Newsjack - Series 11

First recording will be on Wednesday 24 September. Therefore deadlines should be Monday 22nd (sketches) and Tuesday 23 (one-liners).

Oh good.

Thanks for the heads up.

BTW Is it bad when you start counting the passage of your life in terms of newsjack series?

Quote: Judgement Dave @ 10th August 2014, 12:07 PM BST

Thanks for the heads up.

BTW Is it bad when you start counting the passage of your life in terms of newsjack series?

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I called my second child Justin Edwards. She often asks me why.

Quote: V Riddoch @ 10th August 2014, 12:13 PM BST

I called my second child Justin Edwards. She often asks me why.

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Was Miles jealous of the new baby?

Quote: Bomsh @ 10th August 2014, 12:43 PM BST

Was Miles jealous of the new baby?

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No, she was too busy watching the twonk in the pink kilt on Balamory.

Cheers Viv.

Is it wrong my first reaction was, 'What already? I was enjoying the break.'

Quote: StephenM @ 11th August 2014, 11:26 AM BST

Cheers Viv.

Is it wrong my first reaction was, 'What already? I was enjoying the break.'

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Exactly! Well, not exactly exactly. My first udmediated thought was 'not again' - which curiously, is exactly (exactly) what the bowl of petunias thought as it hurtled towards earth after Zaphod engaged the infinite imporbability drive...

... which is totally unrelated to writing for Newsjack, of course.

Unless we are the whale, in which case it makes sense.

Probably (not necessarily!) all still valid from last time.

I will edit this list as more relevant stuff becomes available/people post additional things, so it's all in a single place.

Submission Guidelines for Series 11

First deadline is the Monday before broadcast (22nd Sept) at 12noon for sketches (2 each per show this series, plus an additional 'advert' sketch of 30 secs duration, that could be a traditional ad or party political broadcast or programme ident, etc) and 4pm on Tuesday for one-liners (max. 9; 6 of the 'Breaking News' variety and 3 TV listings).

Tip: put an intro to the sketch and put a gag in that intro. Make the gag in the intro different to the gags in the sketch; otherwise you're just proving that you can do your gag a lot shorter.

Two pages is the ideal length. The readers admit to getting bored after that.

Similarly, two people chatting in a sketch is boring for the readers, so may not progress.

Below, I've tried to collate a lot of helpful (or unhelpful: delete as applicable) information.

Newsjack Twitter Feed: They may update this as the recording nears if they need particular one-liners on a breaking topic.

Ed Morrish's what and how to write for Newsjack. He doesn't produce it anymore, but this is the one thing you should read, if nothing else below.

Lyndsay Fenner's blogs about how they make Newsjack: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/aboutthebbc/posts/How-we-make-BBC-Radio-4-Extras-Newsjack http://www.ideastap.com/ideasmag/the-knowledge/newsjack-producer-lyndsay-fenner-open-door-radio-comedy

List of helpful videos from the staff about script editing, the writers' meeting, etc. Script Editor Jack Bernhardt talks about writing The cast talk about which voices they like doing The Show What You Wrote's 'Tips for Writers' video; a lot of which is relevant to writing any radio comedy sketches

Ed Morrish's advice on jackapps and one-liners. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00kvs8r/features/one-liners

Radio comedy writer James Cary's advice on why you should write for Newsjack(he script-edited other radio shows but is not affiliated with Newsjack)

Here's series 7's 'One Liner Rejects' thread, if people want to read them to get in the mood. Here's series 8's one and series 9's one.

Lots of sketches available in 'Critique' forum to study/see what's wrong/rip-off. Majority will show up in a search for 'NJ:' to get the majority of them in a list.

The last webchat with the crew is available on the link at the top, as are other blogs by other writers.

Justin Edwards talks about the process

Here's a writer's experience of what could happen (in an ideal situation, which happened for her!) http://mums-the-nerd.tumblr.com/post/40292001463/im-coming-over-all-topical-panel-show

And Gabby Hutchinson-Crouch's (now an in-house writer!) fast track 'How To Write For Newsjack' advice.

Here's Alakazam's most excellent 'Prince Albert's Shins' sketch that was broadcast (along with production edits) from last series. And StephenM's 'Billy Footballer'.

Here's Ian's 'how they edited my sketch' sketch (from series 4, I think): https://www.comedy.co.uk/forums/thread/20167/

Here's (former) script editor Gareth Gwynn's blog on comm/non-comm submissions.

