladies. Here's the TV mag sum-up for today's episode, at 1.45pm:
Jimmi is trapped in the flat of a female paedophile who is dying of emphysema.
Quite remarkable. As ever, I shall be watching. Join me.
Showing posts with label TV watching. Show all posts
Showing posts with label TV watching. Show all posts
Twelve Things A-Happening!
On the first day of Christmas, my true love kicked me in the nuts. But that's another story. Here, for your delight and astonishment, are a dozen vaguely festive morsels. Nine good, one sad-but-celebratory, then another two good ones to end on. Where to begin, hmmm? In no particular order:1) My full Red Planet Prize script, Undying, has long been submitted for the finals. Thanks to everyone who helped me shape it, over the last few months, into what I now reckon is my best work – the one who read several drafts and gave splendid notes; the one who made me lose one of my favourite lines; the one who helped me turn a clunky, creaking plot-point into a well-oiled beauty; and the one who swore at me a lot (okay, yes, that was Phill). While it would naturally be insanely incredible to win, I’ve realised that my Number One goal is to show RP supremo Tony Jordan that I can write. If I can achieve that, I’ll be delighted. So let’s see. There are 72 finalists, but I’m not thinking in terms of odds – it’s not a lottery. If any of the other 71 scripts are better than mine, then I won’t win. Simple as that. And while I'm waiting, I'm going to write another script.
2) Doctor Who Short Trips: Christmas Around The World, the collection of short stories to which I’ve contributed, is quite literally out now. Your yuletide experience will not be the same without it. My story's called Christmas Every Day, and involves people being eaten. TV’s James Moran’s in this tremendous tome too, temporarily becoming The Literary World’s James Moran in the process. His story is a thing of beauty, my friends. And wasn't his Spooks episode a belter? Ooh yes.
3) Lo and behold, I have my first Script Editor credit, on a nifty new short film called Big Mistake. I’ll let its writer/director Dan Turner tell you all about that when he’s good and ready, but it was very instructive and fulfilling to follow the project from start to finish - especially as with Dan being such a can-do dynamo, it happened like a click of the fingers.
4) The sketch show Splendid, run by Dan Turner and actor/writer/radio host Richard Glover, becomes increasingly exciting. We had a meeting a few weeks ago which was simultaneously nerve-wracking and thrilling. Picture this: several writers around a table, each with print-outs of their sketch-scripts. Each sketch gets passed around in turn, then is discussed and placed on either a Yes, No or Maybe pile. As you might imagine, this process can generate a fair bit of anxiety – hence the small vat of red wine I consumed as the evening went on, despite doing rather well with my own efforts. It reminded me of the 1988 Chevy Chase film Funny Farm, which every writer should see. There’s a scene where he gives his novel manuscript to his wife to read (as a wrapped present!), then sits there, watching her every reaction. “What are you doing?” he protests, as she turns a page. “That was a big laugh, right there!”5) My TV spec script Happy Ever After has been receiving favourable responses from the great and good. Comments have included “it is always really useful to know writers who clearly love a particular genre” (in this case, horror), “a cracking read”, “absolute page turner, good sense of jeopardy and wit” and “the best damn thing I’ve ever read.” Admittedly, that last one was me.
6) Look At Me plays Hollywood next year! Yes, the short which I wrote and Dan Turner directed is playing the British Film Fest in May. I am very much liking those apples.
7) Apparitions has become my favourite new drama series of the year, by a fair old margin. Martin Shaw proves he’s underrated as an actor, bringing an infectiously subtle presence to the freaky proceedings. Once upon a time, you could have easily taken the Pepsi Challenge with BBC One and Channel 4 shows, guessing which were which. These days, the likes of Apparitions, with its countless taboo topics, bloody murder and untold blasphemy, are mixing it right up.
8) Developments are afoot on what will hopefully be Dan Turner and I's next film collaboration, the feature Blood Red Sky. I delivered a new draft over the last few weeks, which is drawing us ever closer to our desired feast of scares, shocks and people's faces exploding.9) The Screenwriters’ Festival have announced their 2009 dates! Now, while the event is one of my very favourite things in the calendar, I must confess to being gutted that the next SWF is in October. This is for the best reasons, though – I just don’t want to have to wait another 10 months for it.
10) Before launching fully into the Christmas spirit, I always spare a whole load of thoughts for Ray Palmer. Legendary rock photographer, champion drinker and an utter charmer, Ray was one of my very best friends. Of course, the past tense will have given the game away there: Ray died six years ago today, whereupon I created a tribute site for him here. I’m going for a drink later, and every last one will be in his honour. Especially the sixth. Here’s to Ray Palmer. Clink.
11) Last night, I dreamt that I was in M Night Shyamalan's underrated film The Happening. Or, rather, in the situation: a world being torn apart by an invisible enemy. It was terrifying, seemed to last as long as the film itself and even threw in new details when people started turning into plants. I found myself wishing I'd mastered Piers' intriguing lucid dreaming technique, as then I could have flown or had sex, rather than frantically beg loved ones not to go off in the city by themselves.
12) Six must-read posts on the blogosphere, as we shriek, are Danny 'Stackman Crothers' Stack's illuminating ruminations on Reading, Writing, Networking, Being An Industry Insider, Getting An Agent and Discipline. If you haven't already, then please read them with the ocular orbs in your head which Satan bestowed upon you.
Good day!
