Just parson through?
The Sitcom Mission 2012 Page 15
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And for Back to the Future fans... [ Insert pun about a 'Flux Ca-pastor' here]
Is this thing on? I'm here all week, try the veal.
Sorry to interrupt, here's our latest blog on character flaws:
And just to add, if anyone wants to use our script reading service before Christmas, to get their script to us this week. We'll probably do another one in very early January, but doubt there'll be another one in December.
Just out of interest Declan, what do you see as Victor Meldrew's character flaw?
He's quite old.
True.
But not old enough is the dynamic there I guess.
I haven't seen as much of One Foot as I'd like, but I believe that Victor's flaw is that he is a curmudgeonly, grumpy old man who complains about absolutely everything.
Though some people, Marc, would see this as a positive character trait. ;-)
Meldrew is a bit like Larry David in some ways, as both cannot let things pass that they see as not being right. Most of the time, the things they point out they're quite right about, but it's like they don't have the polite filter that others have, and so will say forcefully exactly what they think and won't let it go, regardless of the situation.
Yes I think Victor is an odd one because he isn't actually curmudgeonly as such - it's just the situations around him become more and more annoying and he reacts to them. He is actually a nice old man who has been forced into early retirement whom the world conspires against. And as Matthew says he can't let things pass after a while. He doesn't jump straight in like Larry David but eventually has to. Its the genius of the writing that creates these situations. In lots of ways Victor is the everyman and does what a lot of the audience would like to. Very clever writing.
As usual, it's the context that is the key.
Larry David has a sense of right and wrong that we can all relate to, but he acts on it when we would probably just moan about it and let it go. It's the action based on the flaw that then creates the story.
Victor Meldrew is, in my experience, the best example of a sitcom that's regularly misunderstood by wannabe sitcom writers. Having read something like three million awful sitcom scripts (or does it just feel like that) I'm more than fed up of the script which centres round a middle aged man moaning. Actually quite often it's a man in his twenties moaning, and occasionally it's a very old man moaning. But whichever novel permutation they put on it, many of these writers have seen One Foot In The Grave and conflated it with Grumpy Old Men to come to the conclusion that miserable old men - with whom they, of course, identify - are in some way entertaining or even interesting to an audience.
They're not.
What is interesting is what these miserable old men cause to happen, or how they react to situations, or where their character trait takes the drama. If they just sit there and moan, it's rubbish (unless we're talking about stand up comedy, which is a very different thing).
So if you bring to mind any character you really like from a sitcom, be it Larry David, David Brent, Tony Hancock, Victor Meldrew or whoever, think also of what happens in their stories. All of those characters could equally well go on to be rubbish if badly used in a story (see the later series of The Brittas Empire and Red Dwarf, or the ITV Tony Hancock stories not written by Galton & Simpson, as evidence).
Kev F
If I see someone on a train with their feet up on the seat opposite I seethe inwardly.
If a boring sitcom character sees someone on a train with their feet up on the seat opposite they won't do anything about it but they will moan to their wife about it in a long and tedious scene (stand up masquerading as sitcom).
If a Larry David or Victor Meldrew see someone on a train with their feet up on the seat opposite they will literally 'create a scene'. They'll mention it. And we have conflict.
Quote: simon wright @ November 9 2011, 7:07 AM GMTIf I see someone on a train with their feet up on the seat opposite I seethe inwardly.
If a boring sitcom character sees someone on a train with their feet up on the seat opposite they won't do anything about it but they will moan to their wife about it in a long and tedious scene (stand up masquerading as sitcom).
If a Larry David or Victor Meldrew see someone on a train with their feet up on the seat opposite they will literally 'create a scene'. They'll mention it. And we have conflict.
A very succinct way of putting it.
I hope, for your sake, people listen!
I think it is also worth remembering that a 'character flaw' in isolation is not a narrative driving device. It needs to be coupled organically with what drives the character - what it is that he or she wants. That is the conflict that is important. Basil being obnoxious as a character flaw on it's own would soon be pretty tedious, it has to be linked to his AMBITION - then when his character flaw, his snobbery obnoxiousness etc, prevents him from getting what he wants we have a story. Victor basically wants a simple, peaceful life but he is prevented from getting it by his own failure to let things lie. Renwick builds the tension beautifully so that try as he might, he always ends up stinging the frog crossing him over the river. As it were.