Okay, here's where we're at.
I've sent off my latest drafts of the two premises or pitches for TV Drama. One is kind of a local story - contrasting village life during war time with the same village today - and the other is a political thriller.
These are my third run-throughs of the ideas. To my great surprise (and delight), both ideas in their original forms (two sides of A-4, slightly double-spaced, each) appealed to my executive producer contact (ex-colleague), and at my meeting with her in London we were able to chat over these ideas.
Redrafted versions of the two story ideas were submitted just before I went away on holiday (about which, more anon). Rightly, my exec spotted a few weaknesses in both, and I've now expanded them. The first, about the local village (two dramatic periods in the lifetime of one ageing farmer), I would see ideally as a three-parter. The idea now runs to four pages on that one. The other - what happens when high-profile 'fat cats' start being murdered - I would love to tackle as a five-part serial.
My exec expects to get back to me within a week or so. If these ideas are strong enough, she'll take them to the next level. Basically, she'll be bidding on the basis of these for the go-ahead to commission treatments - detailed plans for each project giving character information, episode storylines and other supporting material. So, if one or both of these projects goes to treatment stage, I'll be a BBC employee again, for the first time in twelve years ...
It's been odd, trying to readjust after the holiday. What I've come to feel is that the research trip to Ulva was symbolically the end of the road for my Arthurian studies. It was on the nearby Isle of Iona, my spiritual home, that I resolved to write my Shakespeare and Arthur books, fully four years ago.
Since then I have researched both subjects at great length and in considerable depth. I have acquired a leading literary agent, lost him, and picked up another. I have tested the material out on 'Authonomy', and in both cases scored something of a hit with the international writing community. And, okay, so, we've hit an obstacle. Publishing is a rabbit frozen in the headlights of economic uncertainty, the advent of e-books, competition from other sources, etc., etc. Nothing seems to be happening.
But the Divine Kim (who's not all that well, just at the moment, sad to say) has given me permission to investigate self-publishing. So I can work on my Arthur book, having visited the spot where the story ends, writing it my way, in the knowledge that even if we don't get a publisher on board in the New Year, I can still go ahead with a publishing arrangement.
So it's all systems go ... sort of.
Showing posts with label BBC. Show all posts
Showing posts with label BBC. Show all posts
Tuesday, 10 August 2010
Wednesday, 14 July 2010
Something in the Air
Okay, so the meeting went well. Really well.
There was me, the very picture of nonchalance as I wandered into the famous BBC Television Centre, probably looking like someone who's spent too long in the countryside and might actually have arrived by tractor. And it turns out that they've moved the drama department. We used to be across the road, behind the bike sheds. Now we have something called 'The Drama Building'. And before long, we'll be moving again.
Hey - dig that "we"!
Anyway, a great chat, most encouraging. And oddly enough, there's a guy working a door or two away on Lark Rise to Candleford. He was script editor on the last series I worked on with the producer I was meeting (she's now an executive producer, two steps down from God). I haven't seen this script editor chap in fourteen years. Only yesterday, though, he was asking after me.
Now, all this is just a wee bit weird. But I've been having a strange sense of a return to business-as-usual after something like ten or twelve years. Let me explain.
One of my very first writing jobs in British TV was developing an idea by Paul Theroux into a potential TV drama series. This was for a firm called Euston Films, a company for which I had, and still have, almost unqualified admiration.
The project stalled rather suddenly when the parent company, Thames Television, lost its licence to broadcast. It lost its licence because it had annoyed a certain Margaret Hilda Thatcher. See, Mrs Thatcher had unleashed a death squad to assassinate a group of Irish people in broad daylight on the streets of Gibraltar. Thames TV made a documentary about it. By doing so, they signed their own death warrant, so to speak. Their broadcast licence was effectively revoked, and my series with Euston Films withered on the vine, basically because Euston Films no longer knew if it had a future.
I got my revenge, up to a point, by restaging the shooting of the Irish Republicans for another TV drama series (we did it on Brighton sea-front, though, rather than in Gibraltar). But it was a hollow victory. I had in fact lost one of my very first jobs because of a politician who went ape whenever somebody questioned the terrible things that happened while she was in power.