Apparitions: Frighteningly Good
A new TV drama series materialises at 9pm tonight, without too much in the way of media fanfare. But perhaps that's for the best. Apparitions is the kind of thing that people will enjoy discovering. Unless, of course, they're sensitive types, in which case they'll probably be horrified and fire off scandalised e-tirades to The Daily Mail.Back in August, you may recall I was impressed by Ben Stephenson's appearance on an Edinburgh TV Festival panel about risk in TV drama. Back then, the man who would shortly afterwards become Controller, Drama Commissioning, no doubt wished he had a promo-reel of Apparitions to show the assembled cynics, in order to stop their bleating about the Beeb playing everything safe. Because Apparitions is quite a remarkable thing for BBC One to air.
Don't worry, no spoilers, but let's just say that certain elements of Apparitions are not so much near the knuckle, as the knuckle itself, in yo' face. There are inevitably, for a series starring Martin Shaw as an exorcist, strong elements of The Exorcist and Exorcist III at play here (along with a hint of The Exorcist: The Fifth, naturellement), along with echoes of the way in which Russell T Davies handled evil in The Second Coming. But as writer/director Joe Ahearne (he who yelled "Cut! on great Doctor Who episodes like Dalek, Bad Wolf and The Parting Of The Ways - and how nice to see a TV drama largely delivered by a one-man powerhouse) has said, this is not so much a crazy gorefest as a psychological piece. Having seen tonight's first episode, I loved the way it combined the subtler, creepier approach with some real nastiness and a fearless approach to taboo subjects.
Apparitions rides a new wave of TV horror drama. This bodes well for me, and any other writer who feels most comfortable when some kind of darkness/intensity is involved. E4's Dead Set may have been a combination of two arguably outdated elements (28 Days Later-esque shaky-cam zombies and Big Brother parodies), but its mere existence was the best thing about it, transcending such quibbles. November 23 also sees the start of Survivors (pictured above), a remake of Dalek creator Terry Nation's 70s series, which also packs quite the punch and really makes me want to go for that flu jab I've been putting off. Long may the new TV Horror Wave Of Doom continue. Certainly long enough for me to wade in and play.
BBC Apparitions press pack, including interviews with Martin Shaw and Joe Ahearne
BBC Survivors press pack, including quotes from creator Adrian Hodges
Peep Show: The Scripts
Tomorrow, a splendid new Peep Show book hits the shelves. Entitled Peep Show: The Scripts and More, it's stuffed full of delights. For a start, it has every single Peep Show script from every single series - yes, all 30 of them. It also throws in some extra, specially-created bits of amusement, such as fictitious e-mails, letters and internal memos between the characters, plus a foreword from stars David Mitchell and Robert Webb.Of particular interest to budding sitcom scripters, though, will be the Genesis Of An Episode segment, at the end. This takes a frank look at how Series Three, Episode Six came to be, changing a fair deal along the way. We get the ultimately discarded Paris-set first draft in its entirety, as well as notes from script editor Iain Morris, producer Phil Clarke and producer Robert Popper. Illuminating indeed. Add it to your Christmas list at once!
In case you missed it, my interview with Peep Show writers Jesse Armstrong and Sam Bain can be found here.
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Spooks & The Unpredictable
Do you have a diary? Flip it open for me, and if you haven't already, insert "Watch Spooks on BBC One" in the entry for next Monday. This weekend, I watched the first three episodes of the new season (in order to write a preview for heat magazine, Kudos lawyers!), and they're as tremendous as I'd hoped.Why do I love Spooks? Let me count the ways. Topping the list, if I'm honest, is Peter Firth's performance as MI5's Section D chief Harry Pearce. The man carries such gravitas and presence, while barely raising his voice above a near-whisper. Rupert Penry-Jones, too, has cemented himself into the show as unflappable action hero Adam Carter. Hermione Norris endlessly fascinates as nails-hard ice maiden Ros Myers, and I can honestly say there isn't a single weak link among the rest of the ensemble.
Spooks' plotting is exemplary, with storylines twisting and constantly rotating to reveal different sides and bigger pictures. Then there's the sheer pace of the beast - it's a rare episode of Spooks which doesn't hit the ground running, at such a fair old clip that you wonder what can possibly happen for the rest of the hour.
Vitally, Spooks is also one of the few continuing dramas where you constantly fear for all of the characters' lives. No-one is safe, as we've seen from a number of shocking fatalities over the past six seasons. This makes it consistently exciting.
Talking about unpredictability, here's something I've realised about my favourite TV characters, who are the aforementioned Harry Pearce, the Doctor, Boyd from Waking The Dead and Vic Mackey from The Shield. Something unites them all: you never know for sure how they're going to react to anything. Perhaps that's something to aspire to as a writer, if you see the appeal in this - creating a character who's well-drawn, but never predictable. Consistently unpredictable, in fact...
Note: Let's keep any comments spoiler-free for Spooks seasons past and present, even after the new episodes air.
Quantum Of Illness
Man-flu has but one benefit. It forces me to do something which I only do when ill: stop working and relax. Sweet lord, when I'm working in TV, execs will love my in-built routine of working, sleeping and precious little else. And this afternoon I'm outrageously excited, because I'm watching the first three episodes of the new series of Spooks, which hits BBC One on Monday week. Spooks and Doctor Who are shoulder-to-shoulder as my favourite UK TV shows, so to get a triple-pack of eps to view is sheer luxury and a privilege. Why, it makes being ill worthwhile. I also have some episodes of top US cop show The Shield to watch, but since this is the seventh and final season, I'm treating them as a nervous crack addict might treat their last few remaining rocks.On Friday night, there was further spy-related action at the world's first screening of the new Bond movie. Quantum Of Solace's title has been amusing me since it was announced in January, but at least there's a rollicking movie behind the multiplex-unfriendly monicker. A high-ranking Sony exec made a pre-screening speech, including the words, "I would thank you for coming, but frankly you should be so bloody lucky".
