Two Guys, One Table: The Affair

This was our unsuccessful script entry for the sitcom trials. We've never written for stage which is why stage directions might seem out of place (if that makes sense). If people want to leave thoughts and views, drop us a message.

Two Guys, One Table: The Affair
Written by Adam Blaize and Sam Smith

Alan and Chris are sitting opposite each other at a round table, centre stage. The table is littered with pens and screwed up pieces of paper. There is a laptop in front of Alan and a writing pad in front of Chris. Alan is a small built individual with a scruffy looking beard. Chris is a spectacle wearing/tall looking individual.

Chris reads from the notes written on his pad. Guy reads from the notes written down on the screen of his laptop.

CHRIS
Right, so there's Guy Ritchie yeah. Ok brilliant right.

ALAN
And Quentin Tarantino.

CHRIS
And they're students, living together whilst they both do a film making course at the London Film College. And...

ALAN
Tarantino acts like a bit of a dick. He's selfish and quite self centred. Oh and the only words in his vocabulary are F**k, Dick and Negro. And he brags about how he has this rock and roll/sex and drugs induced lifestyle.

CHRIS
But Guy knows that Quentin just lies around all day eating spaghetti hoops out of a tin. So what about Guy? What's his character like?

ALAN
Well he sees himself as an everyday run of the mill type of person. He's desperate to shake off this middle class persona that he's been labelled with.

ALAN
Do you think there should be a love interest; because I think there should definitely be a love interest?

CHRIS
Maybe Madonna could be working in a supermarket, stacking shelves? Or maybe she could be a till girl? I could picture her vogueing on the tills.

ALAN
Yeah, yeah. She does it in order to pay her way through college. This thing practically writes itself.

Alan types the previously discussed Madonna/Till idea down on his laptop.

ALAN
So how do Guy Ritchie and Madonna meet then?

CHRIS
Well the guys have some girls from their course coming around for a DVD night; but Tarantino wants the girls to himself.

The centre of the stage fades into darkness. The stage lights come back on, to reveal the living room of a student house. There is a sofa and a settee at the far right hand corner of the stage.

TARANTINO enters the living room, ending a phone call. Tarantino is wearing a black suit. His shirt also has an exceedingly large white collar.

SFX – Quick audience cheer for Tarantino.

TARANTINO
Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey!

GUY enters stage left; he's wearing marigolds and a Chippendale apron, over his white shirt and blue blazer. Guy is also wearing brown corduroys. SFX – canned laughter. Guy pauses and looks to the audience; his eyebrows are raised. He turns towards Quentin.

TARANTINO
I just got off the phone with these two broads, and guess what?

GUY
They're also big fans of Les Miserables?

SFX – Canned Laughter

TARANTINO
What? No, these two pieces of ass are coming over to Big Dick Mansion.

GUY
Oh, where's that, then?

TARANTINO
Here. This is Big Dick Mansion.

GUY
Really?

TARANTINO
Jesus, keep up, for Christ's sake. Look, they'll be here at 8 O'clock. There's a strong possibility that I can nail at least one of these hot tomatoes tonight, so why don't you go and pick me up a little something, something from the supermarket.

SFX – Canned Laughter

Tarantino and Guy fade into darkness. The stage lights come back on to reveal Chris and Alan, sitting in the middle of the table.

ALAN
I like it. But do you think people will get it? I mean, maybe we should hold back on the knob jokes for the time being.

CHRIS
Well the thing about comedy, is that there's an audience for everyone. I mean, at the very least, we'll probably find our way onto one of those internet comedy channels. We can always come back to that bit later anyway. What time is it?

ALAN
Half five.

CHRIS
Shit.

Chris stands up from his seat and heads towards the front door.

ALAN
What's wrong?

CHRIS
I'm supposed to be meeting Gaz in fifteen minutes.

Chris puts his jumper on. He mistakenly puts his head through the arm of the jumper.

Alan stands up from his chair.

ALAN
Gaz? Who's Gaz? You've never mentioned a Gaz before.

Chris manages to remove the jumper.

CHRIS
He's just a friend. We're writing this drama together. I said I'd go to his house.

ALAN
A drama?

CHRIS
Yeah. It's this eighteen century period piece about two young female scientists; one of them becomes addicted to Opium, which causes a rift in the space time continuum.

ALAN
Wait a minute. Just hang on. Just hold your horses. You're writing with somebody else? But what about G&T?

CHRIS
Well we'll write it when I get back.

ALAN
Well I might be out then.

CHRIS
Where?

ALAN
Don't turn this around on me. (Pause) Is he the first?

CHRIS
Don't do this.

ALAN
Just answer the question.

CHRIS
Back in university, I did some experimenting. Her name was Annette.

ALAN
What happened?

CHRIS
Come on. Don't do this.

ALAN
I wanna know everything. What you wrote, where you wrote it.

The tone of Chris' voice becomes angry.

CHRIS
Alright fine. We wrote some poetry; pre-renaissance. We wrote it in the kitchen, in the living room. One day, when my computer wasn't working, we even wrote some on your laptop.

