- Writing
- Online via Zoom
- £135.00/ £125.00
There are no currently available dates for this course. You can sign up for an email notification at the bottom.
At the BBC Comedy Festival in Glasgow, Jon Petrie, the BBC's Director of Comedy, said they are oversupplied with comedy drama ideas and are now looking "firmly sitcom first, with a high joke rate." And US TV has apparently called for more "hard comedy," by which they mean proper, laugh-out-loud shows. Meanwhile, a writer I coach has a script with a TV channel. The commissioners like the premise and the story but have returned to him requesting a rewrite "with far more gags".
If you want to write funnier scripts, this is the course for you.
I'm Chris Head. I teach comedy writing at BBC Writersoom, the British Library, Bath Spa University and to writers and performers worldwide on Zoom. I also mentors writers with Lucy Lumsden, former BBC Head of Comedy Commissioning. I am also the author of "Creating Comedy Narratives for Stage and Screen."
These weekly Zoom sessions are for you if:
* You want your scripts to be funnier.
I could leave it there, but I guess I should say more.
* You might have a specific project you are working on or you can simply come along for inspiration.
* You might be working on sketches, sitcom or comedy drama script, or even a movie script, a play or a radio show.
We'll work on creating funny characters, dialogue, scenes and stories. To make each run of the course bespoke, you can nominate clips from TV shows from sitcom to comedy drama, comedy movies, sketches and more for us to discuss and analyse.
* Each week we’ll explore a selection of comedy writing techniques inspired by clips you’ve shared and related to what the group are working on.
* Looking closely at scenes and sketches from sitcom, sketch and comedy movies we will to get under the bonnet of how dialogue and comedy action works so that you can write better comedy.
* In response, you write a scene or a sketch every week. This can be a stand alone piece, it can be part of a longer narrative.
On this course you will:
- hang out with a friendly bunch of comedy writers
- get expert input into your writing
- learn new writing techniques and finesse old favourites across a structured five weeks
- develop your existing project and/or be inspired for your next one!
You’re welcome to join it if you’re new to working with me. It’s also an ideal follow on to previous online courses I offer. Plus it’s different every time so you can come back as many times as you like.
Each session in the first half we go over the scripts you have submitted that week.
- They are read aloud in the session. It can be so helpful to hear your work read aloud – or to read it aloud with others.
- You get a different perspective on it and can see issues and opportunities with it that you can't necessarily spot on the page.
- You will also receive helpful and inspiring feedback.
Leave the course inspired, with lots of new writing and with new tools and techniques to create more.