There'll be no spoilers in this mini-review, partly because I had no idea what was going on at any point. This might have taken the edge off the experience, were it not for the sheer exhilaration of the action scenes. State-of-the-art is a good way of describing them - superbly directed, they excel in the kind of take-your-eye-out mayhem which makes you physically respond by ducking and gasping. Tremendous. As with Casino Royale, the 12A certificate is being pushed to its limit, as Daniel Craig's cold-hearted take on Bond murders his way through a small army.
As I say, the plot seemed overly complex and I really disliked the ending. But at least, unlike Casino Royale, Quantum knew when to end. I'm no Bond buff, but Craig's Bond has definitely piqued my interest: this 007 is more like an '80s action hero. He doesn't say much, is driven by revenge and is a violent bastard. Which I like - at least, in fictional action protagonists.
While I hate to sound ungrateful in any way, having been invited to such a great screening, the event's sole downside was the film industry's ongoing OTT piracy paranoia. Entering Leicester Square's Odeon was like going through an airport, complete with handheld metal detectors, bag searches and demands that we display any metallic contents of our pockets. Thank God they bagged and took my Blackberry away before the screening, or clearly I would have used it to take low-res stills of every second of Quantum, then animated them together, added my own homemade soundtrack and sold it to the Russian mafia. Phew! Close one.
Hollyoaks Hots Up
If you've been toying with the idea of seeing what the Hollyoaks fuss is all about, then this is the week to start watching. A long-running storyline has reached its endgame. Niall Rafferty, a splendidly three-dimensional maniac, is finally taking his revenge on the McQueen family. He's been kidnapping the many McQueen siblings, one by one - and all because matriarch Myra left him on the steps of a church when he was a baby. Bless.
Niall's been a great character. The casual viewer might have caught episodes where he appeared to be perfectly amiable and normal, and his mask doesn't slip. This is emblematic of the show's approach to him, making Niall far more than an obvious, perma-drooling psycho. His front of normality made it all the more shocking when he killed Father Kieron, in a supremely disturbing sequence.
Hollyoaks may still be seen as a kids' show by some, but it's certainly more than that. Right now, it strikes me as the freshest, feistiest, funniest, bravest soap out there. This week, it's also likely to be one of the most gripping. Furthermore, let me tell you this: if Niall kills Mercedes or Michaela McQueen, I shall go every available shade of mental.
Big Brother: What The Housemates Did Next
"This year, 12 million people went into the Big Brother house," said documentary-maker Lee Kern last night, towards the end of the hour-long doc Big Brother: What The Housemates Did Next, "so I haven't got time to put them all into the film."
No, Lee, that's not quite right. You haven't got time to put them all into the film, because you've made an hour-long documentary about yourself, and how funny you are, with some added Big Brother housemates acting as foils to your endless gags.
Cheers for that.
No, Lee, that's not quite right. You haven't got time to put them all into the film, because you've made an hour-long documentary about yourself, and how funny you are, with some added Big Brother housemates acting as foils to your endless gags.
Cheers for that.
Peep Show Writers: Exclusive Interview
Archival note: this interview took place in 2008, but has dated pretty well, due to mainly focusing on the duo's early writing years.
You do know that I love you, right? Like the brother/sister I never had? Well, in case you were in any doubt, I’d like to treat you to an epic, utterly exclusive interview with Jesse Armstrong (on the left, in the picture) and Sam Bain, the creators and writers of Channel 4’s painfully funny sitcom Peep Show.
I recently interviewed the duo in a Clapham boozer, ostensibly for a forthcoming feature in The Word magazine. They’re a friendly, self-deprecating pair, as dryly funny as you’d expect – and like any self-respecting writers, were delighted when I bought them lunch. While The Word’s feature focuses on the story of how Peep Show came to be, and how it works as an entity, I naturally couldn’t resist asking them all kinds of things which would be primarily of interest to writers and would never make the article. I was thinking of you, dear reader. And, clearly, myself.
Sam and Jesse in the early 90s, while on a university writing course in Manchester. After producing various short stories, they spent a while doing their own thing – novels, short films. They finally got together to collaborate on a script in about 1996, and did a few. 1998 saw them start writing professionally, working on various shows until Peep Show finally convinced the world of their genius in 2003.
So when you started work on Peep Show, did it feel like the classic last roll of the dice? A now-or-never type deal?
Sam: In retrospect, that would’ve been quite pathetic, because it was quite early in our careers! But we definitely felt like we’ve been through the mill a bit. We’d done Days Like These, that big ITV show, which really flopped big-time. So that was quite interesting to be around.
Jesse: Then we did another flop – Ed Stone Is Dead, which starred Richard Blackwood as a man who’d died, then come back to life.
Sam: We were part of a large writing team, but it turned out to be another big failure that we were involved with. After those big projects, it was a bit of a fallow time. I mean, we were always doing okay - we would write links for The Big Breakfast…
Jesse: And a lot of sitcoms, which was good training.
Sam: We know a lot of writers who have real talent, but haven’t had their own original sitcom. And that’s just because they haven’t had the confluence of the right people, the right commissioners, the right production company. It’s a real piece of luck when you can get everything to work, and it all comes together.