ALAN (tone of voice is shocked and surprised)
Oh my God!! I don't even know you. Who are you? And this Gaz? Is he a better writer than me?

CHRIS
It's different with Gaz.

Alan is taken a-back by the comment. He sits back down in his chair.

ALAN
Different?

CHRIS
With you and me, it's comedy. It's always comedy. We just sit around outlining ideas, but come on, let's be honest; none of our ideas go beyond this room.

ALAN
Yeah but that's the romance of the struggle. It gives us something to talk about on the DVD documentary.

CHRIS
I'm sorry. So I met another writer. I just don't see what the big deal is.

ALAN
I can't even look at you right now.

CHRIS
I'm going. I don't have to take this.

ALAN
Alright fine.

CHRIS
Fine.

Chris exits stage right. Alan exits stage left.

SFX – the bedroom door slamming, is followed by the front door slamming.

STAGE DARKENS (CLIFFHANGER)

END SCENE

(PAYOFF)

It's late; Chris is sitting at the table, which is still littered with the same pens and paper as earlier in the day. Alan's laptop also remains in the same position that it had previously been in. Chris looks dejected and downtrodden with his head leaning against his hand. Enter Alan, stage left; he's is wearing his blue dressing gown.

ALAN
Alright?

CHRIS
Alright?

ALAN
So how was it then? You're back late; I take it that it went well.

CHRIS
I don't wanna talk about it.

ALAN
Ok. I'll leave you to have some alone time.

Alan turns away from the table.

CHRIS
Gaz doesn't want to write with me anymore; he says he met another writer. Apparently I'm not a mature enough writer for him.

Alan turns back around, and takes a seat, sitting opposite Chris.

ALAN
What?

CHRIS
That's what I said.

ALAN
Well personally, I thought that the space time continuum idea, sounded like it could have brought something different to the table.

CHRIS
Exactly. How can anyone say that the manipulation of the space time continuum isn't a serious issue?

ALAN
And was it your idea, to involve aspects of Science Fiction in the story?

CHRIS (the tone in his voice becomes more upbeat)
Yeah. I mean, Frankenstein; that has Science Fiction in it. You don't see people complaining about Frankenstein.

ALAN
Shall we carry on writing G&T?

CHRIS
Yeah, go on then.

ALAN
Hey, I had this idea, about a man who gets a gypsy curse put on him, by an old woman at his local supermarket. It's called, Tom's Dick and Harry. He gets something called, the curse of the talking penis.

Darkness slowly comes over the stage. Chris and Alan continue talking; their voices and their laughter slowly fade into the distance.

END EPISODE

©adamblaizeandsamsmith

Hello Adam,

I think your general plot about writers talking about writing is a good one and obviously, where you can take things is seemingly endless.

Now the harsh bit (sorry) -

Alan and Chris aren't distinct enough as characters, they seem like the same person

There is very little conflict between them - they should be diametrically opposed for the most comic potential - perhaps Alan wants to write Ken Loach kitchen sink dramas and Chris wants to write Transformers 3: Dinobots Unleashed. You need that chalky cheesy, yingy yangy, opposites attract dynamic.

The jokes are a little weak and the swearing just seems to be there for shock value.

The cliffhanger isn't really a cliffhanger. There has to be more peril. If Chris had said, 'I've had enough of this, I'm splitting up the partnership, we're through!' then I might have cared. But it just didn't seem that big of a deal.

If you're going to be using Pop Culture references as sub-sketches, choose something a bit more up to date then Guy Ritchie and Tarantino. They've already been pastiched a million times and your jokes bring nothing new to the piss take table.

Finally, there's no 'heart' - by that, there's nothing particularly redeeming or likeable about your main protagonists and we're not given any real emotional insight into their lives. The lazy way would be to introduce the saucy but unattainable female neighbour who they both compete for. But with your script, you could have made Gaz into Gizelle. Alan's ex-girlfriend. His writing partner teaming up with his ex-girlfriend?! Instant tension, drama and emotions.

Please feel free to ignore any and all of my criticisms - especially as I didn't make it through this year either - so what the hell do I know?

Cheers,

RC

Although I don't agree with everything you said, I do appreciate you taking the time to read through it and offer your thoughts. We're all in the same position and on this occassion, I would say that it's simply a case of people having different types of sense of humour.

After reading it again, I would say that the characters were similar but we did find it difficult to develop the characters in just 13 minutes. It's all a learning process though. The sitcom within the sitcom idea was something that we were keen to develop along the way had we been successful.

What I would also criticise about our script having read it again was that I felt we took too long to get to the main point of the episode ie the affair part.

I don't know about taking too long your first segment was only about five minutes worth Adam. So this could have been a factor in the selection process too. For me it just didn't have enough 'gags' in it. Laugh aloud stuff for the audience from the beginning. The opening stuff was a bit like a sketch, for some reason I could picture the american producer from the Shooting Stars doc talking like that but not two young writers. For me, as a writer, if people are going to write about writers it's got to be real or out and out bizarre I guess. As this has been done now why don;t you have a go at a traditional type of sitcom? Well done for posting by the way.