But it was a golden period for me, following on from Thatcher's own political demise, because her party remained in government for another seven years. Great news for hard-hitting drama and political thrillers. Why? Simple:
Because we expect Conservatives to misbehave. We know that they're up to no good. We can devote all our energies, 24/7, to uncovering their multitudinous peccadilloes, their evil little schemes, their shady deals, their assaults on civil liberties ...
Thirteen years under a centre-left government just weren't the same. Okay, so the Labour leadership might mess things up a bit. They might annoy us somewhat. They might even lead us into illegal wars. But they're not hideous, twisted, self-serving swindlers, bigots and cheats. Right-wing conspiracy theorists will go out of their way to invent strange stories about Labour but they're unlikely to be true.
The last thirteen years have not been very good for drama in the UK. But no sooner have the forked-tongued chinless wonders of the right got back into power and, hey, the BBC beckons me to The Drama Building. Former colleagues are enquiring about me after all this time. Looks like we might be back in business. TV Drama is about to be reborn out of fear and loathing, the anguish and the outrage which it is only sensible and proper to feel in the face of this dreadful coalition government.
Something in the air, my friends. Something in the air ...
(Oh, and BTW - hi, Shayne!- a really good friend who works in arts documentaries has suggested that the BBC might be interested in a documentary or two about Shakespeare, or rather about the revelations I can offer. So that's something else I'll be looking into very closely, while publishing's very, very quiet just now.)
There was me, the very picture of nonchalance as I wandered into the famous BBC Television Centre, probably looking like someone who's spent too long in the countryside and might actually have arrived by tractor. And it turns out that they've moved the drama department. We used to be across the road, behind the bike sheds. Now we have something called 'The Drama Building'. And before long, we'll be moving again.
Hey - dig that "we"!
Anyway, a great chat, most encouraging. And oddly enough, there's a guy working a door or two away on Lark Rise to Candleford. He was script editor on the last series I worked on with the producer I was meeting (she's now an executive producer, two steps down from God). I haven't seen this script editor chap in fourteen years. Only yesterday, though, he was asking after me.
Now, all this is just a wee bit weird. But I've been having a strange sense of a return to business-as-usual after something like ten or twelve years. Let me explain.
One of my very first writing jobs in British TV was developing an idea by Paul Theroux into a potential TV drama series. This was for a firm called Euston Films, a company for which I had, and still have, almost unqualified admiration.
The project stalled rather suddenly when the parent company, Thames Television, lost its licence to broadcast. It lost its licence because it had annoyed a certain Margaret Hilda Thatcher. See, Mrs Thatcher had unleashed a death squad to assassinate a group of Irish people in broad daylight on the streets of Gibraltar. Thames TV made a documentary about it. By doing so, they signed their own death warrant, so to speak. Their broadcast licence was effectively revoked, and my series with Euston Films withered on the vine, basically because Euston Films no longer knew if it had a future.
I got my revenge, up to a point, by restaging the shooting of the Irish Republicans for another TV drama series (we did it on Brighton sea-front, though, rather than in Gibraltar). But it was a hollow victory. I had in fact lost one of my very first jobs because of a politician who went ape whenever somebody questioned the terrible things that happened while she was in power.
But it was a golden period for me, following on from Thatcher's own political demise, because her party remained in government for another seven years. Great news for hard-hitting drama and political thrillers. Why? Simple:
Because we expect Conservatives to misbehave. We know that they're up to no good. We can devote all our energies, 24/7, to uncovering their multitudinous peccadilloes, their evil little schemes, their shady deals, their assaults on civil liberties ...
Thirteen years under a centre-left government just weren't the same. Okay, so the Labour leadership might mess things up a bit. They might annoy us somewhat. They might even lead us into illegal wars. But they're not hideous, twisted, self-serving swindlers, bigots and cheats. Right-wing conspiracy theorists will go out of their way to invent strange stories about Labour but they're unlikely to be true.
The last thirteen years have not been very good for drama in the UK. But no sooner have the forked-tongued chinless wonders of the right got back into power and, hey, the BBC beckons me to The Drama Building. Former colleagues are enquiring about me after all this time. Looks like we might be back in business. TV Drama is about to be reborn out of fear and loathing, the anguish and the outrage which it is only sensible and proper to feel in the face of this dreadful coalition government.
Something in the air, my friends. Something in the air ...
