BBC rejection letter to John Cleese Page 2

Fawlty Towers script written today:

Dear Mr Fawlty,

Our readers sift through the first 10 pages of all scripts that we recieve and if they don't see promise, they give it no further consideration. Unfortunately, yours falls into this category. So just F**K OFF and leave us alone, you untalented hack.

Yours sincerely,
Some nobody on minimum wage who reads 10,000 'first 10 pages' a day and wants to paper cut his wrists

P.s Check out our latest future classic, 'Coming of Age' - it's the 'next big thing' according to readers of ZOO magazine and those people on YouTube who leave comments like 'DIS IS LYK MASIVVLY FUNI! ROFLCOPTOR!!!!!!'

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Rant over.

Interesting to note it was later shown on Dutch television.

What ever happened to your nude version of Open All Hours with a bisexual Nurse Glady Emanuel?

Quote: Marc P @ March 20 2011, 9:05 AM GMT

Interesting to note it was later shown on Dutch television.

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They have a diferent sense of humour you know

Nice cheese though.

Quote: Lee Henman @ March 19 2011, 9:40 PM GMT

I know this is a joke but it really is such a typical rejection, I've had loads along the same lines, where the script reader assaults you with a sort of Spock-like Vulcan logic. It makes you want to scream really, because real life can't be squeezed into convenient boxes. So in this (admittedly fictional case) the reader is asking the writer why Basil would still be with Sybil and why they didn't split up years ago. Well the answer is obvious - because if they had split up years ago there wouldn't be any comedy. And why doesn't he fire Manuel and get somebody more qualified? Because if he did that there would be no comedy.
Plus real life is JUST like that - people stay in the wrong jobs and wrong marriages all the f**king time. Illogical situations and relationships happen all the f**king time.

Sorry, I'm getting annoyed now. And it's not even real. Just hits a little too close to home I suppose. Grrr.

And calm.

Ommm.

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Amen.

Besides, what did the script reader expect to see in a script about a hotel in Torquay? Sydney Opera House perhaps...

Class!!!

Quote: Mikey Jackson @ March 20 2011, 5:30 PM GMT

Amen.

Besides, what did the script reader expect to see in a script about a hotel in Torquay? Sydney Opera House perhaps...

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Herds of majestic wildebeest.

Quote: Griff @ March 20 2011, 9:03 AM GMT

I'd never heard of "The Prince Of Denmark". Turns out it was a sitcom with Ronnie Corbett running a pub with his wife:

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That does make mores sense now; I thought maybe in the original pilot script the bodycount was higher than in the broadcast version.

Quote: Flaner @ March 20 2011, 1:44 AM GMT

Yours sincerely,
Some nobody on minimum wage who reads 10,000 'first 10 pages' a day and wants to paper cut his wrists

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Minimum wage, those were the days; now it would be an intern.

Quote: Griff @ March 19 2011, 11:55 PM GMT

Next sitcom I write is going to be about the f**king Waltons.

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George Bush Sr. was ahead of his time.

Very funny. I seem to have quite a lot in common with Failed Comedy Writer! I started a blog after the Laughing Stock experience, for better or worse... I'm having a 'Shit Ideas I Had' amnesty if anyone's interested? Amy x

http://writers-rehab.blogspot.com/

The truth is that nobody in television really knows when a good script lands on their desk. And by "good script" I mean a script that will make a great TV show. This is why it's so incredibly-difficult to get anything made if you're a new writer (or an established one in fact). TV execs, producers etc are terrified of making a bad decision. After all it's their job to make good TV and if they fail, their reputation suffers.

I always think of it this way - I'm asking the BBC or whoever to trust me enough to part with the best part of a million quid to make my show. When you think of it that way, rejection starts to lose a bit of its sting. Or maybe I've just become immune to the stings over the years. Bee Bee Cee. Heh. I've still got it.

You know reading this very funny rejection letter you get an even better idea about how bloody clever FT is.

I'm thinking here mainly about the uno, dos, tres bit - I didn't know what one, two, three was in Spanish when I first saw the episode when I was 7, but the writing is bang on the nail telling you as part of the gag, rather than in the setup.

Genius

In Defence of Ian Main:

Has anyone considered that maybe that first script wasn't much good?

I certainly remember the 'Un Dos Tres' joke being out of character with the rest of that episide and about as funny as a joke that relies on a heavily contrived situation creating a linguistic similarity to a phrase in a foreign language most of the audience don't know deserved to be.

Maybe a lot got rewritten in that year before the programme emerged.

Of course, we would all love to believe that Main was a cock, because that would mean that we are all John Cleese, right? ... right??? ... RIGHT??

It's a brilliant joke, always one of my favourite bits when I was little.

Quote: Christian Cawley @ April 10 2011, 10:47 AM BST

I'm thinking here mainly about the uno, dos, tres bit - I didn't know what one, two, three was in Spanish when I first saw the episode when I was 7, but the writing is bang on the nail telling you as part of the gag, rather than in the setup. Genius.

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And that's very true.

Quote: Griff @ April 10 2011, 11:26 PM BST

The uno, dos, tres joke is clever and funny, and in character for both Basil and Manuel.

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Erm ... nope.

I haven't got a smart reply for you, Griff.

I can tell you, in all honesty, that this isn't an opinion that has popped up in the course of the thread. For years and years I've remembered it as a weak joke, oddly out of character with the rest of the show. Now I'm marginally less ignorant about the process, I suspect it's an example of one that slipped through from the first draft. If it's any consolation, there's also quite a lot of moments in 'The Builders' that similarly don't seem to work as well as the rest of the show, which always confused me, since ep.1 'A Touch of Class' is seamless and perfect - but then I think I read somewhere that 'The Builders' was the first filmed, so maybe that's it.

The joke? If I have to think about it, I guess it's too contrived, without really paying off in laughs. Are they in character? well, Basil doesn't smack him on the head with the trays, so maybe not (Christ, how depressing if it comes down to that).

I realise 'erm ... nope' is a trite and annoying reply but I couldn't see there was much else to say. Maybe it's just one of those 'thereof we must remain silent' (or at least terse) things.

That's not much of an explanation, is it? But then, if you have to explain it ...