Very Short Excerpt from New Sitcom

This is the original excerpt. I have posted a revised excerpt which I would be very greatful if you could comment on.

Thanks - much Minty Love

MIKE AND JANICE (MARRIED) ARE SITTING AT A RESTAURANT TABLE, WAITING FOR TWO OTHERS TO ARRIVE

JANICE:
Relax Mike. Just relax, breathe easy

MIKE:
How am I supposed to breathe easy with this thing on? You said you could knot a tie!

JANICE:
I said I could tie a knot! Two very different things!

MIKE:
What if he's a dropout, a low life, a sponger, someone who depends on the state, or worse, someone who depends on me! . . . . . . . . . .What if he's a vegetarian!

JANICE:
Mike, he's 27, he's got this far without bothering you, and besides, you've spoken to him on the phone

MIKE:
Voices can be deceptive Janice. I give you Amy Winehouse! Voice of an Angel, face of an Angle Grinder

JANICE:
I'm sure if he takes after his father, he'll have no trouble in the looks department. You've just got to hope the ears aren't a genetic thing !

MIKE:
Janice, you are not helping! Maybe I shouldn't have gone through with it, maybe I should have kept it to myself.

JANICE:
You should have done that 28 years ago

MIKE:
I can't believe I was stupid enough to agree to this. I could have just said no, not interested, leave me alone

JANICE:
He's your son Mike, you've got responsibilities!

MIKE:
Fatherhood begins with helping with the delivery and cutting the cord. Not choosing the wine and paying the bill. By the end of tonight I'll still not have seen any of the tears, the tantrums, wetting the bed!

JANICE:
I've got a feeling I will

MIKE:
I'm saying I've missed out

JANICE:
You really haven't

MIKE:
I'm serious Janice, I've had no input into this boy's life, what if he's trouble, what if he's a nasty piece of work . . . .

MIKE DOESN'T NOTICE, BUT HIS SON SIMON AND GIRLFRIEND GRACE WALK IN JUST AS HE SAYS

MIKE: (CONTINUED)
What if he's a CRIMINAL?

SIMON:
Dad?

MIKE:
And as I was saying, the price of the wine is Criminal. Simon!

SIMON GOES TO HUG MIKE, MIKE GOES IN WITH A HAND SHAKE, SIMON CORRECTS HIS HUG AND GOES FOR A SHAKE, JUST AS MIKE DOES THE OPPOSITE

SIMON:
This is Grace

GRACE IS VERY PRETTY AND DRESSED VERY ELEGANTLY; SHE SHAKES THEIR HANDS AND DOES A CUTE CURTSY. SIMON AND GRACE SIT DOWN AT THE TABLE

MIKE:
This is my wife, Janice. The wonders of Internet Shopping

JANICE:
And this is my Husband Mike, who is proof that when shopping on the Internet, you don't always get what you pay for

SIMON TAKES A SIP OF HIS WINE

SIMON:
Dad, I think you were ripped off!

JANICE:
Excuse me

SIMON:
How much did you pay? I think you should ask for your money back

JANICE:
You cheeky little . . . . .

SIMON:
The wine is terrible; it tastes like the cheapest wine on the menu. How much did you say it was?

GRACE:
Oh it's fine Simon, stop being such a fusspot! Anyone having Starters?

GRACE HANDS THE MENU'S THAT WERE ON THE TABLE TO THE OTHERS, IT'S VERY BIG

MIKE:
Wow, I really don't know where to start

SIMON:
How about the birth, or we can start before that if you like. How about the day you left mum?

GRACE:
Why don't we start with something a little more upbeat? Like the day Mike met your mum

SIMON:
It was the same day

Grace:
Oh

Minty,

In my humble opinion.

In all honesty I'd like to say, this is spot on. It ticks all the boxes. I see each character clearly. You've cleverly crafted around 10 jokes into a page or so and each one works. The premise introduces the characters, setup and background quick and well..and I want to read more.

Really, really well done.
Its the kind of writing that reads so simplisticly and yet (I'm finding) so difficult to get right.

Andy

Really interesting premise, and some very well crafted gags. I particularly like the way gags are set up by earlier gags in the conversation, so there is a nice smooth development through the scene.

In my equally humble opinion . . .

Overall, I like it - but there's far too much dialogue and the humour is somewhat 'hit and miss'.

What this scene needs is a few periods of silence where Mike looks at his watch and/or glances towards the entrance. Apart from helping to build suspense, it would also serve as a good set-up to his being taken unawares by his son's sudden arrival at the table.