Bedsitcom is one of the entries on your pre-Peep Show CV…
Jesse: There are a number of people who have been really important to our careers. Andrew O’Connor was a producer who went on produce Peep Show. But before that, he developed a couple of projects with us, and believed in us when we were at our lowest ebb. That’s when you need the money and the support. Bedsitcom was one of the shows we helped him out with.
And how was working on Smack The Pony?
Jesse: That was one of the ‘jobbing writer’ things we did before Peep Show. I don’t think we ever thought we were particularly good at writing sketches, but it was our first experience of telling people in a pub about a show you’d written for and they’d go, “Oh! I’ve seen that”. So that was quite a nice feeling – to work on a quality show. We’d worked with lots of good performers, but Smack The Pony’s were at the cool end of comedy, rather than the… less cool end.
You knew Peep Show stars David Mitchell and Robert Webb before Peep Show, right? How did that come about? Jesse: We were all part of a writing team experiment at the BBC. We liked them a lot and we had a show which we wanted to write for them. The four of us wrote episodes for the BBC with Gareth Edwards. It was a really good show – a bit like Peep Show, in the sense that two guys shared a flat, and they were a bit like Mark and Jez. There was also a Super Hans figure! It was a helpful process to develop a show like that – we got a sense of Robert and David’s voices, and spend a lot of time collaborating with them. They’ve really got their DNA into Peep Show, because we’ve got similar comic sensibilities. Not always, though – they write amazing sketches that we could never come up with. There’s just a big common ground of comedy stuff that we know from that period – what works for them and what makes them laugh. Not only how they speak, but good comic things that they appreciate. It was an incredibly important and fertile period for us. There are plots and idea and vibes that we still go back to now and plunder.
Did you cannibalise any of it for Peep Show?
Jesse: We did, actually. The Peep Show episode where Mark’s sitting on the toilet at the end is a more developed version of something we originally wrote for that show.
What are the main benefits of writing as a duo?
Sam: With comedy, if the other writer is laughing, you know you’re onto something. It’d be so hard otherwise. You get constant feedback.
Jesse: It’s a morale thing, because it’s quite tough when you’re starting out. It’s good to have someone to talk to and laugh with, about the constant disappointments! With two people, as well, if one of you isn’t having a great day, you can still keep going. It probably triples your output, at least, because you’ve always got double the ideas and can work things out together. As long as you’ve got the same work ethic and sense of humour, it’s gold.
So how does your writing system work? Is one of you the typer, while the other one paces around?Sam: For the actual writing, we use the same method as Richard Curtis and Ben Elton used on Blackadder. We write separately, then cross-edit. But when we are breaking plots, one of us will write stuff down. Often Jesse, because he types faster.
Jesse: I do have a good typing speed. I think that was one of the things Sam originally liked about me. He thought, “This guy can really type!”.
What’s your estimated words-per-minute speed, Jesse?
Jesse: Wellll… it’s not amazing. I’d say 45 words, tops. But on a good day, I go like the wind!
So does one of you ever say, “Hold on a minute, why did you rewrite my scene involving the goose-heads in a bag? That was hilarious, you bastard!”.
Jesse: That’s what collaboration is. We have three of those moments, per page! Co-writing works because you’ve found a way of negotiating difference of opinion. Of course, it’s not always three moments per page. Sometimes I’ll send a scene to Sam and he’ll completely re-write it and I’ll be very pleased because I know it wasn’t totally working. Equally, sometimes you might think, “Hold on, I thought that
You must have a pretty good shorthand with each other by now.
Sam: Or, in our case, “shit” or “acceptable”.
If you ever reach a complete stalemate, does the readthrough ever become the decider?Sam: Yeah, actually, sometimes you do that and see what happens.
Jesse: Often, like a lot of writers, we overwrite. It becomes a difficult decision, as to what to cut and what to leave in. That can often be the most painful part of the process. Up until that point, everything’s like, “Well, give it a go, try it that way – we can always put it back”. But as you move towards that final script, you know that if a joke goes, no-one’s ever gonna see or hear it. That’s why the readthrough is really great, because you know when something’s working or not, and that’s illuminating.
There’s bonus behind-the-scenes readthrough footage on the Peep Show Series Five DVD, which makes it look like you’re all having a right old hoot.Sam: We only film the laughter, of course! Not the uncomfortable, painful silences.
Jesse: It probably looks pretty self-congratulatory, because we all like each other in the room! And our director Becky Martin is a good laugher. It’s important to hear people laughing when that material’s first done.
Sam: The readthrough is make-or-break for us. If a script dies, you have to start again. It happens.
Does the readthrough freeze your guts with terror?
Sam: It’s scary and exciting. We often end up heavily rewriting at least one episode after the first readthrough. Last series, we did major surgery on a couple. We expect that, so it’s not a huge surprise. Obviously it’s disappointing because you want it all to be perfect, but it never is.
Jesse: What often happens is that the episode you thought was great ends up lagging behind and becomes the runt of the litter. You’re like, “Shit! I thought that episode was great, but now it seems to be crap!”.
Did Peep Show’s POV concept go through Channel 4 quite smoothly? Or did someone go, “Christ, I don’t know about that?”
Beyond Peep Show’s neat camera-POV gimmick, it’s Mark and Jez’s internal monologues which really make the show work and make it special. It’s a different approach to the comedy of recognition - revealing people’s lowdown, dirty thoughts, which we might often be ashamed to admit we share. Are human beings that rubbish, or is it an exaggeration?
