Alchemy

...is part craft, part alchemy.

The craft part is relatively straightforward. Sketch a family background - how did they become who they are? Is their job important to the story? If so, research what characteristics they would need to make them good at their job - or bad, if the story requires - and how that effects their relationships with other characters. What do they want? What do they need? Does their psyche help or hinder them in getting it? Why?

And so on.

But there's something else. I tiptoe round them, filling in bits and pieces that seem to fit, sizing them up, sticking in a failed relationship here, a guilty conscience there, an obsession down in that damp patch in the shadows, circling them warily with but one question; that's all very well, but who are you?

And then, if I'm lucky, I get it. A sudden insight - something which takes that patchwork biography of attributes, desires, and contradictions and links it - no, merges it with the story that is simultaneously taking shape. Hard to explain, but for me it's often linked to an understanding of the overall theme of the piece. He is like this, which is why it makes puts him in conflict with that in the third act, which is why he... will pursue vengeance at the cost of all he loves... pursue love in spite of the world being against him etc. And so the biography becomes a character, and the character, story.

Character is story, story is character. They're not linked - they are inextricably intertwined and inter-dependent.

I only mention this because it happened a couple of days ago - I've been wrestling with a character for a while, compiling notes with a frustrating lack of direction and then PING - she came alive, and the story with her. Magical.

Alchemy.

I'm sure I could analyse that process in the hope of making it systematic and reliable, but you know what? I prefer the magic. It's those precious, rare moments that make the slog worthwhile.

How to start writing

The key to starting to write is to write.

Oh so simple, oh so easy for me to say - and so ludicrously hard for me to do. As a boss prevaricator in the vast underworld realm of prevarication, I find getting started on the latest project next to impossible. Every...single...time.

And I go through a pointless, anxiety inducing, and entirely destructive thought process that includes such nuggets of wisdom as, 'I don't know what I'm doing', and 'I've forgotten how to write', and 'I'm rubbish'. Every...single...time.

When of course I haven't forgotten how to write - I just don't know quite how to write this particular project...YET.

And the correct response to this dumb exercise?

Write.

Anything. Doesn't have to be the project in hand - this would count (and I am counting it, believe me). Because it's action, and action provokes energy and thought, and before you know it, you're in there - you're writing.

Huzzah.

Just in case you thought you were the only one.



note; this does not apply to writers forged in the furious fire of continuing drama, such as my pals JP, MG and AP, who, used to the relentless weekly demand for 'words, damn you, get me words for the actors to say and get me them now', don't bother with such self-indulgence. They just get on and get it written. Swines.

Minger

So Minder is being revived. Can't see it myself - with the word 'updated' in all the press I've seen, I have images of a 2008 Terry slamming a rival scallywag up against a wall with a stanley knife at his throat. Good clean gentlemanly fisticuffs just won't play these days...

ITV didn't go for the pitch - too quirky. The incoming regime intends to play it safe, which is fair enough given their gruesome performance recently. So off it pops in hopes of finding a different, perhaps better, home. Fly little pitch, fly.

I want this in black (white's just silly, isn't it? White electronic goods are so clean, shiny and antiseptic they make me think of sanitary ware) and I want this.

The former because it's the laptop I've been yearning for since I first used computers - I don't want a whizzbang desktop replacement on which I can watch HD movies/create my own movies/play GTA/surf/mix my latest gabba track to irritate my fellow train travellers with, I want something on which I can type up notes, maybe work on a draft if production pressure demands it, that's fast, no heavier than a plumpish book, and won't make me feel sick if (or rather when - I know myself all too well) I drop it. And the latter because it's about as close to a magic wand as I've yet seen.

But we need to get a sand pit. Tsk. The bairns can play but I can't...?

Barfta

So, went to the BAFTAS. Life on Mars 2 didn't win, which surprised nobody. I felt disappointed for Matthew and Ashley - they should have won at least one. The nature of the drama winners reflected the nature of the juries and their motivation, I reckon; white middle class guilt. Britz over Cranford? What?

Best part was strolling along an unusually pedestrian-free Great Marlborough Street in the warm Sunday evening with my LoM buddies, dressed in my Moss Bros suit (no bow tie; there are limits), and gradually realising that the reason for the absence of pedestrians was the iron fences holding back the crowds gathering at Argyll Street, which was red-carpeted from one side to the other. I loitered uncomfortably for a while with lovely Julie Rutterford as Philip and Dean were blinded by flashbulbs, then made a dash for the auditorium and the free champagne. My response to the dazzling and the bedazzled crowds is to think of this. I had to agree with Ash - writers just aren't made for this kind of event.

Cop pilot finally in and awaiting final absolute definite really this is it this time decision from the Beeb. Pitch in at ITV. Working on a treatment for a thriller type pilot and about to start on the single commission. Busy busy. In a good way. And the sun's shining.

