The Sitcom Mission 2011 Page 32

Quote: bushbaby @ March 2 2011, 7:33 PM GMT

I always think too, that on the page something may sound banal but acted out it is very funny but how do the Beeb etc suss that out?

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It can't 'sound banal' and 'act out as funny' at the same time, at least not with the 'average actor'. The clue is in the words 'sound banal': if something sounds banal it is banal. It may look banal on the page and be funny acted out, but the BBC could still reject it on its banality. It may not even sound or look banal and the BBC reject it. They are hundreds of reasons for a script being rejected...

(I think I'm turning into John Prescott...)

Quote: Tim Azure @ March 2 2011, 7:40 PM GMT

It can't 'sound banal' and 'act out as funny' at the same time, at least not with the 'average actor'. The clue is in the words 'sound banal': if something sounds banal it is banal. It may look banal on the page and be funny acted out, but the BBC could still reject it on its banality. It may not even sound or look banal and the BBC reject it. They are hundreds of reasons for a script being rejected...

(I think I'm turning into John Prescott...)

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Yea but the Royle Family was sooooo banal on the page!

Quote: Tim Azure @ March 2 2011, 7:40 PM GMT

It can't 'sound banal' and 'act out as funny' at the same time, at least not with the 'average actor'. The clue is in the words 'sound banal': if something sounds banal it is banal. It may look banal on the page and be funny acted out, but the BBC could still reject it on its banality. It may not even sound or look banal and the BBC reject it. They are hundreds of reasons for a script being rejected...

(I think I'm turning into John Prescott...)

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I understand what you mean BushBaby. I used to write a lot at university and with one particularly dim producer we learnt never to let her read the script before it was agreed to go in to the show. She would read it aloud and flat, usually interspersed with comments along the lines of why is that funny? No, I don't get that. Ooh you'll have to rewrite that etc. So, once we'd heard that level of critique everything which we wrote thereafter we read to the cast so they'd get the timing and inflection. It worked.

Banal not being funny? No. Going to argue with you there. Migt not be one of the best examples but Enfield and Whitehouse doing the two Harley Street GPs schtick over Christmas and the 'forty/forty five' which went on for virtually the entire sketch but it worked. However, just think how that would have looked written down...

Sorry. Will try to spell the name right in future.

Quote: Teddy Paddalack @ March 2 2011, 5:52 PM GMT

That's not me being bitter it is sadly a true reflection, otherwise explain to me how The Green Green Grass and Rock & Chips got on the telly.

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Rock and Chips and The Green Green Grass got on the telly by being written by John Sullivan. I'm no great fan of either show, but I'd guess the BBC put them on the telly because they were written by the guy who wrote their most popular sitcom ever.

Here's his Wikipedia entry. Not quite part of the Oxbridge Konspiracy, is he.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Sullivan_(writer)

Whilst there may well be a lot of 'Oxbridge' bias left in this country, I don't think it has spread to the world of sitcoms just yet as, Fawlty Towers aside, all of the great sitcoms have been written by people who not only failed to go to Oxford or Cambridge, but often didn't go to university at all.

Quote: Jinky @ March 2 2011, 8:23 PM GMT

Rock and Whilst there may well be a lot of 'Oxbridge' bias left in this country, I don't think it has spread to the world of sitcoms just yet as, Fawlty Towers aside, all of the great sitcoms have been written by people who not only failed to go to Oxford or Cambridge, but often didn't go to university at all.

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That's me knackered then.

Quote: KLRiley @ March 2 2011, 7:58 PM GMT

I understand what you mean BushBaby. I used to write a lot at university and with one particularly dim producer we learnt never to let her read the script before it was agreed to go in to the show. She would read it aloud and flat, usually interspersed with comments along the lines of why is that funny? No, I don't get that. Ooh you'll have to rewrite that etc. So, once we'd heard that level of critique everything which we wrote thereafter we read to the cast so they'd get the timing and inflection. It worked.

Banal not being funny? No. Going to argue with you there. Migt not be one of the best examples but Enfield and Whitehouse doing the two Harley Street GPs schtick over Christmas and the 'forty/forty five' which went on for virtually the entire sketch but it worked. However, just think how that would have looked written down...

Sorry. Will try to spell the name right in future.