The snag with having really good jokes in a script is that they can act as a contrast to the less good ones and thus make them look pretty bad.

The 'tie a knot - knot a tie' line is very good but the 'Amy Winehouse' joke is aiming a little low in a script of this otherwise decent quality.

Another thing is that in real life two people chatting together hardly ever address each other by name yet your couple do it frequently and it seems unnatural.

Mike's line "What if he's a dropout, a low life, a sponger, someone who depends on the state, or worse, someone who depends on me! . . . . . . . . . .What if he's a vegetarian!" is funny right up to 'vegetarian' bit. That would only be funny if Mike were a butcher. You need something funnier.

If it were my script, I'd delete the entire 'criminal/wine' section. It seems less than natural to me.

On a much more positive note, the dialogue leading up and including Simons's 'It was the same day' is very funny indeed.

All in all, I think viewers will be atttacted by the premise of a parent meeting a 'long lost' child. It's been done before (with John Thaw) but it's an eternally fascinating idea.

Great start, great finish - polish the middle!

Quote: Roodeye @ October 30 2009, 1:41 PM BST

In my equally humble opinion . . .

Overall, I like it - but there's far too much dialogue and the humour is somewhat 'hit and miss'.

What this scene needs is a few periods of silence where Mike looks at his watch and/or glances towards the entrance. Apart from helping to build suspense, it would also serve as a good set-up to his being taken unawares by his son's sudden arrival at the table.

The snag with having really good jokes in a script is that they can act as a contrast to the less good ones and thus make them look pretty bad.

The 'tie and knot - knot a tie' line is very good but the 'Amy Winehouse' joke is aiming a little low in a script of this otherwise decent quality.

Another thing is that in real life two people chatting together hardly ever address each other by name yet your couple do it frequently and it seems unnatural.

Mike's line "What if he's a dropout, a low life, a sponger, someone who depends on the state, or worse, someone who depends on me! . . . . . . . . . .What if he's a vegetarian!" is funny right up to 'vegetarian' bit. That would only be funny if Mike were a butcher. You need something funnier.

If it were my script, I'd delete the entire 'criminal/wine' section. It seems less than natural to me.

On a much more positive note, the dialogue leading up and including Simons's 'It was the same day' is very funny indeed.

All in all, I think viewers will be atttacted by the premise of a parent meeting a 'long lost' child. It's been done before (with John Thaw) but it's an eternally fascinating idea.

Great start, great finish - polish the middle!

View original

Cheers All

Agreed Roodeye, I'll look at them addressing each other by their names. I've not particularly done that before in my writing, but felt for these characters it worked. I'll remove and see how it feels. Amy Winehouse joke will be removed. It never hit the spot for me and angers me that I let it pass.

With regards to having moments of silence, looking at watch etc That is indeed exactly how I picture it, but I hate writing stage directions/camera instructions etc It bugs me when reading a script and it bugs me even more when writing. I'm a writer, not a director. That said, I can see the purpose when it is integral to the believability of a particular scene. Thanks for that

The line regarding being Vegetarian is key in the overall script and it doesn't come accross in this excerpt. Hope that makes sense

Criminal/Wine section. Will definitely consider a re-write/removal

Cheers

Couldn't really get into this Minty.

I couldn't really figure out Simon's character. Is he being difficult as he's bitter with his Dad or is it a natural character trait? Either way, I didn't feel much sympathy for Simon or Mike.

Most importantly, it didn't make me laugh. The punchlines were all far too obvious and not set up very well. The 3 main ones that jarred were these:

Quote: Minty @ October 30 2009, 12:43 PM BST

MIKE:
Janice, you are not helping! Maybe I shouldn't have gone through with it, maybe I should have kept it to myself.

JANICE:
You should have done that 28 years ago

---------------------------

MIKE:
Fatherhood begins with helping with the delivery and cutting the cord. Not choosing the wine and paying the bill. By the end of tonight I'll still not have seen any of the tears, the tantrums, wetting the bed!

JANICE:
I've got a feeling I will

----------------------------

MIKE:
I'm serious Janice, I've had no input into this boy's life, what if he's trouble, what if he's a nasty piece of work . . . .

MIKE DOESN'T NOTICE, BUT HIS SON SIMON AND GIRLFRIEND GRACE WALK IN JUST AS HE SAYS

MIKE: (CONTINUED)
What if he's a CRIMINAL?

SIMON:
Dad?

MIKE:
And as I was saying, the price of the wine is Criminal. Simon!

View original

Agree this one was weak:

MIKE:
Fatherhood begins with helping with the delivery and cutting the cord. Not choosing the wine and paying the bill. By the end of tonight I'll still not have seen any of the tears, the tantrums, wetting the bed!