Killing time in Foyles before a meeting - oh joy - I picked up a screenwriting manual, my first in a long time. It turned out to be fascinating - first I've read that reflects the TV writer's real experience rather than the fantasy life projected in most feature writing books. I'm sure you all know it, but I'll recommend it anyhow; Writing the TV Drama Series, by Pamela Douglas.

Stuff of writing days

I suppose what I should be writing here is the bit on co-writing I promised, but that seems to involve more thought than I've been able to manage for a week or two, so it'll have to wait. So this is an insight into the STUFF of writing days of the last week or two.

Holed up in a room with my cop pilot* co-writer for two days thrashing out what we hope is the clinching draft (as opposed to the several other clinching drafts we've been through so far). It's the first time we've tried working in the same room simultaneously, and it proved surprisingly painless. We're closing in on the final greenlight decision, so everyone's getting antsy.

Reading lots of stuff on the web researching for another pilot I'm doing (another cop show - have I mentioned that writers are as prone to typecasting as actors? Probably a post topic in itself), trying to avoid logging on to this, this and this, failing miserably, and consequently frittering away hours at a time**.

Met the woman on whom the show will be based, which was both intimidating and thrilling - she had an extraordinary job, and perhaps the most extraordinary thing about her is that she doesn't seem extraordinary at all, other than extraordinarily nice. Extraordinary.

Arranged a meeting with some other people whose world is very far from my own that I had to postpone, but when it goes ahead I'm sure I'll post about that too.

Ashes to Ashes finished magnificently - the audience declined in a fairly normal and graceful arc rather than a catastrophic plummet, which bodes well for A2A2.

And Life on Mars 2 was nominated for a BAFTA. This apparently means everyone involved in the show can now embroider "BAFTA NOMINEE" on their underwear, which is a bonus. The genuine actual bonus is that I get to go to the ceremony, dinner and party which, even though Skins will walk away with it, is pretty damn exciting. Big question is - which frock?

Met my very favourite exec in the world for coffee, gossip, and a casual 'let's see if we can cook something up' meeting. And, much to our surprise, we did, so I wrote a two page pitch which went down very well and will go to a broadcaster next week, with the backing of one of the UK's top indies.

Crivvens.

Now, before you click your mouse button with bitter fury - lucky bastard, he gets it on a plate, I could do that, it's not what you can do it's who you know, it's not about ability it's about luck etc. bear in mind how long it's taken for me to reach this point. Eight or so years on the dole and working part-time in a corner shop while churning out scripts that gradually got better, followed by eight years of writing scripts under the pressure of production deadlines and all that entails.

That's a lot of work to put in to earn some luck.

It's led me to the precarious point in my life as a working writer where people are looking for me to come up with stuff with real expectation - exciting, but also terrifying; the tightrope is thin, the fall vertiginous. The opportunities now coming my way entirely depend on my ability to produce the goods - screw them up, and the work goes away.

Okay, now I'm really scared...


*Meaning the cop pilot show we're working on, not the profession of my co-writer. Though he is an ex-cop. If I discovered he flew light aircraft that would really screw my glib 'cop pilot' phrase.

**My goal in supplying this information being to suck you into a frittering vortex of my creation, reducing my own I-should-be-working guilt levels by allowing me to believe that 'everyone else is doing it'.

A2A2...

...is on.

Quite a debut for Monastic Productions - go the West Country writer monks, go!

Scores on the Doors

Ashes to Ashes Ep. 5 did remarkably well in the ratings last night - 6.6m with a 28.6% share. The consolidated figures* across the series so far have increased the audience by an average of 950k per ep, which could push ep 5's ratings to 7.5m, which would be very very good indeed.**

I also note that IPlayer now has a top ten most popular downloads, and that ep. 5 of Ashes is no.1, while ep. 4 is no. 10. More good news. And which oddly makes me feel more connected to the audience - as I type this on my PC, someone somewhere is watching the episodes I wrote on a PC just like mine in a scruffy hole of an 'office' just like mine. I'm as connected to them as I am to you as you read this - doesn't that give you an eerie, ever so slightly paranoid shiver?

And all this good news doesn't just apply to me. The relevant part for those of you who aspire to write TV drama, is that the extra 800,000 people who watched Ashes to Ashes this week were watching Trial and Retribution last week, which means that they preferred to watch drama rather than football last night. Drama still pulls them in! Across a variety of platforms and media, there is still a large popular audience for the stuff that we make up.

Feeling better?

You might think it's shallow to be preoccupied with viewing figures - what about my artistic integrity, dammit - but you're wrong. Audience figures are everything.

