Partnerships?

Now except from the odd bit of input from a friend on sketches here and there I have never had a proper writing partner and I was wondering how it works because I have yet another new project a mockumentry. I never tried writing in this style before and I wanted to write with someone because... I can.

Anyway I choose my best mate and he seems excited (he's a good writer but not a comedy writer) just wondering what we will face and how it all works, for instance can we still work on the project when we aren't together?

Doe's a none comedy writer help make it funnier or the complete opposite?

God I'm so confused help me!!!

Hey Paul

Reading the interview with Andrew Collins (on here somewhere) it seems to be that the way him and Lee Mack wrote Not Going Out was very much funny man and structured story writer. Lee seemed to riff with comedy ideas (which he does seem to do if you've ever seen him live) and Andrew seemed to 'reign him in' and keep him focussed on the plot. That's not to say they both didn't come up with funny lines/plot, just that one was more suited to one thing and another on another.

I imagine this is true of most comedy partnerships, whatever they say. Red Dwarf's good ideas seemed to stick around for the seventh and eighth series but the humour wasn't nearly as good, which I attributed to Rob Grant obviously being the 'funny one' and Doug Naylor being the story/plot guy.

When I write with my writing partner, he's the wacky, bonkers ideas one and I'm the one trying to concentrate on a good story. That said, the wackier ideas seem to be mine, so it's a bit of both really -- there's certainly no definite dividing lines.

We split it up by writing three episodes each for a first draft, then the other has a go. Seems to work quite well.

Just my thoughts

Dan

thanks for the advice swerytd

When I wrote in a partnership we basically met in a coffee shop with a laptop, a pad and a few pens. We came up with a whole bundle of stuff with a few guidelines.

- You can tell the other one that thier idea is crap without them getting hurt by it.

- You can chime in with additions/changes to a suggested idea at any point in time.

- One writes whilst the other smokes/drinks before swapping over.

That was basically it and we would spend about five or six hours at the same table (buying coffee pretty much every 40 minutes so we didn't annoy the owner) once a week and then go off to write an agreed segment. We were lucky by the fact that our writing styles weren't a million miles away from each other so it was hard to see the join.

Quote: Cameron Phillips @ January 16, 2007, 9:28 PM

When I wrote in a partnership we basically met in a coffee shop with a laptop, a pad and a few pens.

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Cameron - are you sure you're not getting your life confused with that of Rick Spleen (from Lead Balloon)?

Quote: paul watson @ January 13, 2007, 7:39 PM

because I have yet another new project a mockumentry.

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mockumentary about what? you just writing it or are you making it or what?

I'm writing a mockumentry... I really want to keep the idea to myself at the moment, but its a good idea me thinks.

Thanks everyone for the partnership stuff... the guy I'll be writing with has voiced concerns about spending more that 3 hours in a room with me... I couldn't help but agree... strongly.

Quote: Mark @ January 17, 2007, 5:15 PM

Cameron - are you sure you're not getting your life confused with that of Rick Spleen (from Lead Balloon)?

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Actually, I am Rick Spleen!!!

I'm off to check my bins.