I thought that the traditional angle would have been an easy direction for us to take the idea. On another level, I do think it was perhaps not adaptable for the stage. We had a very good picture of the idea in our heads but perhaps that was the problem. Perhaps it was just a case of us thinking of a TV production and not a stage production.

Quote: Adam Blaize @ September 21 2009, 1:53 PM BST

I thought that the traditional angle would have been an easy direction for us to take the idea. On another level, I do think it was perhaps not adaptable for the stage. We had a very good picture of the idea in our heads but perhaps that was the problem. Perhaps it was just a case of us thinking of a TV production and not a stage production.

View original

For that kind of sitcom Adam a TV production would stil be a stage production with a live audience - and the same things would apply. You need to give the audience a reason to laugh out loud, nobody can hear people smiling or nodding sagely at observations. You are making life doubly hard for you because professional comedy writers/producers/directors etc will be looking at the piece. I'd put it aside and come back to it some time later. And the traditional angle is never an easy angle either. Nothing about any of it is easy - apart from the barmaid at my local of course. You can get an easy smile out of her.

Quote: Marc P @ September 21 2009, 1:58 PM BST

Nothing about any of it is easy - apart from the barmaid at my local of course.

View original

Where is your local?

Quote: bigfella @ September 21 2009, 2:17 PM BST

Where is your local?

View original

Just round the corner!

Well done for posting this. I think for me it falls between two stools. Firstly, not enough character development to really engage with them - and I agree about that being very hard to achieve in 10 mins (and harder still in the 5 posted here). However, there are ways of making this happen. How long does it take for you to peg exactly who the characters in the IT crowd or Peep Show are? You need a memorable action or phrase to set someone up. It helps if they are extreme characters in this shortened form. The second thing (pretty much as Marc said)is, if the characters aren't jumping out, you need to get the audience up and laughing right away. Once a character has made us laugh we really want to get to know them.

It may be worth trying to make one of the live events to see how others did it. You don't have to see them as better than yours, just recognise that there are different ways of doing things.

Hi Adam, I'm still not quite brave enough to post mine on here yet so well done for posting yours.

I like the idea of two writers as main characters and I'm sure that it's an idea you can develop. I also liked that you'd obviously remembered that most people watching aren't writers.

My main criticism would be that I didn't actually laugh during this, although I did smirk at the Frankenstein bit. Also, the storyline about one being annoyed at the other for seeing other writers has been done to death in the past and should really only be resorted to for filling out an episode not as the main thread.

I still think the concept is a good one though, any partnership has conflict and work partnerships have plenty, so there is a lot of scope for material.

I have to agree with Marc P about the length, it is very short (no insinuations intended) but I did read somewhere that they wanted entries to be no longer or shorter than 10 mins pre-cliffhanger.

Anyway good luck with your next project and when I do finally get the balls to put mine up for critique, feel free to tear it to shreds.

Wow. This is all really constructive criticism. But maybe someone is gonna post something that just says, 'brilliant. absolutely loved it'.

Did you think it was brilliant Adam? And did you absolutely love it?
Come on be honest?

We look at it from our own writers perspective and so from that point of view, I do love our ideas but when I look back over it, I do feel as though it might not necessarily give enough to the script readers or the audience. Obviously you'll always get your jokes better than other people. It's something we'll definitely be working on over the upcoming months.

Up against other things I have written; no it's not brilliant. But then that's because we usually write television scripts to send off. It's a very different thing to write for the stage, because in television, you have the luxury of visuals and things to explain what the characters about.

I wrote something before about a super market security guard and it was like a homage to taxi driver. But it would have been very difficult to take that to stage, because the departments and supermarket environment were integral to the way that script worked

I think you need to go and see some theatre Adam, the stage is an incredibly versatile medium. And think of radio. there is no luxury of visuals and things to explain what the characters are about as you say, they have to define themselves from the moment they open their mouths in our ears.

Quote: Adam Blaize @ September 21 2009, 3:09 PM BST

We look at it from our own writers perspective and so from that point of view, I do love our ideas but when I look back over it, I do feel as though it might not necessarily give enough to the script readers or the audience. Obviously you'll always get your jokes better than other people. It's something we'll definitely be working on over the upcoming months.

Up against other things I have written; no it's not brilliant. But then that's because we usually write television scripts to send off. It's a very different thing to write for the stage, because in television, you have the luxury of visuals and things to explain what the characters about.

I wrote something before about a super market security guard and it was like a homage to taxi driver. But it would have been very difficult to take that to stage, because the departments and supermarket environment were integral to the way that script worked

View original

Yes, it's true that in television one has 'the luxury of visuals and things to explain what the characters about.' - but I can't see those 'luxuries' making this piece even mildly amusing.

I know it's hard for parents to accept that their baby is ugly and wonder why it has never won any Baby Competions - but once they have, (I did - and my parents!) things can only get better.

May I suggest, Adam, that you erase all evidence that you and your partner wrote 'Two Guys, One Table: The Affair' - place it in an unmarked envelope and in the dark of night, abandon it on a church doorstep.