Jesse: It is an exaggeration…
Sam: We all think reprehensible thoughts. I certainly do, as much as possible.
Jesse: We could have people thinking nice, kind thoughts, and it might be a more accurate picture of the average person. But it really wouldn’t be as funny.
How did you feel when the first episode of Peep Show went out?Sam: And we would’ve been saying, “Yeah, we still know them. They’re still nice to us!”.
Jesse: Sean Lock had a show on at the same time as ours. We thought it was a great show, but it never really ‘arrived’. Our show could’ve so easily been like that.
Sam: Our show is quite small. But after five series, you feel like you have some little place in the culture. You feel as though everyone who might like Peep Show has had a chance to watch it.
I’ve hardly ever met anyone who doesn’t like Peep Show.
The character Jeremy is hilariously selfish. Was it ever a concern, though, that he might become too unlikeable?
Any other learning curve realisations, after the first series?
The media’s partyline on Peep Show is that it has fairly poor viewing figures, but does well on DVD. How true is that?
Sam: It doesn’t really bother us that much. The show keeps being commissioned, we get good reviews. We’re not too worried about beating Jonathan Ross. It’s a good position for us to be in.
Jesse: Channel 4 has been pretty good for us over the years. It would be nice to give the people that we deal with there, like [Channel 4’s head of entertainment and comedy] Andrew Newman, a birthday present in terms of a massive viewing spike. But on a creative level, the main thing is to have the respect of people who I respect. People who I like, like the show.Sam: We’ve been very supported by Channel 4. They’ve never said, “You’ve got to buck your ideas up or we’ll cancel!”. The only thing they ever did was suggest we put a sexy girl in the second series – which turned out to be the American character, Nancy. But that wasn’t even exactly about changing everything: it was about maybe getting a few more viewers.
Jesse: Luckily, we’d had the sexy girl idea anyway.
Mitchell and Webb are credited with additional material on the show. How does that work?Jesse: Before each series, we have a “plot party” at one of our houses. We tell them things we’ve been thinking about, and they tell us what they think of storylines. They offer up ideas and maybe things develop out of that. At the other end of the process, we’ll often send them a script that we’re not happy with and they’ll suggest lines. It’s nice for us to have input from their very good comedy brains and to know they’re available.
I noticed that one episode in Series Five was written by Simon Blackwell – a different writer, for the first time…
Jesse: It wasn’t mentioned in the Radio Times, which was unfortunate, because Simon’s brilliant. It was something we’d been toying with for a while, wondering if Peep Show was too personal. But he did such a brilliant job. We storylined the episode with him, so we still felt involved! Most people wouldn’t have noticed a difference, good or bad. It was such a shame he didn’t get credited more widely.
So how did that come about? Was it a time thing?
Jesse: We’re very collaborative – there’s always been a big committee around. We like having a lot of comedy brains around, so it wasn’t really such a big deal, having someone else come in and go that extra step. Although it actually
It must have been nice, when Series Five was commissioned while Series Four was airing.
Sam: Did we?
Jesse: Oh, didn’t I tell you?
Series Five’s final episode was quite brave territory, I thought, in the sense that Jez joins a cult which could be interpreted as a Scientology affair.
Jesse: Well, we’re both in a cult. So that was handy.
Sam: People have asked if it was all about Scientology, and we thought about doing that. But we didn’t know enough about the subject to do a specific satire of Scientology. It’s just about that world where people go into these places and feel a little wobbled and changed. It felt like a good area to do – especially with Jeremy. I did a ‘personality test’ about ten years ago, while researching a script. It was an emotional experience, which was the jumping-off point for the story. I went in there, not really knowing what I was dealing with, and leaving feeling quite emotionally raw. You go in there, thinking you’re going to patronize these idiots. Then you come out thinking, ‘Maybe my life is all a failure. Maybe I should call my mother and apologise. Oh my God, I need a drink!’. The most interesting scenes, for us, were when Jez was going in and coming out. We only did one scene where he was fully fledged.
How would you sum up your experiences in writing the film Magicians, which also starred Mitchell and Webb, but sadly didn’t do especially well at the cinema box office?Jesse: It was fascinating and Andrew O’Connor directed it, so it was nice to hang around him and David and Robert. It’s hard, getting a film to sustain over 90 minutes. The thing we always think about sitcoms is: if you get a tone that works, most other things will follow from that. Most shows fail, and a lot of them don’t have a certain tone. With film, you don’t get much of a chance to finesse your tone.
Sam: There are no pilots for films.
Jesse: Yeah, you get one shot. We like a lot of things about Magicians, but you need a lot of time to make something really good. We feel like it’s a piece of work that we’re not unhappy that we did. We’re glad we did it and it’s a good film in many ways, but we did learn a lot from doing it. God, I sound like a politician! But it was hard: there were bruising reviews for it, and that was quite tough. A lot of that came from being a well-loved TV show – and because it had David and Robert in it, comparisons were naturally made.
Sam: Everybody mentioned Peep Show. The irony was, we got the film made because of Peep Show, but it was never anything like Peep Show. So everyone was disappointed. That’s a very difficult thing to overcome.
Jesse: It’s one of those films which didn’t take off, but it doesn’t mean we don’t want to do more. We definitely intend to write more films. Just because one film doesn’t take off, doesn’t mean you can’t do the next one. We’re doing rewrites for American films at the moment.
When Magicians was released last year, there seemed to be a mini-wave of magic-centric flicks, with The Prestige and The Illusionist.
