I love Mark Thomas but I can't imagine him doing it any better then Sacha Baron Cohen, lol. Any Youtube clips I wonder? Is Mark still doing stand?
Is it right to... Page 3
Yeah that's a fair point Griff but if a character like say a Basil Fawlty (not a good example as he's SOOOOOOO well known but you know what I mean) who has had consideable exposure is ripped off, then probably the only thing to do is retreat - not unless of course you can prove that your character was in development earlier than or even before the better known of the two.
I think that also if a writer rips off another deep down he / she knows the real truth and for me that would always rankle.
Quote: Griff @ April 16 2008, 8:11 PM BSTOh yeah, Basil Fawlty cast a long shadow over sitcom for decades. You wouldn't dare write anything resembling it, ever. Curtis and Atkinson chose to write a historical sitcom (Blackadder obv.) because they were afraid that ANY SITCOM SET IN THE PRESENT DAY was in danger of being overshadowed by Fawlty Towers, not just one about a hotel. Wasn't that one with Reece Shearsmith last year the first hotel sitcom ever that anyone dared to write after FT ? Imagine writing something so brilliant (and by God, it is brilliant) that no-one else will even touch the same subject matter as you for the next thirty years!
Interestingly, I do have a sitcom set in a hotel, which is being pitched by a producer to commissioning editors (called 'Vacancies'). Mine is more in the style of '15 Storeys High' than Fawlty. Mine hotel is one in a corporate chain of the Holiday Inn/Ramada Inn type and focuses more attention on the mundane, sterile and impersonal experience of working or staying in such a place.
Knew I was taking a big risk setting a comedy in a hotel, but it has to be said there is a lot of scope for storylines to be found in such a situation.
The trouble you seem to encounter is that any scenario you choose seems to be comparable to another sitcom, or the production company has something similar in development.
I borrowed a joke from a stand up for a script reading. Just the one joke, and it was the one that every one praised. That's where it can go wrong, when the joke you borrow, is better than the rest if your stuff.
The annoying thing was there were lots of laughs, through out and it worked. Would have worked with out the joke.
Quote: Griff @ April 16 2008, 9:49 PM BSTGood luck with Vacancies Tim!
Yes, it's true, everything you write seems to be like something else. I thought my arts-centre based sitcom was completely unique, but then I started to think "well the mimes/clowns are like that Alan Partridge chat show episode" and the general auditioning of crappy acts is like "Phoenix Nights" and the Arts Council bureaucracy is like "Yes Minister" and so on and so on...!!
Another sitcom was really liked by a script editor at a major production company, but they are working on something similar apparently. And that was set in the pre-war 1930's! What are the chances, eh?