When it comes to comedy I always think the best demographic to write for is people with a sense of humour. Not sure the BBC entirely grasp that.
BBC's New Writing Initiatives Page 24
Quote: Timbo @ October 8 2010, 12:39 PM BSTWhen it comes to comedy I always think the best demographic to write for is people with a sense of humour. Not sure the BBC entirely grasp that.
That's quite reductive. Surely you can appreciate how variable the sense of humour in this country is!? That's why we can have something like the Thick of It and My Family on the same channel! One viewing public hates the other, but they co-exist and that's why it's brilliant.
Write what you want to write when you want to write it! F*** everyone else 
Quote: Sophie Petzal @ October 8 2010, 12:42 PM BSTOr write what you want to write when you want to write it! F*** everyone else
Damn right!!!!
Quote: swerytd @ October 8 2010, 8:49 AM BSTWell done Sophie. Hope it all goes well!
BB, how to quote is here: https://www.comedy.co.uk/info/help/bb_codes/
(but it's just the word 'quote' in square brackets and '/quote' similarly to end)Dan
Thanks for that...simples
Quote: 2ChristianTypists @ October 8 2010, 11:56 AM BSTExactly! Perfectly said - and most comedy commissioners would heartily agree with Sophie here.
Can't folk just be happy for someone's writing success? Folk really need to stop circling what they think such and such want from a script and just get down to writing it instead of firing back and forth badly veiled bitterness and then try and mask it with lazy quips which The Chuckle Brothers would balk at (these forums do a lot of that - ie. "oh so hilarious" wordplay that betrays whether some people's personal scriptwork is actually funny at all... to anyone). Can't folk just get on with writing what they find funny instead of trying to constantly prove they are in forums like this...? (sorry - rant over).
As Micheal Jacob has suggested, it is HOW something is done not what it is about. If someone ditched a divorce comedy script because they "heard" such-and-such a show was not favoured, then that is their loss and a slight suggestion that they had no confidence in the work anyway.
It is also worth thinking that writing comedy needs to be about now, not reworking old formats with contemporary dressing. Yes, the DEL BOY and STEPTOE templates would still work but the writing has to be about the now. THE OFFICE could not have been made in 1984, FAWLTY TOWERS could not have been made in 2009 and THE INBETWEENERS would not have maybe been so relevant in 2001. It is about timing... in all sorts of ways.
Actually if you go back and check the last few pages you'll see it's really only one person making value judgements on a script they haven't read. The rest have been supportive of the writer's success and criticised any bad-mouthing. But thanks anyway for wading in and telling us about our veiled bitterness and lazy quips. It's telling that for someone complaining about bad behaviour on internet forums you only ever show up to complain.
Quote: David Bussell @ October 8 2010, 1:03 PM BSTIt's telling that for someone complaining about bad behaviour on internet forums you only ever show up to complain.
Having said that, they have done some excellent UPPER CASE work.
Did someone make value judgements on a script they hadn't read? I must have missed that
In fairness 2sanctiomonioustypists practices what he preaches, never giving us any reason to suspect that his scriptwork might actually be funny.
Quote: David Bussell @ October 8 2010, 1:03 PM BSTActually if you go back and check the last few pages you'll see it's really only one person making value judgements on a script they haven't read. The rest have been supportive of the writer's success and criticised any bad-mouthing. But thanks anyway for wading in and telling us about our veiled bitterness and lazy quips. It's telling that for someone complaining about bad behaviour on internet forums you only ever show up to complain.
I don't chip in very often round here as there is nothing that wastes time more than an internet forum (and I say that as someone who can be guilty of exactly that). If you feel I only do so to "complain" then that is your take on it. It's not that make or break for me, either way - though I do wonder where trying to remind people just to write from their (funny) heart regardless of what they think producers want (based on others reports) becomes a "complaint".
Quote: bushbaby @ October 8 2010, 1:13 PM BSTDid someone make value judgements on a script they hadn't read? I must have missed that
No worries, let me cast your memory back...
I'm not impressed with the choice of the Beeb but then again I haven't read them but how can a story about a woman that is preggers and doesn't know out of four men who the father is, progress into a lengthy series?
I won't comment on the others but just say this. Every time one submits a short story or a play or a sitcom idea, it is absolute death to do one on a lottery win theme (everyone knows that except the beeb seemingly) no magazine or theatre will touch it........the mind boggles.
My entry was scripted from a published novel....my husbands (with full permission to do that BTW) and whilst it is obviously good enough for publishers, it's not good enough for the beeb. It's hilarious/sad/pathos/true and could have gone on for years.........
Quote: don rushmore @ October 8 2010, 12:13 PM BST
How eloquently put. I did not mention Micheal Jacob's words as some display of bottom-pouting but as someone who agrees with him from my own professional viewpoint.
Quote: 2ChristianTypists @ October 8 2010, 11:56 AM BSTfiring back and forth badly veiled bitterness and then try and mask it with lazy quips which The Chuckle Brothers would balk at (these forums do a lot of that - ie. "oh so hilarious" wordplay that betrays whether some people's personal scriptwork is actually funny at all... to anyone).
You don't see how this might have put people's backs up?
If the beeb say they don't want flat-share or family based sitcoms, then they accept one...or two, is that not confusing? This is not a complaint about writers, like my other posts, it's a question
Quote: Timbo @ October 8 2010, 1:21 PM BSTYou don't see how this might have put people's backs up?
It's my own observations based on perusing these forums from time to time. Whether it gets folk's backs up is for them, not me.
I do not intend to make waves - certainly not an (it appears) an anything goes forum like this where agreeing with someone a lot of you respect suddenly becomes brown nosing and someone deems photographic allusions to that as necessary or progressive to the discussion in hand.
Surely if the BBC do not want something, then receive something that makes them throw their preconceptions in the bin, and go along with it, that is a good thing!?