How does Peep Show fit into the TV comedy landscape?
Sam: Gavin & Stacey might be that breakthrough show. It feels like it could do that. It’s not in-your-face like Nighty Night, which ripped your head off and shoved it up your arse. It’s more characters and relationships, which works very well.
Can you see Peep Show mellowing any time soon?
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The Power Of Returning Series
Everyone loves a good TV drama serial - and the recent Criminal Justice, aired across five consecutive nights, was a very good TV drama serial. Yet there's something about the returning series - and I'm including "continuing drama" here, or soap, or whatever you want to call it - that can really deliver an unbeatable punch to the gut. I'll be stating the obvious here, but more in celebration of the art-form than attempting to make some big revelation.Last night, I watched the final episode of a returning British TV drama series. It's one of the shows I need to catch up on, because I want to write for it. And one of the regular characters got killed. I'd been warned that this particular show had a somewhat ruthless approach to its regulars, but it was a big shock nonetheless. Not just because it was a surprise and a Big Moment, but because I felt I knew this character so well. After all, I'd spent a total of approximately 26 hours in their company. I'd watched them win the day, be a hero, be totally depressed and generally ponder their own existence. I'd done time with this person. Then, the next thing I knew, their corpse was being dragged out of a room. That's a big "ulp" moment, right there.
That's one of continuing drama's real strengths - big moments that really mean something, due to the amount of time we've devoted to the show. When it's done well, the viewer virtually feels grief. I felt like that last night. And Christ, don't even get me started on incredible US cop show The Shield (pic above). At the end of one of its seasons, something terrible happened which I still don't think I've come to terms with. I'm probably still in denial.
Warning: if anyone mentions Ethel Skinner from EastEnders, I will weep.
Have A Peep
Peep Show is endlessly watchable. Shot entirely from the points-of-view of various characters, it's a brilliantly observed browse through the thoughts inside our heads which we'd really rather not admit we have: the deeply rubbish dark side of human nature. Remarkably, 30 episodes of Sam Bain and Jesse Armstrong's top sitcom now exist, and the latest six are out now on DVD, under the collective heading of Series Five.Commissioned at the same time as Series Four, it's a fine collection, offering all the uncontrollable belly laughs we've come to know and expect. There's only the slightest of story arcs, as Sophie slowly falls to pieces, having been jilted by Mark at the end of the previous run. Mark and Jeremy's drug-crazed mate Super Hans features quite prominently, which is a good thing as he tends to bag some of the best lines ("Jez, you can tell me, as someone who knows me well... is the bottom half of me on fire?").
As usual with Peep Show DVDs, there's a healthy collection of extras (and there has to be, given that you can watch all five series of Peep Show for free with this little beauty). One behind-the-scenes piece is of particular interest to us writers: Bain and Armstrong guide us through the production process, including ideas generation, cast rehearsals and readthroughs, all the way to shooting on set.
Then there's a relationship guide for all five series of the show, some deleted scenes and, interestingly, some unused Series Five scenes from Sophie's POV.
Bain and Armstrong will be appearing at next week's Screenwriters' Festival. For which a mere 75 tickets remain available.
UPDATE: Bain and Armstrong have had to cancel, due to work commitments. Gah! And 53 tickets are now left...
Toby Whithouse Interview, Part Three
Here's the final instalment, folks. Thanks to Toby for agreeing to this exclusive Q&A. If you need to catch up, you'll be wanting to read Part One and Part Two.
How many episodes will comprise Series One of Being Human, and when will it air? Did you write any of those episodes while waiting for the green light, in an optimistic state of mind?
It's 6 x 60 mins. As I said, the BBC kept Being Human in development even after it was originally overlooked. I was commissioned to write another episode - what would in theory be the first episode of the series proper. Though I confess after we didn't get the commission, it did rather knock the wind out of my sails. But I carried on, nonetheless. And it meant that when we finally got the nod, I'd already written the first draft of the first episode.
Do you have a writing routine? Do you, for instance, work with concentrated intensity for three hours a day, or all day, every day like some breed of madman?
I approach it very much like a job. I start at about 8.30am and finish about 5pm. But the best time of the day is certainly the first three hours. That's when I write best. Everything after that is diminishing returns. Also, bear in mind, between 8.30am and 5pm, there is a lot of surfing, emailing, talking to my friend Harriet, weeping, tea drinking and perhaps a crafty nap.
Certainly now I'm writing Being human full time, I'm a little more disciplined. There is a heap of work to get through, so generally my days involve a lot more writing and a lot less porn.
What advice would you give to screenwriters hungry for their first TV credit?
Never write for an audience. It sounds odd, but you have to get yourself into a state of mind whereby you're imagining that whatever you're writing will never get made. The reason is, you need to develop your style and your voice, not ape someone else's. And the best way - I found - to do that is write without worrying about getting a commission.
There will be plenty of occasions, once your career is up and running, when you'll have to adopt a house style on a show. Every show I've written on that I haven't originated, I've had to write in the style - albeit with my own colours and twirls and nonsense - of the show. But the thing that will get you those jobs is your calling card script. Be it a play, a feature, a sit-com, a single drama. And that script has to demonstrate your own unique voice. And I found the moment I stopped writing for an audience, but for my own enjoyment, my voice started to develop.
That doesn't mean to say you shouldn't have writers you admire or are influenced by. But you should let these people inspire you rather than form you.