JANICE:
I've got a feeling I will

The criminal one sets up the next gag, so you get a nice progression (though the intranet dating angle could have been set up more smoothly).

Quote: Minty @ October 30 2009, 12:43 PM BST

MIKE:
Janice, you are not helping! Maybe I shouldn't have gone through with it, maybe I should have kept it to myself.

JANICE:
You should have done that 28 years ago

View original

In stark contrast to Ben's opinion, if (as the script seems to suggest), Simon is the result of a one-night stand, I think the above joke is very good.

I didn't mind the Amy Winehouse joke. It stuck out but in a good way.

Understand about the characters calling each other by their names but in an openening scene, acted correctly I don't see a problem as a means of introduction.

I thought Simons character was interesting his ready confrontation made me wonder how the new relationship between father and son was going to pan out and it made me want to learn more about him. Why does he behave this way?

"Fatherhood begins with helping with the delivery and cutting the cord. Not choosing the wine and paying the bill. By the end of tonight I'll still not have seen any of the tears, the tantrums, wetting the bed!"

This is the only bit that stuck out to me..I did have to read it a couple of times to try and get it to sink in.

Would like to read more.

yes I think it works in places, but you need a little boom-bah somewhere to sprinkle some extra funny. certainly a very good base for more of the same though, rather good.

Hi Minty

I thought it was really good. For the most part the characters were believable and well-defined.

As far as their names are concerned – I don't think it's that important to keep stressing them. One's a father, one's his wife, one's the son and one's his girlfriend. If it became a sitcom we'd get to know their names in the long-run, anyway.

"Voices can be deceptive. I give you Amy Winehouse" works on its own without having to labour the joke with Angel/angle grinder.

I'm not sure if meeting your dad for the first time in 28 years you'd greet him straight off with 'dad?' you'd probably say, "Hi… Mr.. Mike..er, dad" or something a bit more tentative.

It also seemed a bit convenient that Simon and Grace sat down to poured glasses of wine and started chatting about the wine (it was as if you were just trying to make the Criminal/wine joke work for us).

But the flow of it made me want to read on so good stuff!

I thought this was very good, it made me laugh a few times! Lose the Amy Winehouse gag though, that stuck out like a sore thumb.

For the most part it flowed nicely. There were a couple of clunky moments, mainly the 'internet shopping' and 'criminal/wine' parts; I wouldn't remove them, they just need a little reworking to make them flow easier.

The concept is a compelling one, in fact I was working on a script (I say script, it never really moved beyond an idea) about a daughter seeking her real father. There is lots of mileage in the idea and I'd be interested in reading the rest of your script.

Overall, very enjoyable.

Is this planned as a mainstream, studio-audience sitcom?

Quote: Martin H @ October 30 2009, 11:52 PM GMT

I thought this was very good, it made me laugh a few times! Lose the Amy Winehouse gag though, that stuck out like a sore thumb.

For the most part it flowed nicely. There were a couple of clunky moments, mainly the 'internet shopping' and 'criminal/wine' parts; I wouldn't remove them, they just need a little reworking to make them flow easier.

The concept is a compelling one, in fact I was working on a script (I say script, it never really moved beyond an idea) about a daughter seeking her real father. There is lots of mileage in the idea and I'd be interested in reading the rest of your script.

Overall, very enjoyable.

Is this planned as a mainstream, studio-audience sitcom?

View original

Thanks Martin and others. This idea came about via a brainstorm with my writing partner. We had 16 ideas and we eventually got it down to 3, we are now working on the first few pages of each sitcom alone and will meet up on Saturday to chose one to go ahead with for entry to the sitcom mission. Ideally this would be 10 pm BBC 2 sort of scheduling, no live audience, similar
to Smoking Room or Royle Family

Cheers

How about this as a replacement to the Winehouse gag

MIKE:
Voices can be deceptive Janice. I give you Amy Winehouse! Her voice is Strange and Hoarse, while her face. . . well it's much the same actually

Hello. I'm a newcomer here, just stumbled across this, and here's my tuppence-worth:

- Good idea & you set the scene up well.

- I really liked some of the gags in themselves: the tie a knot / knot a tie one is a cracker.

- But I wondered if you were concentrating too much on the gags and not enough on the characters. They (the gags) seem a bit intrusive at times & maybe undermine the naturalism of the scene. For instance, the bit where Simon actually appears - I'd expect a bit more fumbling nervousness in the characters here & the internet shopping gags seemed a little out of place.

Rupe