Ah, right. Cheers. Just saw a few "rejects" appear in Critique. Got all confused like.
Newsjack - Series 5 Page 34
That's me and my lax attitude to critiquing everything years after anyone cares...
Dan
Quote: Jinky @ September 28 2011, 9:11 AM BSTMaybe they could introduce ThemeJack, where every Friday morning we'd go to the BBC website to see the word of the week (example: Food) and then we'd have all weekend to write sketches about food for the Monday 12pm deadline.
Hmmm....that sounds awful, but at least it would make a change from 'News' every week.
Although you could just write a sketch about a news story about food...
The point being that unless you're writing about Westminster (which I like doing, but I know some people don't) "the News" is actually quite a broad brief, containing a huge amount of potential comedy subjects each week.
Over the years, I've gradually slid towards the belief that all BBC open-door comedy shows should be topical. It's a great way to hone your skills. And if you can't manufacture a laugh out of all the things that have occurred in the news in a two or three day period, comedy writing mayn't be for you, I reckon.
Leevil,
they usually have got worked out by now what's going in and they (so I'm told) let the lucky writers know. However, when they record they do about 40 minutes so there's no telling whether your contribution is in until transmission.
Ok 
Ok
No, I'm pretty sure the usual thing nowadays is they don't tell you until tomorrow evening. In the first series or two they emailed to say it had made the script on Wed night and emailed again Thursday night to say if it was in the edit, but I don't think they do the Wednesday now. Not that I know for sure as I havent had anything in yet this time round.
Quote: Mr Writer Like In The Song @ September 28 2011, 4:09 PM BSTThe point being that unless you're writing about Westminster (which I like doing, but I know some people don't) "the News" is actually quite a broad brief, containing a huge amount of potential comedy subjects each week.
I know, I know.
Before this current Government of spivs got in, you could write about absolutely anything and had a chance of getting on as long as Gordon Brown was in the sketch. They loved doing Gordon Brown in Series 3.
Now it's not so easy. I might try an 'Eric Pickles is fat because he eats a lot of cakes' sketch next week and see if I can sneak some food-based material on.
Quote: Jinky @ September 28 2011, 6:21 PM BSTI know, I know.
Before this current Government of spivs got in, you could write about absolutely anything and had a chance of getting on as long as Gordon Brown was in the sketch. They loved doing Gordon Brown in Series 3.
Now it's not so easy. I might try an 'Eric Pickles is fat because he eats a lot of cakes' sketch next week and see if I can sneak some food-based material on.
I wonder why Gordon was so heavily featured. 
I sent in a Eric Pickles correction
I've mentioned Eric Pickles in a sketch. Is he a good fall guy, or is it just his surname that gets the laugh ? Naturally, for Jeremy Hunt, it IS all in the name.
Just to put people's minds at rest they now don't let you know until tomorrow evening whether you've got something in the final show or in the recording but not the final show.
Well I'm basing that on getting something in the recording only in episode 1 but it would be a bit weird if they e-mailed the successful ones on Wed and the unsuccessful ones on Thurs.
Apparently the BBC are pretty hot on that kind of thing since Blue Peter kitten-gate.
Quote: Park Bench @ September 28 2011, 6:31 PM BSTI've mentioned Eric Pickles in a sketch. Is he a good fall guy, or is it just his surname that gets the laugh?
Eric Pickles is brilliant. Having hard 'k' sounds in both his first and last names makes him automatically funny and when you add the facts that he is a fatty and his wife is Irene Pickles and he is the MP for Ongar then I don't know why they bother having sketches. They should just read out his Wikipedia entry every week for guaranteed laughs.
That was the premise of my sketch.
is anyone going tonight?
Quote: Mr Writer Like In The Song @ September 28 2011, 4:09 PM BSTAlthough you could just write a sketch about a news story about food...
The point being that unless you're writing about Westminster (which I like doing, but I know some people don't) "the News" is actually quite a broad brief, containing a huge amount of potential comedy subjects each week.
Over the years, I've gradually slid towards the belief that all BBC open-door comedy shows should be topical. It's a great way to hone your skills. And if you can't manufacture a laugh out of all the things that have occurred in the news in a two or three day period, comedy writing mayn't be for you, I reckon.
Hi All,
i think the "News" element in this type of satirical sketch show is irrelevant. like the "News" Huddlines and "News" revue, most sketches only pay scant lip service to the "News" item they're parodying. What the directors, producers, script editors et al, on all these shows are looking for is "funny." Any funny sketch that has a thin and tenuous connection to current events has a chance of being used. A factual unfunny one won't.