The original Being Human BBC press office page
The BBC press office announces the full-series commission
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My Amazon-acclaimed non-fiction ebook How To Interview Doctor Who, Ozzy Osbourne And Everyone Else is out now on Amazon UK, Amazon US and Amazon.de. Amazon Prime members can also rent it for free. Full details here, you splendid individual.
Toby Whithouse Interview, Part Two
Part One began yesterday, here.
What was the score with the season of six BBC3 pilots, of which Being Human was one? Some perceived it as a competition, in which only one series would receive the green light.
Hmmmm. Good question. Yeah, I think it was a competition. But to be fair, every round of commissioning is a competition. The only difference is this time the submissions were filmed and broadcast.
There are pros and cons to piloting shows. For the broadcaster, it allows them to try something out and see whether it appeals to the audience, instead of green-lighting a series of eight and then finding (as we've seen happen quite a lot recently) the show tanks in episode two, but you've still got weeks and weeks left of episodes to transmit. And for the writer, it's like a lottery - you have to be in it to win it, as they say - and you never know, you might be the one...
But - and it's a big but - the problem is, if a show is piloted and turned down - the chances of getting another broadcaster to pick it up are very very very slim. Often, scripts that have been developed and turned down by one broadcaster will be picked up by another. Channel 4 developed and then passed on Life on Mars, for instance. Then the BBC picked it up. But if a pilot has been made and broadcast, then it's very difficult to get another channel interested.
Personally I'm not in a hurry to repeat the experience. But to be fair, I'd be surprised if the BBC were either.
How much pressure does it add, when you publicly air a pilot for approval or otherwise?
Well, under normal circumstances you make a show and it gets transmitted and the public either watch it or they don't and that dictates whether it gets commissioned / re-commissioned / repeated / buried in a lead lined casket. Consequently the public's approval is absolutely crucial. In this instance it's well known that the decision about what show would be commissioned was made before the pilots were aired, so the pressure was different.
In America obviously they make dozens of pilots and the various networks make their choices. But the pilots aren't broadcast. It's different for the BBC, because they're a public service broadcaster. They can't spend millions of pounds of license fee making a series of pilots and then not show them. In America, the networks are private companies, so they can spend their money doing what the hell they please.
I had a similar experience with Channel 4. They did a series of sit-com pilots recently, and I wrote one of those. Despite it being well received, the channel didn't choose it. Even though Being Human did eventually get the nod, it was an incredibly frustrating process. Writing the script was the easy bit. Consequently I don't think I'll be letting any more of my shows get piloted.
But you know what? Even though the rules of the piloting competitions are vague and ever-changing and sometimes feel unfair and baffling - ultimately, we all knew what we were getting into. I assume that every one of the shows that were piloted, were - like Being Human - being developed as series at the BBC, and no one put guns to our heads making us enter our scripts for the pilot scheme. So even though I'm not a fan of the pilot system - at least not the way it's done in this country - I can't complain about it.
How true is it to say, as many have speculated, that Being Human got the go-ahead because of a real groundswell of support, post-transmission?
Weeeeelllllllll, the BBC have acknowledged that Being Human struck the strongest chord with the audience. And, to be fair, even though we didn't get commissioned the first time around - when Phoo Action was commissioned - they did keep Being Human in development. I have a feeling most of the other shows were officially and definitively turned down at that point, but the work on Being Human did continue. Also, none of us were prepared for how strong a reaction it would get. That took us all by surprise. I think if Being Human had just sunk like a stone in a pond, then maybe things would have been different. But it would have been pretty weird for the BBC to ignore such an extreme reception. So I'm enormously grateful to all the people that reacted so positively to the show.
In tomorrow's final instalment: Toby's writing routine and tips for budding screenwriters.
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My Amazon-acclaimed non-fiction ebook How To Interview Doctor Who, Ozzy Osbourne And Everyone Else is out now on Amazon UK, Amazon US and Amazon.de. Amazon Prime members can also rent it for free. Full details here, you splendid individual.
Toby Whithouse Interview, Part One
First, some history. Toby trained as an actor at The Guildhall School of Music and Drama. His first play, Jump Mr Malinoff Jump, won the 1998 Verity Bargate award. It was the opening production at Soho Theatre in 2000, and has since been adapted for radio. His second play Blue Eyes And Heels was produced there five years later. For television he has written on Where The Heart Is, Attachments, Hotel Babylon, Doctor Who, Torchwood, The Armstrong and Miller Show. He wrote Other People for the C4 Comedy Playhouse season. And then, of course, there's Being Human...
What can you tell us about the genesis of Being Human as a concept? Did it spring from that hold-it-in-your-hand idea of "A vampire, a werewolf and a ghost share a house"?
I was approached by Touchpaper - an Independent TV company. They wanted to develop a drama series about a group of friends who buy a house together. To be honest, I wasn't exactly electrified by the idea. I rather felt this was territory that had been visited often before - in shows like This Life - so was on the verge of saying a polite no.
But then strangely, completely unbidden, three characters kind of dropped into my head. It was very odd and believe me it never normally works like that. But there they were, these three characters, fully formed. So I wrote their biogs (a couple of pages per character, describing their background and personalities, their lives and loves) and gave them to Touchpaper. They liked the characters, so we started developing the project.
There was still something missing. We spent months knocking ideas around, trying to get a story-line for the first episode, but nothing worked. We decided to have one last meeting and if nothing came of it, we'd call it a day. And half way through I said "You know, what we could do... is make George a werewolf, Mitchell a vampire, and Annie a ghost..."
