The future of the TV sketch show?

First off I have to say I am new to sketch writing. Until I discovered this (excellent) site, I had not really thought about sketches. So far I have only been playing about with them. I had been off work sick and it was a way to cheer myself up and to make use of some of the mental space that had been freed up. Now I am thinking I would like to go further with this, but I am not seeing obvious outlets for the material I am writing. I am not particularly asking for suggestions. My question concerns not so much the market as it stands but the potential market.

The accepted wisdom seems to be that the public has the attention span and memory of goldfish. So they have to be served up short punchy sketches and they will continue to find the same gag funny no matter how often it is repeated.

On the first point, the Two Ronnies sketchbook still runs at primetime on Saturday night with sketches that typically come in at over 5 minutes. Is this just nostalgia for familiar material, or does this demonstrate an appreciation on the part of the public for longer sketches with more developed ideas and characters?

On the second point, I thought the recent series of both Mitchell & Webb and Armstrong & Miller were hilarious. For the first episode. Then I got bored, then I didn't bother tuning in. I can see the advantage of repetition for film companies, as it cuts down on filming, and for performer/writers as it cuts down on the ideas they have to come up with. But is it what the public wants, or is it a fashion that has had its day? In which case can we expect a shift away from writer/performers resulting in an increase in demand for material from other writers?

I suppose my question is, what sort of sketch show should a smart producer be looking to make?

I think it depends on the sketch. Trying to put too many ideas in to a sketch can make it muddled, padding it out can make it boring - even the awesome 4 candles sketch starts to run out of steam towards the end.

I think it's a rare sketch that can properly sustain your interest over more than a couple of minutes.

Back to the 2 Ronnies, things like the Phantom Raspberry Blower or The Worm That Turned are a bit different as they are more like an ongoing mini-sitcom.

Repetition can be a bit annoying too. They start crowbarring a character into things just to get the catchphrase out of the way. And that bores me after a while. For both Catherine Tate and Little Britain I quite liked the first series, the second was meh and third was just annoying.

Quote: Griff @ June 17 2008, 4:48 PM BST

This is a rather sour view of things. TV sketches are kept short because shorter and sharper is usually funnier, not because producers think the public are idiots. Believe me, if sketch show producers thought that longer sketches would get more laughs, they'd be doing it. And every producer I've met (OK, only about three, but still) is pretty smart. Many of the Two Ronnies sketches contain an awful lot of padding and are kept afloat by Ronnie Barker's charm as a comic actor. If you go into the industry thinking you are writing down to idiots, or that as a writer you ought to treat your audience as idiots, you will fail. Also, times and fashions change, otherwise we'd all still be listening to Victorian monologues from the music-halls.

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I agree that a lot of Two Ronnies sketches are padded, but he padding still gets laughs. The point you make about them being buoyed up by Ronnie's comic charm is an important one. Ronnie had faith in himself as a performer. I think a problem with a lot of recent sketch shows (not so much M&W or A&M) is that the actors have not been given space to perform. They are just wheeled on to deliver a gag. The opposite of course are the repeat sketches which are all performance and no gag. What I was wondering was if there was not space for a format that allowed actors to create characters and do a bit of business, but without the repetition that is a feature of writer/performer lead shows.

The point about fashion is to a degree the one I was making. Short dumpy girls do not look good in skintight flares, but they will still wear them if it is the fashion. And lets face it TV is not noted as risk taking business, successful formats get copied. But in time the fashion changes. I just wondered if short sketches and repeat characters were not starting to look a little last year.

Everything gets reinvented.

My natural preference is for performer-led, performer-written sketch shows. However, that's not to say the producer-led sketch show is inherently a bad idea. And face it, for writers they're a bit of a godsend. I can't imagine the Monty Python team would have been that interested in submissions from outside their team. Elitist bastards.

As for the length of sketches - write 'em to the funniest length for the idea. If they're funny I'd hope nobody would reject them out of hand for being half a page longer than average.

Quote: Griff @ June 17 2008, 5:15 PM BST

As for "allowing actors to create characters and do a bit of business", of course as a writer that is forbidden territory for you. All you can do is write the sketch and hope that you get a good actor and a director who will see the opportunity to make use of that actor's comic skills.

We've all been tempted to write

INT. A SHOP

A MAN comes in. MAN does loads of hilarious non-verbal stuff, you know, funny faces and quirky mannerisms and that. (Note to actor: Have Fun!)

... but it's not allowed!

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Indeed. I had a go at doing a Norman Wisdom parody, and although it played hilariously in my mind trying to capture any of the business on paper was a dead loss. But on the other hand if the sketch speeds too quickly to the punchline the actor does not have a lot to work with. If you look at Two Ronnies sketches the padding is used to build character. Obviously the padding cannot be completely deadweight, but the question for us as writers is whether we are doing performers a disservice by making sketches as lean as possible.