(Oh, and BTW - hi, Shayne!- a really good friend who works in arts documentaries has suggested that the BBC might be interested in a documentary or two about Shakespeare, or rather about the revelations I can offer. So that's something else I'll be looking into very closely, while publishing's very, very quiet just now.)
Friday, 2 July 2010
Good News/Bad News
Apparently, it's hell out there. Nobody's buying anything. And it's worse in the UK than in the US of A. Publishers in London, poor things, are staring out of the window wondering what to do with their lives. It can't go on.
That, at least, would appear to be the case with popular non-fiction, a genre (?) which has been hit rather badly by the recent economic uncertainty (and that uncertainty is currently enjoying something a come back here in the UK). Historical fiction, so they say, is thriving. And knowing some fantastic writers of excellent historical fiction I can only say, well that's great news.
But I'm too scared to write historical fiction. I keep thinking I'll go to pieces if I don't know what colour doublet Will Shakespeare was wearing on a certain Monday morning (and if I make it up - well, then it'll be made up). No, I feel safer with historical non-fiction, especially my own sort of investigative brand. Which just happens to be what publishers don't think anyone is interested in buying at present. Not just me - it's across the industry. Something to do with a certain High Street bookstore chain and its dullard management, fortunately elbowed aside after a truly dreadful Christmas season and now replaced by some human beings.
Anyway, that's what my agent told me over the phone yesterday. Best to wait until a publisher somewhere stops staring out of the window, gives a little shudder and thinks out loud: "Better do a bit of publishing, then."
So what's a poor writer to do in the meantime? Well, here's the weird thing. I'm heading back to the BBC!! Haven't passed through that hallowed portal in twelve years or something crazy. But, couple of weeks from now, I'll be back in the building, discussing DRAMA.
All a result of meeting up with an old producer colleague a few weeks back (just go down a few posts and you'll find it). An idea or two was sent, both were liked, so we're seemingly back in the game. How cool is that?
Like I say, it's been a dozen years since I crossed the threshold of the BBC Drama Building, and I'm extremely optimistic that things have changed. Most important, though - I learnt, way back, that in TV drama you have to be working with people you trust. If you don't, or can't, trust your colleagues to make the right decision every once in a while, the project's probably doomed. And I trust my old producer colleague, not least of all because she's done some terrific stuff while I've been out in the sticks. She's kept the torch alight, bless her, like a beacon in the darkness.
So, while we wait for the publishing industry to shift its collective arse, heigh-ho, it's off to the BBC in London, and a break from history for a wee while.
Funny old world.
That, at least, would appear to be the case with popular non-fiction, a genre (?) which has been hit rather badly by the recent economic uncertainty (and that uncertainty is currently enjoying something a come back here in the UK). Historical fiction, so they say, is thriving. And knowing some fantastic writers of excellent historical fiction I can only say, well that's great news.
But I'm too scared to write historical fiction. I keep thinking I'll go to pieces if I don't know what colour doublet Will Shakespeare was wearing on a certain Monday morning (and if I make it up - well, then it'll be made up). No, I feel safer with historical non-fiction, especially my own sort of investigative brand. Which just happens to be what publishers don't think anyone is interested in buying at present. Not just me - it's across the industry. Something to do with a certain High Street bookstore chain and its dullard management, fortunately elbowed aside after a truly dreadful Christmas season and now replaced by some human beings.
Anyway, that's what my agent told me over the phone yesterday. Best to wait until a publisher somewhere stops staring out of the window, gives a little shudder and thinks out loud: "Better do a bit of publishing, then."
So what's a poor writer to do in the meantime? Well, here's the weird thing. I'm heading back to the BBC!! Haven't passed through that hallowed portal in twelve years or something crazy. But, couple of weeks from now, I'll be back in the building, discussing DRAMA.
All a result of meeting up with an old producer colleague a few weeks back (just go down a few posts and you'll find it). An idea or two was sent, both were liked, so we're seemingly back in the game. How cool is that?
Like I say, it's been a dozen years since I crossed the threshold of the BBC Drama Building, and I'm extremely optimistic that things have changed. Most important, though - I learnt, way back, that in TV drama you have to be working with people you trust. If you don't, or can't, trust your colleagues to make the right decision every once in a while, the project's probably doomed. And I trust my old producer colleague, not least of all because she's done some terrific stuff while I've been out in the sticks. She's kept the torch alight, bless her, like a beacon in the darkness.
