British Comedy Guide

E-mail scene

Kyle is lying in bed and his phone goes off, he notices the camera and flinches. He answer’s the call and puts it on loudspeaker.

Kyle
What the hell you ringing at this time for?

Robert (V.O)
I just got a call from Michael

Kyle
Michael! as in your brother Michael, gee talk about an anti-climax (disappointed)
What did he want, oh let me guess he wanted to know how you were, brrrrrilliant!! You Jerk!! (Light heartedly)

Robert (V.O)
Nah he said he was talking to his friend Garry

Kyle
Garry?

Robert (V.O)
The one you told the racist joke too and then…

Kyle
He told me his wife was black, ah yeah. (to the camera) I am not racist by the way, I was simply the messenger.

Robert
Not black! The term I think you are looking for is our tainted brothers… and, or sisters (deadly serious)

Kyle
(sighs in frustration) I really don’t think they like that. So Garry, what about him?

Robert (V.o)
Yeah he told Michael that there is a competition to meet Sally, all you have to do is send a letter away saying why you want to meet her in less than a thousand words so we could do that today?

Kyle
Moron!! I seen that yesterday was on a kid’s TV show

Robert
And what?

Kyle
We could e-mail her I suppose, yeah we do that later.

Robert (V.O)
Yeah, Oh you should have seen my dream last night, it was where I was in A bug’s Life and Me and Flick were just talking about ways to beat the grasshoppers!(in a childlike tone but as though this actually happened)but in the end we didn’t bit sad, don’t know if it would be classed as a dream or a nightmare?

Kyle
(laughs) I love that, the ants were obviously better off without you, they can defeat them in the movie! Later man

Robert (V.O)
See ya

CUT

Later in the day, writing the e-mail to Sally. Kyle on the computer and reading out as he is typing.

Kyle
(To the camera) Right, we are now about to start our e-mail to Sally. Robert did one earlier. It was however preposterous. Do you wanna hear it? (Desperate to read out the garbage written by Robert) Here it is, it’s hilarious:

Dear Sal, we’ve wrote before but you still ain’t calling
I left our cell, my pager, and my home phone at the bottom
We sent two letters back in autumn, you must not-a got 'em
There probably was a problem at the post office or somethin
Sometimes I scribble addresses too sloppy when I jot 'em
but anyways; f**k it, what's been up? how's your daughter?

Robert Continues
Firstly she doesn’t have a daughter, you nob! (to the camera) and then he goes on:

I know you probably hear this everyday, but I'm your biggest fan
I even got the underground stuff that you did with Elton
I got a room full of your posters and your pictures wo-man
I like the shit you did with Barlow too, that shit was fat
Anyways, I hope you get this Sal, hit me back,
just to chat, truly yours, your biggest fan
This is Bobby Brown aka Fran

Why Fran? (holding in laughter)

Robert
Wanted to make it rhyme at the end!

Kyle
Ah right, and you did all this yourself right?

Robert
Most of it yeah!

Kyle
Didn’t

Like I've said before, you do have a style of writing that makes it clear to understand and easy to picture in the mind's eye and that's something that can be taken for granted until you see it done badly, so well done.

I also understand that you are only putting up short scenes from a full episode and that makes sense, as if you put the full thing up then I don't think too many people would take the time to read everything, as it's far easier going watching something that has been filmed, than to have to read it off the page.

The only downside is that it can be hard to familiarise yourself with who is who and get a feeling for the characters, even if you get what is going on and as a result, because the reader might not be familiar with the characters, they wouldn't have to same empathy if for example they’d read a small part of a script from say Porridge because we all know Fletcher's and McKay's personalities.

That's hardly your fault though and I do realise the difficulties in actually getting something visual filmed so that people can watch it.

Hi Chris

I've read through this and to be honest, I don't really get it. I think it's because it's the middle bit of a sitcom and I haven't got a sense of the characters.

To tell the truth, I think something in your formatting is stopping people from reading through your work, as it's difficult to differentiate between your character's names and the directions. I only say this as I found it difficult myself. If you could capitalise both (character's names and camera directions) it would make it a lot easier to continue reading and I think you'd get more feedback.

You also said you do more sitcom stuff than sketches and I know a lot of people don't really have time to review sitcoms. We try our best but it takes a *lot* of time to give feedback on a sitcom and the majority of us are trying to write a stuff ourselves. If you post the first three scenes with a bit more of the formatting suggested above, I think you'll get more responses. No need to post more as the first three scenes will either grab our interest (and someone will ask you to post more) or you'll get feedback telling you what you need to do/work on.

Please, please, please read the pinned threads at the top -- 'Pirates' and 'Rough Idea' -- as the discussions that follow cover a lot of the basics of sitcom-writing advice that we dish out to first-time sitcom writers again and again. We've all had the advice before, btw!

Bear in mind that the forums are a bit of give and take here; people giving advice want feedback on their stuff too (even if it's as curt as 'Didn't find it funny'/'Did find it funny') and you'll find you learn a lot from reading other people's material too.

Also try not to take offence if people criticize. Yes, you'll be taken aback by anyone saying 'I didn't like it because x, y, z' but the warm glow of someone telling you it's good soon disappears as it's no help in your development compared to someone saying 'what I think you need to do is x, y, z'. Producers are going to say that a lot, if you do get that far!

Hope this is helpful

Dan

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