But my original point about the Two Ronnies was whether their continued primetime appeal was down to nostalgia and familiarity or whether there was still a popular appetite for their style of comedy. There is obviously element of truth in the former, and of course Ronnie Barker was an exceptional performer, but I think there is also something in the latter. Five minutes can be along time (I've watched French and Saunders), but I do not think we should discount the possibility of the five minute sketch.

Quote: James Harris @ June 17 2008, 5:21 PM BST

My natural preference is for performer-led, performer-written sketch shows. However, that's not to say the producer-led sketch show is inherently a bad idea. And face it, for writers they're a bit of a godsend. I can't imagine the Monty Python team would have been that interested in submissions from outside their team. Elitist bastards.

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Of course it helped that there were six of them. And that they had all had a lot of experience beforehand of writing for producer lead shows.

We could probably have another long discussion about what constitutes padding, but there should not be anything that is either not funny in its own right or necessary as set up. I agree that a good actor should not need reams of dialogue to establish character.

I am not disregarding your advice on sketchwriting , which I am sure is sound. Most of the time I would agree shorter is better. But I am interested in the longer sketch as a form in its own right. My first love is sitcom, and I enjoy writing dialogue, so when I have created characters who amuse me I tend to want to keep them around a little longer, and have some fun with them. I would like to think that there is still a place for an intermediate form between the punchy gag sketch and the repeated character sketch; a single longer sketch which is based around a gag but which extracts as much mileage as possible from the characters. I could be deluding myself!

Quote: Timbo @ June 17 2008, 4:31 PM BST

I suppose my question is, what sort of sketch show should a smart producer be looking to make?

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A smart producer, in the current climate, will be going to commissioners with performer-led, 'oven-ready' sketch shows. Everyone's saying the same thing now - talent is paramount to commissions and you've got a seriously hamstrung idea if you don't have a name attached to your sketch show in some way. (not true with sitcoms, yet - thankfully).
I'm not talking shit - I've just had a sketch show that I co-wrote with the very talented James Harris turned down by a commissioner for the very same reason. No performer talent attached. It's all very f**king annoying, but that's the current 'fashion' and you have to accept it and do what you can to overcome it.

As for the longevity of sketches, I praise the Lord that the 10 minute sketches of the Ronnies are a distant memory. The Ronnies were brilliant but their stuff was padding personified.

Outside the comedy geek box and the only people who love the two ronnies (and their long winded sketches) are old people and those "in the biz" in someway (inc. users of this forum)

Your average 20-30 year old does not want to see four candles when he can see matt lucas dressed as a fat woman.

It's a little like asking a film buff for their best movie...you'll get answers like Godfather and On the Waterfront - if you want normal people to be entertained in 2008 though you'll stick then in front of BadBoys.

Interesting debate but in truth, if there was a current market for longer sketches then we'd be seeing them on TV / radio. But they aren't appearing, not because no one writes that material but because the current trend is to commission - from the wide range of scripts sent in - material that meets a demand. That is a) direct and punchier sketches or b) the dire and annoying catchphrase crap.

As writers, we're in the process of selling a product to buyers with a specific requirement (working out that requirement is an art in itself). No amount of arguing, cajoling, or reasoning will persuade a commissioner to buy a show that sits outside their particular wants.

Personally, if a sketch produces a laugh, it succeeds, however short. Plus statistially, you stand a better chance of making someone laugh with a wide variety of short sketches rather than 3-4 longer ones that may not hit their mark.

I also think equating length of sketch with improved development of character is false. It's all to do with the skill of a writer. A single word or even silence can deliver character as effectively (and more economically) than a ream of character monologue.

If a character could say exactly the same thing in less words then you've highlighted padding that can be removed. Some people argue that it isn't naturalistic to have people deliver info / gags in as short a space as possible but they miss the point. As writers, the skill is not to reproduce, word for word, the hormonal ramblings of two 14 year-olds on a bus-stop. If that were the case then stenographers and tape recorders would be at the top of the business. The skill lies in what writers choose to leave out, while still keeping the meaning and character unchanged.

As to the future of sketch shows: I think the current trend will be here for quite a while longer.

While I agree with Timbo about the desirability of longer sketches, or at least a mixture of shorter and longer sketches, I'm not quite as down as him on the merits of repetition of characters.

Part of the fun of watching sitcoms is identification with the characters and anticipation of how they will react in a given situation. With repeated characters that fun can be replicated in sketch shows.

It doesn't always work, but it can.