Antrax
Monday 29th June 2009 5:10pm
331 posts
Quote: Norman Wisdom @ June 29 2009, 1:24 PM BST
I might be playing Devil's advocate here but our emails are read by many 'minor,unestablished' members of the team before they get to be seen by anyone with ,as you say, a reputation.
What would stop someone reading it, thinking that's a good idea, I'll work on that and submit it myself.
Listen I am not slagging off the whole industry I am just asking people to be aware of all possiblities that's all. Having said that, we haven't got much choice in the matter.
Well, I'm not convinced that 'minor, unestablished' is the quote you imply, but I think you're focusing on the wrong bit. Look at 'of the team'. As I said above, no one gets 'on the team' without having proven themselves somehow, and they wouldn't need to nick and tweak. Remember 'minor and unestablished' member of a BBC sketch show writing team isn't the same as 'minor and unestablished writer'.
What would stop them reading and deciding to work on it themselves... well, they really gain nothing from it. They'll be paid the same. They'll save the BBC some money, but I'm not sure they'd care that much about that. So what would stop them is the sheer pointlessness of the act, and the general risk to their career if they were found out.
Bear in mind, I've written sketches that were almost top to tail rewritten by the script editors of the show (the sort of people who'll be reading these subs) to the degree that maybe two or three of my original lines have got through. Yet no extra credit was taken by them, and the script was credited to me. The people who are reading these things don't need that.