Quote: Griff @ March 7 2011, 10:23 AM GMTI don't believe anyone goes to the Trials with the primary objective of being entertained. Every single person in that audience is there because they are supporting friends who are writers, actors or directors, or because they would like to become involved in the Trials themselves and are scoping it out.
Griff, I think in general I agree with your points here, and certainly at Sitcommission last year I was in the audience for 4 of the shows and the compere asked who in the audience was associated with a sitcom or a writer and pretty much every hand went up every time. Oddly, I did meet a few genuine punters at the last Si and Dec run Sitcom Trials at The Leicester Square Theatre. One had even come back to the semi-final specifically to see mine, which is the second most flattered I have been as a writer. So its not entirely true that there are no punters, but they may be exceptions proving rules.
I wholly concur on the voting thing though. It leaves a nasty taste even when it works in your favour - I say this as someone who qualified for the final on audience vote in my first outing. Interestingly, we got quite a few more votes than the pathetic number of people I could drag down from the Midlands so I suppose there must have been independent people there.