So, while we wait for the publishing industry to shift its collective arse, heigh-ho, it's off to the BBC in London, and a break from history for a wee while.
Funny old world.
Wednesday, 16 June 2010
Rebuilding TV Drama
Went to the first of three meetings yesterday, in my old hometown of Birmingham. This was of a strategy group working under the aegis of the Producers' Forum and Screen West Midlands. The issue to be discussed - how to rebuild a sustainable TV drama industry in Birmingham and the West Midlands.
The drama industry in Birmingham was the casualty of a cultural sea-change in British TV. I remember it because I was working on a couple of Birmingham-based drama series when the sea-change happened.
There was a BBC1 drama series called "Back Up". It was an interesting one for me because it was based around a police support unit in Birmingham, and my kid brother was then a member of a police support unit in Birmingham. Which meant that, for a week or so, as part of my research I was effectively working alongside my brother.
The first series went pretty well. That was when management looked on Birmingham as a production centre in its own right, and the Head of Drama at good old Pebble Mill took the trouble to find out what Birmingham and the region had to offer. There was a real sense of an alternative to London, and that BBC Birmingham had just enough independence of outlook to develop and produce its own slate of drama projects.
The second series turned into a bit of a nightmare. The management had changed - and the new lot simply didn't want to be in Birmingham. They hated spending time there. It was like a gulag to them. They couldn't stand being so far away from The Groucho Club. They feared that, if they weren't stalking the corridors of BBC Television Centre or hanging around Soho House, somebody else would get noticed, somebody else would get the promotion.
The atmosphere, the culture, and the quality of the product had changed radically, overnight, and for the worse.
There was no third series. Not long after that, there was no more Pebble Mill. What we got instead was Doctors, a kindergarten for people entering TV. The BBC's weird obsession with medical stuff had meant a conveyor-belt daytime drama, pumped out of Birmingham for the benefit of those who happened to be at home, was the contribution of my great city to the schedules.
You can tell how bad things are: Doctors doesn't even admit it's in Birmingham; Hustle came and filmed here, but only to keep costs down (the viewer was not meant to realise they'd popped up to Birmingham for some shots) and Survivors ... well, that was just crap.
So how do you rebuild an industry that has been destroyed by cultural prejudice rather than economic conditions? Maybe we should be asking other regions who have suffered a similar kind of devastation for what were purely political reasons. But one thing's for sure - for as long as there were senior managers in the media who felt such contempt for the audience that they couldn't bear to be out there where the viewers actually are, there was never going to be a strong drama industry anywhere in the UK.
I mean, just because people are in work - in the mythical town of Holby, or that strange London suburb of Walford, for instance - doesn't mean that the drama side of things isn't on life support.
Maybe the return of a viable TV drama industry in the Midlands will mark the rebirth of TV drama in general. Now wouldn't that be nice?
The drama industry in Birmingham was the casualty of a cultural sea-change in British TV. I remember it because I was working on a couple of Birmingham-based drama series when the sea-change happened.
There was a BBC1 drama series called "Back Up". It was an interesting one for me because it was based around a police support unit in Birmingham, and my kid brother was then a member of a police support unit in Birmingham. Which meant that, for a week or so, as part of my research I was effectively working alongside my brother.
The first series went pretty well. That was when management looked on Birmingham as a production centre in its own right, and the Head of Drama at good old Pebble Mill took the trouble to find out what Birmingham and the region had to offer. There was a real sense of an alternative to London, and that BBC Birmingham had just enough independence of outlook to develop and produce its own slate of drama projects.
The second series turned into a bit of a nightmare. The management had changed - and the new lot simply didn't want to be in Birmingham. They hated spending time there. It was like a gulag to them. They couldn't stand being so far away from The Groucho Club. They feared that, if they weren't stalking the corridors of BBC Television Centre or hanging around Soho House, somebody else would get noticed, somebody else would get the promotion.
The atmosphere, the culture, and the quality of the product had changed radically, overnight, and for the worse.
There was no third series. Not long after that, there was no more Pebble Mill. What we got instead was Doctors, a kindergarten for people entering TV. The BBC's weird obsession with medical stuff had meant a conveyor-belt daytime drama, pumped out of Birmingham for the benefit of those who happened to be at home, was the contribution of my great city to the schedules.