Here's a series 6 webchat, with links to three previous (series 5) webchats below it and here: series 5 webchat 1, series 5 webchat 2, series 5 webchat 3

Formatting:
Instead of us all arguing about formatting, as that repeats here more than Last of the Summer Wine, the producer have kindly supplied templates on the submissions page. Use whatever they put here.

OLD NOTE ABOUT FORMATTING THAT IS WORTH KEEPING IN FOR REFERENCE:

Formatting: here's a template for the sketches in Google Docs if you don't have/want to use Word. Unfortunately Google Docs has changed so you have to download in .docx rather than .doc and I don't know if that's compatible with the BBC yet. (I write in G-Docs, download then convert in Word to 'old-fashioned' .doc format

quote from Mr Feeoree on January 17 2013, 10:10 PM GMT
Also people, further to Mr Sweryt's post with the template, here's a blog that Dan Tetsell (the then Script Editor) wrote 3 years back, re formatting and how much they like it to look proper! : http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/writersroom/2010/01/newsjack_script_smart_or_smart.shtml /quote
This is the blog that *everyone* at the BBC (and even external prodcos) refer to when asking for radio submissions, so use it. The instructions are written down for you, and there is a link to a copyable/downloadable Google Drive version above that does the same thing, if you don't have Word, and allows you to still send in a Word doc, and I reiterate, even if you don't have Word. As a script editor of an open submissions show myself (and the one who usually painfully puts the final script together), CAN YOU PLEASE USE THIS EFFING TEMPLATE, FOR GOD'S SAKE! It is a massive pain in the arse to have to change your formatting, if it's not like this.

Marc Paterson's pain in writing for Newsjack is very similar to my experience over the weekend. (He wrote this in the run-up to series 7)

Twitter vibe from the producers in series 8 episode 1 was that there are a lot of idiots who don't put their name or email address in their one-liner submissions. Try to avoid this, as angry producers notoriously don't find things funny.

Here are some very good blogs from our own Mr Salisbury about 'The Killer Premise', 'Things to Consider Whilst Drafting' and 'Sketches Need Characters' . Newsjack went reasonably well for him in series 7 so listen to his wise words. David also has a very useful list of what NOT to write for Newsjack.

Let the fun and games (read: 'rejection and hair-pulling') commence...

Dan

Tickets available now!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/showsandtours/shows/newsjack_series11

Thanks for the info above Dan!

Any clue as to whether they're sticking with the Breaking News/Coming Up/TV Listings format for the one-liners?

I'm sure they'll update the submission guidelines at some point.

Quote: swerytd @ 12th August 2014, 12:57 PM BST

Ed Morrish's advice on jackapps and one-liners. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00kvs8r/features/one-liners

Here's series 7's 'One Liner Rejects' thread, if people want to read them to get in the mood. Here's series 8's one and series 9's one.

OLD NOTE ABOUT FORMATTING THAT IS WORTH KEEPING IN FOR REFERENCE:

Formatting: here's a template for the sketches in Google Docs if you don't have/want to use Word. Unfortunately Google Docs has changed so you have to download in .docx rather than .doc and I don't know if that's compatible with the BBC yet. (I write in G-Docs, download then convert in Word to 'old-fashioned' .doc format

quote from Mr Feeoree on January 17 2013, 10:10 PM GMT
Also people, further to Mr Sweryt's post with the template, here's a blog that Dan Tetsell (the then Script Editor) wrote 3 years back, re formatting and how much they like it to look proper! : http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/writersroom/2010/01/newsjack_script_smart_or_smart.shtml /quote

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If anyone is new to Newsjack for series 11 (welcome) worth pointing out in Dan's uber post a couple of things changed for series 10. Dan points them out but in case you missed them:

(1) The one-liners were no-longer jack-apps etc. so the old reject threads (pre series 10) & Ed Morrish's blog may not be applicable. Worth digging out the rejects for series 10 to see what they're after (although it took a while for me to work out what they were after!)

(2) The script template changed for last series from a .doc document to a .rtf file so the old formatting stuff isn't as relevant now.

Of course they may change both again for series 11 so the golden rule of always read the submissions guideline still applies.

As does the other stuff in Dan's post about being funny.

Oh cool.

I don't have enough rejection in my life. Good to add to it with a bit of Newsjack.

Some odd looking site has an interview with Romesh, little bit on Newsjack at the end.

The Alan Pardew sketch by Richard Woolford was picked out for special praise...

https://www.comedy.co.uk/live/circuit_training/romesh_ranganathan_interview/