I know first hand about them and the people they pass off as health professionals at assessments etc. I get around 5 - 6 pound an hour were I work but as I am classed as Self Employed I get nothing else.
But I write to escape from my reality and in the hope of altering my reality at the same time so I try to stay light with my stuff as most people want to laugh at funny rather than smile with sympathy.
Quote: Teddy Paddalack @ 30th January 2020, 8:45 PMI know first hand about them and the people they pass off as health professionals at assessments etc. I get around 5 - 6 pound an hour were I work but as I am classed as Self Employed I get nothing else.
But I write to escape from my reality and in the hope of altering my reality at the same time so I try to stay light with my stuff as most people want to laugh at funny rather than smile with sympathy.
Yes. I have sat in on many of those assessments and made many complaints about Crapita.
Experts and non-experts can argue about comedy and comedy-writing till the cows come home but when they do come home (which is, as everybody knows, at the end of the day) I don't think anybody in his/her right mind could say that script isn't funny.
Given the very nature of the characters, comparisons with Carla Lane's "Bread" are inevitable. For me, your script comes out of that comparison pretty well but that might not be the point. The point might be that Carla got there first in the 1980s and that might be enough to put some TV bigwigs off the idea of commissioning something similar in the 2020s.
If they were simply looking for "funny", that script would suit them down to the ground. The snag, however, is that they are never simply looking for "funny": they're looking for all sorts of other things and those other things are changed almost on a daily basis just to keep writers on their toes.
There are some beautifully funny lines in that script, Teddy. I'm sure the TV people cannot fail to have been impressed by the funniness of your writing and therefore, by extension, the funniness of your mind.
I don't think you've wasted your time writing it: it's entirely likely that someone from the BBC who has read the script or someone else from somewhere else who reads your script is going to want you to write something for them.
Carry on writing!
ATOS is the Ensatzgruppen that they use in the north.
Agree Rood. It is definitely funny with some really good lines. Same. I thought of Bread. You should feel really positive about it Teddy. If you don't mind my saying. Don't mean to sound patronising.
Quote: Teddy Paddalack @ 30th January 2020, 8:50 PMATOS is the Ensatzgruppen that they use in the north.
Is it still ATOS up north?
In the Midlands it is now Capita for PIP and Maximus for ESA. I think.
Bloody stupid names.
Bloody stupid system.
I agree Rood as you know I do my own stuff and would have never touched on this subject but I was asked for it by a BBC producer and in our world thats like having the Angel Gabriel at the foot of your bed. I would have never done this but when I did I see it as meeting the remit of 'borderline watershed with young and old characters facing realistic issues rather than high concept . As for Bread it wasn't within a whisker of life in Liverpool not a whisker. Where as Watching with Emma Wray and Lisa Tarbuck was amazing. Subjectively speaking of course as Bread was the bigger hit.
Maybe a slight reminder for me of Bread, a bit of Birds of a Feather, a bit of Only Fools and Horses which is all good stuff. But ultimately it is original and your work so it doesn't matter.
Teddy, I'm not up on screenwriting but it seemed to me the whole thing hung together and I laughed out loud on a number of occasions. Good luck.
Thanks Brio I personally think that it resonates as a working class caper with no reliance on negative stereotypes etc , but I suspect I;m to close to it as it has been knocked back a BBC producer so its a hard one to work out. But thanks for the read and and I'm glad you liked it.
Quote: Teddy Paddalack @ 31st January 2020, 7:30 PMit has been knocked back a BBC producer so its a hard one to work out.
Many years ago, I was talking to a writer with lots of BBC dramas on his CV and he gave me this advice: "No matter how good things are looking, you can never assume your script is going be on TV until you see it on TV."
Wise words, I think.
I agree Rood I've learned that the hard way.
I'm sorry if you've already mentioned this but what about writing for radio?
Or is that a much more limited market?
Thanks for the advice John I would love to write for radio but there is only Radio 4 and due to subjectivity they are not my medium nor I theirs. They like more middle class stuff that social workers laugh at were as I tend to write from the perspective of someone who may need a social worker. Obviously I joke but I do find that my stuff is far from what Radio 4 want.
I didn't think of that.Unfortunately the BBC is the only station that has anything other than music or shock jocks.It's a shame because some of the great writers started on the radio.