Festive wishes from the Sitcom Skirmish

There's less than twenty four hours to go until Christmas Day. Our journey has only just begun but we're looking forward to sharing more of it with you in the new year. Until then, we'd like to wish you the best of festive holidays and a little Christmas entertainment.

Are You Being Served 'Naughty Santa'

(Please note that we are not connected with the supplier of this clip which came from You Tube.)

Thanks, But No Thanks

The BBC in their finite wisdom have decided that they and our first pilot script are not destined to be. We, being optimistic by nature, see this not so much as a rejection as a passer by on the street not wanting to become instant best friends. We see this not as an ending but merely as another step along the path.

We intend therefore to move onto the next viable inroad into the world of production and shall keep doing so until an accord is reached.

For those that are interested, the returned manuscript came with a letter to say that the first ten pages were reviewed and that they do not wish to continue further. At this stage they do not offer any feedback but hope that the experience doesn't stop you from submitting further material for review. Without any feedback and a belief that what we have created is of a commendable standard we can only presume that the style and/or subject matter is not what they are currently looking for.

We still have the second script with the Beeb, one can only guess if that will receive a similar response.

News From The BBC

Our second postcard, almost identical to the first, has landed on our doorsteps.

Our new and exciting Scifi pilot is now officially in the hands of the movers and the shakers.

So it's back to our feverish finger crossing (which does make it trickier to type).

So far, we have proven that their auto-postcard sending machine works. Although severely tempted to send them in something random, say a teabag, just to see if that would work I shall resist. (I'd love to read the critique on that!) That aside, let's hope it is more interesting news in the next piece of correspondence from them.

As you know, I'm not great at the waiting game, so I am taking a break from pilot writing and am playing with game writing in Macromedia Flash instead. I will post a link if it amounts to anything half playable. If it turns ugly, I shall return to write a hybrid script I've thought of. Not to reveal too much it's a cross between Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Battlestar Galactica and Glee. Fun.

Until next time, be good.

Remember remember...

Image by Niccolò Caranti via Flickr

...the fifth of November,
Gundpowder, treason and plot.

I always want to add a 'boom boom' on to the end of that. Can you tell that I come from the Basil Brush generation (the original one)? So we have two scripts at the BBC and ideas for more. We could keep right on writing but I think it's time we had a little distraction here at the Sitcom Skirmish. To that end, tonight we shall be visiting a local castle for a firework display and bonfire. I wanted to write that we shall be taking our children but it's fair to say that they'll really be dragging us along.

So however you celebrate the day, have a wonderful time and stay safe. Happy Bonfire Night!

Is this normal?

What is the point of hindsight? Honestly?

On our first pilot, the moment it hit the post-office's counter we thought of about a dozen improvements that simply did not occur to us beforehand. Is hindsight supposed to give us an insight into not repeating our mistakes? No. It didn't work. Exactly the same thing has happened with our second delve into sitcom script writing.

In later episodes (wishful thinking at this stage, I know) we want character X to do something to object B, but that would only make sense if object B appeared in scene 2 of the pilot! Infuriating to say the least. (Paul counts to ten slowly in his head.)

Anyway, what is done is done.

I suppose the underlying questions is; what type of sitcoms would you like to see on TV? What style tickled your teenage funny bones? What would you like to see 're-envisioned', 'rebooted' or 're-imagined' or whatever the current phrase is for resurrecting the good-ole-days?

We look forward to hearing any comments. Laters.

Explosion!

That's what it feels like anyway. I'll explain.

The sci fi pilot script is finished. Hurrah! The covering letter is written. Woo hoo! Now for the series development outline...

We already had quite a large number of storylines we wanted to use as future episodes so we put them down and found that we actually had a lot to play with there. Some ideas would fill an entire episode. Others would snuggle into an episode alongside a companion storyline.

We also had a storyline that is hinted at in the pilot which we wanted to spread throughout the first series (am I being overly optimistic here talking about a 'series' when we haven't yet submitted the pilot to anyone?) and it was a good storyline, if rather vague. So we started talking it over. What could this mean? Why would this happen? What were the ramifications for the world in which our pilot is set?

Talk, talk, discuss, discuss, boom! The world and concept behind our series took off into outer space and beyond. What had started as a sizeable semi detached with a lovely view had now been extended into a castle with a moat, and wheels, and possibly an interdimensional drive, with cherries on top.

After a couple of evenings of hyperventilating over red wine, we finished the outline. It and the accompanying documents are currently sat on our dining room table. One last read through and we will send our script off into space and wait to hear of it's triumph or demise.

The Hands On The Clock Go Round And Round

Image by Brooks Elliott via Flickr

'Yipee!  Success!  We've been accepted!  They start filming in the new year!' are all things I'd like to be writing bolstered by the foundations of truth.  Sadly, this is only a rehearsal.

If this were a computer program you would be watching a spinning hourglass, buzzy bee, rotating circle or whatever icon set you've settled for.  

Whilst the wait is on, we've been hammering the final touches to our SciFi pilot, our second foray into the script writing world.  The trouble we're finding is trying not to put too many ideas into the first sitting.  We have so many ideas of where to take the plot it is proving a challenge to put enough in to keep it interesting but not too much to make it a jumbled mess.  We've decided to try and plant some seeds early on in the hope of hooking viewer's interest from the outset.

Once again, whilst writing this new script it spawned off even more ideas for other potential pilots!  Will this ever end?  Or will we be forever caught in the trap of writing hour long scripts that are ever read by three or four people! Noooooo!