You can tell how bad things are: Doctors doesn't even admit it's in Birmingham; Hustle came and filmed here, but only to keep costs down (the viewer was not meant to realise they'd popped up to Birmingham for some shots) and Survivors ... well, that was just crap.
So how do you rebuild an industry that has been destroyed by cultural prejudice rather than economic conditions? Maybe we should be asking other regions who have suffered a similar kind of devastation for what were purely political reasons. But one thing's for sure - for as long as there were senior managers in the media who felt such contempt for the audience that they couldn't bear to be out there where the viewers actually are, there was never going to be a strong drama industry anywhere in the UK.
I mean, just because people are in work - in the mythical town of Holby, or that strange London suburb of Walford, for instance - doesn't mean that the drama side of things isn't on life support.
Maybe the return of a viable TV drama industry in the Midlands will mark the rebirth of TV drama in general. Now wouldn't that be nice?
Saturday, 22 May 2010
Old Friends
Went to a talk last night in Birmingham. The two guest speakers were Tony Garnett and Hilary Salmon, both top TV producers. I worked with both of them in the 90s.
It was great to see them both again, and really nice to chat with them briefly afterwards. But it felt rather odd. See, I've been out of TV for nearly ten years now, because - well, basically, because it just wasn't worth it. I'd learnt at the feet of the masters, and now a bunch of minnows had taken over and were screwing up everything in sight. I couldn't afford to carry on writing for television, not if I wanted to retain my last remaining shred of sanity.
At the same time, it was odd to think that I had worked with some of the best, and had really learnt my craft. And that, for the whole of the noughties, all that know-how was redundant. Even thinking about working in British TV was a waste of my time.
Could things be changing? Is it possible that, with big cuts coming to all sectors (the BBC included), we can get rid of the thousands of spin-doctors, marketing wonks and unnecessary 'executives' who have been cluttering up the BBC for years, getting in the way and preventing the creatives from making good programmes?
I'm almost daring to hope so. Of course, I still want to carry on with my books; I've done far too much research and development on them to let all that go to waste.
But I would be happy to go back to TV, if I could bypass all the bullshit and just work with a first-class producer on a real good project.
After all, at one point I had a four-part series with the BBC, who were eager to discuss a potential second series and would I be interested in a screenplay adaptation as well? Then somebody new came along and I've never worked for the Beeb since. Maybe it's time to venture back - just dip my toe in the waters - listen out for the approaching-shark music - see how we go.
Meanwhile, I've stared into the hole in the ground where Shakespeare's house was (you can see the cellar walls now) and may well be helping to enlarge it before too long. That should help me keep my feet on the ground (or even under it) while thoughts of TV drama begin to distract me.
It was great to see them both again, and really nice to chat with them briefly afterwards. But it felt rather odd. See, I've been out of TV for nearly ten years now, because - well, basically, because it just wasn't worth it. I'd learnt at the feet of the masters, and now a bunch of minnows had taken over and were screwing up everything in sight. I couldn't afford to carry on writing for television, not if I wanted to retain my last remaining shred of sanity.
At the same time, it was odd to think that I had worked with some of the best, and had really learnt my craft. And that, for the whole of the noughties, all that know-how was redundant. Even thinking about working in British TV was a waste of my time.
Could things be changing? Is it possible that, with big cuts coming to all sectors (the BBC included), we can get rid of the thousands of spin-doctors, marketing wonks and unnecessary 'executives' who have been cluttering up the BBC for years, getting in the way and preventing the creatives from making good programmes?
I'm almost daring to hope so. Of course, I still want to carry on with my books; I've done far too much research and development on them to let all that go to waste.
But I would be happy to go back to TV, if I could bypass all the bullshit and just work with a first-class producer on a real good project.
After all, at one point I had a four-part series with the BBC, who were eager to discuss a potential second series and would I be interested in a screenplay adaptation as well? Then somebody new came along and I've never worked for the Beeb since. Maybe it's time to venture back - just dip my toe in the waters - listen out for the approaching-shark music - see how we go.
Meanwhile, I've stared into the hole in the ground where Shakespeare's house was (you can see the cellar walls now) and may well be helping to enlarge it before too long. That should help me keep my feet on the ground (or even under it) while thoughts of TV drama begin to distract me.
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