I should explain, that suggestion didn't exactly come out of nowhere. I'd been developing an idea for a odd little rom-com about a werewolf, called Mild Thing (I literally just cringed). It was a bit of a guilty secret pleasure. I had grown up addicted to comics and British Sci-fi and Hammer Horror and John Wyndham and so on. But for years there hadn't been a place for that genre on British TV.
Anyway. Strangely, the three characters transposed very easily into supernatural creatures. Mitchell, in his original incarnation, was a recovering sex addict. That translated easily into a vampire who has decided to renounce his nature and is struggling to live a life without blood. George was punctilious and house-proud and fastidious and cautious. Again that worked well for someone who constantly strives to keep the 'chaos' of his curse at bay. While Annie was shy and awkward and lacking in confidence, and there can be no greater knock to someone's confidence than having died.
I wrote a version of the script that was wildly different to what eventually hit the screen. This early draft was really more of a sit-com. The characters were much more established - they already had the house and nice jobs.
After it was done, myself and the producers looked at it and we all agreed it wasn't quite right. So I started again from scratch. I moved all the characters much further back in their stories, and changed the whole tone of the show. I'd written the first version as a comedy, and for the next version I decided that tonally it should be more like a low budget American Independent film. As soon as I did that, it was actually the easiest script I ever wrote.
To what extent did being the creator of No Angels, and writer for the likes of Hotel Babylon and Doctor Who, make it easier for you to then dangle the idea under BBC noses, like some glorious carrot?
Well, in this case, it was the BBC that commissioned the initial idea of the flat-share in the first place. So the door was already open. But in answer to your question, ultimately it's the quality of the script and the strength of the concept that will determine whether or not it gets made... one would hope. Though it'd be disingenuous of me to say that being connected with successful shows doesn't help.
Have sci-fi and horror elements become more accepted in British TV drama? If so, what can we attribute to that change?
I think you can trace it back to Doctor Who, which proved that something high concept can cross into the mainstream and pull in the viewers. If the return of that show hadn't been the success it was, I think sci-fi and fantasy would still be in the wilderness. Before, had you pitched a supernatural or sci-fi project to a broadcaster, they probably have called Security. But suddenly there was - if not an appetite - then certainly a cautious interest in those types of show.
For broadcasters, viewing figures will always be the bottom line. They will follow success, and so unsurprisingly, they wanted to see if they could replicate the popularity of Doctor Who with other formats and shows. Being Human, Primeval, importing Heroes, remaking The Prisoner, Survivors and Blake's 7 - it's unlikely any of these things would have happened if Doctor Who hadn't been such a hit.
Tomorrow, in Part Two: the pressures of publicly-aired pilots, and how Being Human got the green-light for a full series...
The original Being Human BBC press office page
The BBC press office announces the full-series commission
***
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Awesome To Awesome
I couldn't make yesterday's Q&A with Ashes To Ashes creators and writers Matthew Graham and Ashley Pharoah, due to some last-minute Doctor Who-related work. Which was a big shame - especially as I'd rush-watched the series in order to avoid any spoilers. I didn't even watch the whole thing - just episodes 1, 2, 7 and the climactic 8.Don't worry, there'll be no spoilers here, in case you're waiting to catch up with it upon its May 5 DVD release, or simply from your DVD Recorder's hard drive. All I will say, is that this show probably is better than Life On Mars - funnier, more vibrant and even more clever. And one particular revelatory scene in ep 8 is one of the most brilliantly bizarre and chilling things I've ever seen in a TV drama. Superb stuff.
On promo discs for the DVD set, I've seen a fine documentary which looks into the making of the series. I'd never seen the real-life Gene Hunt, actor Philip Glenister, speak before, and it was interesting to see that he appears to have little of Hunt's accent, swagger or confidence. And yes, I do realise that this is what actors do. But I think that this slight, apparent shyness in Glenister probably accounts for Hunt's likeability, despite the character being a sexist, brute-ish anachronism. You can see that Hunt's really an insecure little boy in a brusque, burly shell, and his hilariously tense interactions with Keeley Hawes in the episodes I've seen so far were a joy to behold.
Series Two must happen. And who's posting a report of yesterday's Q&A, hmmm?
Save The Human... And Read Sofia's Diary
Having finally caught up with Being Human, the BBC3 drama written by Doctor Who scribe Toby Whithouse - centring on a house shared by a vampire, a werewolf and a ghost - I'm happy to add my voice to the chorus of bloggers like Piers, Rob and Oli who want to see the February pilot spawn a full series. Piers has a suggestion for the best way to make it happen. He is also a bastard for making me drink white wine last night. I don't drink white wine.
Blog-lord Danny Stack is as busy as ever, penning 20 'webisodes' of Bebo's new online drama, Sofia's Diary. The first three instalments are up for our perusal - all of which are Danny's. It's sharp stuff: a well-observed journey into the teenage mind. Loved the drug lecture in Episode Two. I also recommend you sponsor Danny on his forthcoming chariddy run - it'll make you feel good, without having to even break sweat. Here's the great man's fundraising page.
Blog-lord Danny Stack is as busy as ever, penning 20 'webisodes' of Bebo's new online drama, Sofia's Diary. The first three instalments are up for our perusal - all of which are Danny's. It's sharp stuff: a well-observed journey into the teenage mind. Loved the drug lecture in Episode Two. I also recommend you sponsor Danny on his forthcoming chariddy run - it'll make you feel good, without having to even break sweat. Here's the great man's fundraising page.
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