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I think banal is extremely funny and that's my point, on the page it can be so banal but it's how it is acted out. That's why comps are so hard, the reader has to totally get the humour....or not

My point about the BBC and its Oxbridge connections refers to the selection of the scripts commissioned. I for one think the 'Fools & Horses' was tame and reflected a middle class view of working class life.
The first two episodes of Shameless were excellent due to the fact that the writer was writing from real memories, the current Shameless reflect a degree of 'Oxbridge' enhancements as such it is more surreal than real.
The Beeb would have us believe that all families have 2 children a boy and a girl, they all sit at the table in the morning and milk comes in jugs and grown ups have full English breakfast in their houses before they go to work everyday and that the kids all play instruments and sports until they go to university then come back and ruin their dads Sunday afternoon nap.
Its not real its simply not real, but sadly its what they want and they won't take anything else unless the main character is a drop dead handsome 20 year old wizard who turns into werewolf!

Quote: Teddy Paddalack @ March 2 2011, 9:26 PM GMT

My point about the BBC and its Oxbridge connections refers to the selection of the scripts commissioned. I for one think the 'Fools & Horses' was tame and reflected a middle class view of working class life.
The first two episodes of Shameless were excellent due to the fact that the writer was writing from real memories, the current Shameless reflect a degree of 'Oxbridge' enhancements as such it is more surreal than real.
The Beeb would have us believe that all families have 2 children a boy and a girl, they all sit at the table in the morning and milk comes in jugs and grown ups have full English breakfast in their houses before they go to work everyday and that the kids all play instruments and sports until they go to university then come back and ruin their dads Sunday afternoon nap.
Its not real its simply not real, but sadly its what they want and they won't take anything else unless the main character is a drop dead handsome 20 year old wizard who turns into werewolf!

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I totally agree. Shameless has become horrendous and not like the original scripts. I guess that's because Paul Abbott isn't writing them any more. I wonder who the Beeb's editors are and do they know about real life. Are they young graduates and have no experience of life yet. Whatever, it is virtually impossible for a new writer to get a sitcom commissioned

Quote: Teddy Paddalack @ March 2 2011, 9:26 PM GMT

My point about the BBC and its Oxbridge connections refers to the selection of the scripts commissioned. I for one think the 'Fools & Horses' was tame and reflected a middle class view of working class life.

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But it was written by a working class guy who left school at 15. I suppose he must be a class traitor or something.

The TV adaptation of Brideshead Revisited was a middle class view of upper class life. That's how TV works, it plays safe and aims for the middle.

Then again...what about '15 Stories High'? That didn't strike me as especially 'middle class'.

Quote: Jinky @ March 2 2011, 10:00 PM GMT

But it was written by a working class guy who left school at 15. I suppose he must be a class traitor or something. The TV adaptation of Brideshead Revisited was a middle class view of upper class life. That's how TV works, it plays safe and aims for the middle. Then again...what about '15 Stories High'? That didn't strike me as especially 'middle class'.

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I'm not sure, it was quite stylised and offbeat. And based on a Radio 4 show, the bastion of middle classery.

"The TV adaptation of Brideshead Revisited was a middle class view of upper class life"

and in that respect they were faithful to Waugh.

If it's good, if it's funny and if you persist, then you wall achieve what you want.

John Sullivan, the Only Fools example you use above, was a scenery moving monkey at the BBC who became so cross at the poor standard of Auntie's sitcoms that he wrote his own in a fit of rage and pestered producer Dennis Main Wilson until he read it.A comedy pilot later and it became Citizen Smith. The point is; believe in yourself, make contacts, work work work the scene and polish that script. 90% of television is who you know but that final 10% of inspirational brilliance is crucial.

Brideshead Revisited wasn't a sit com

Quote: bushbaby @ March 2 2011, 11:58 PM GMT

Brideshead Revisited wasn't a sit com

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No shit.

And 'Only Fools and Horses' wasn't written by Ken Loach.

I don't think the man is a class traitor as I would have done what he done without batting an eye lid, that said the show was tame and was not something I could personally relate to, the things subjective and I was just expressing an opinion.
I'm not political in anyway, I just like a bit more realism in a comedy as opposed to acceptable stereotype of the lovable rogue with wits and no brain.
I know illiterates who run complex drug empires in their heads and terrorise entire communities at their whim, I know that prohibition of one thing or another is about the only thing keeping some estates afloat and offering hope to a deprived youth base.
I just don't know anyone who can live that type of life and not leave victims.
It can still be funny but the lovable aspect is lame, its up there alongside the 'Brass wiv a heart of Gold' and 'One of your own'.
If comedy continues to follow the template laid out by the BEEB then it will always reflect what is required and very rarely what is.
I don't want dark satanic mills or Dora Brians hitting sailors, I don't want Kes II 'The Knave strikes back' and I don't want Ma Boswell or Yozza Hughes.
I want to see grit in the wit that reflects today, funny likable real, that's all it's not much but it is a whole new concept to them and they don't want to smash the stencil, that's why 'Rock & Chips' got commissioned.