Somewhere in the suspiciously ordered desktops*** of The People Who Really Make Decisions there is an unbelievably precise breakdown of how many people of what kind watched how much of the show that you wrote. If it's the right number of people of the right kind, and they watched it to the end when the trail for the next show has a chance to keep them watching the channel, the next time your name is proposed as a writer on a new show, the suggestion might be greeted favourably; the wrong number of people of the wrong sort - maybe the suggestion won't be discussed for as long as you might hope...



*which include 'time shifted viewers', i.e. people who recorded it to watch later, and the figures that really matter for those shadowy, omni-powerful figures known as 'Commissioners'. However, they don't include the figures for those viewing via BBC IPlayer. Yet - but they will, oh yes they definitely will...the future is coming, Fumble.

**Unless those 800k people who watched T&R last week all taped Ashes to watch later...

***I just bet they're neat.

Funk to funky

So Ashes is going down well.

Apart from a Life on Mars=Genius, Ashes to Ashes=Betrayal Of Every Aspect Of Humanity That Makes It Remotely Bearable hardcore fanship, the audience seems to sticking around for the ride. Which is good. They better strap in, 'cos it gets dark and bumpy from here on in. Ha.

This was going to be a post about co-writing, which I am currently doing, but that will have to wait until I've recovered from the latest of my impressively continuous series of colds.

Playgroups. Swamps of infection; a bunch of kids swimming about in a thick viral soup they can't wait to smear over their parents' mucous membranes the instant they get home.

Went to the BBC Worldwide Showcase Ashes to Ashes themed dinner*, which was quite an event. Being part of a group that was processed into the central tables in the middle of a vast ballroom crammed with drunk and over-excited television buyers was quite an experience, and one that the estimable Mr. Glenister and the quite remarkably lovely Ms. Hawes handled with considerably more glamour and grace than myself. Not really built for this part of the job, writers. I stuck close to Ashley, hoped some of his award-winning gravitas would rub off on me, and tried not to have more than an inhuman amount of alcohol*. Not that I needed to worry – the real star (apart from the aforementioned talents) was this, parked on a dais for all to see, admire, slaver over and gently caress. Wish I’d had me camera.


*I particularly liked the "Gene Says..." T-shirts the waiting staff were wearing. V. nice touch. I wanted one badly, but swapping shirts didn't seem like a good idea - there was no competitive element to the evening. Maybe okay at an awards ceremony - the TV Plus awards, perhaps, but only by winners in parallel categories.

**And failed. When will I learn...?

He knows the use of Ashes

As requested by oli, glimpses of the development process on Ashes to Ashes (now officially a hit show, a relief and delight to all concerned).

I’ve mentioned a little about it in previous posts (top secret groovy project). While it didn’t stay top secret for long, it does remain groovy, thanks to its fine pixie boot stylee.

Not long after Life on Mars 2 finished shooting, some time in October 2006, I was asked if I’d like to join in on developing the proposed spin-off. Didn’t take me long to answer.

I joined Matthew, Ashley, Jane, Claire (later Simon), Beth, and Anna (creators and all round top men and writer geniuses, execs, producer and editor) for a number of mind-expanding series development sessions over the next few months. Matt and Ash had the format clearly in place from the start – London, 1981, Female psych cop as co-lead etc. – but how that might play out was another thing. It was the most exciting and stimulating project I’ve been involved in at such an early stage, thanks to the generosity and infectious enthusiasm of all concerned, particularly Matt and Ash, who were quite ready at all times to kick their baby round the room, bounce it off walls and force it into an endless series of mutant shapes.*

To oli’s questions;

Given that the LOM series finale (more or less) concluded Gene et al were fictional, did you worry about the audience connecting with a hallucination, and if so how did you tackle it?

Personally, not for a moment. Every dramatic character is a fiction, every ‘realistic’ world a selective projection of its makers, no matter how ‘real’ they might claim it to be. If the stories and characters are engaging and compelling enough, the artificiality of the story framework is irrelevant. Fantasy stories that explore and celebrate the power of the imagination over the real are so familiar a narrative type that they are almost a sub-genre in themselves. Not many people have difficulty connecting with ‘The Wizard of Oz’, so why shouldn’t they connect with something that has cops at its centre instead of a seventeen year old woman in a chest band, witches, a lion with a speech impediment, and very small people with strange haircuts?

On a similar note, how will you make the fantasy elements effective now the audience (presumably) knows the whole thing is a fantasy?

As above – by making the characters engaging and their stories compelling. Alex as a character has a broader frame of reference and a bigger journey to go on than Sam. Hopefully the audience will be entertained and intrigued enough by the fantasy elements to stick with her and engage with her predicament.

I detect a confusion amongst some critical voices between fantasy and science fiction – neither Life on Mars nor Ashes to Ashes are science fiction. Much as some people might like them to be about time travel, they’re not, and never were.

Why was the decision made to switch from "first person" to "third" - e.g. giving Gene scenes that Alex is not present in?

If the LoM universe is a fantasy constructed by Sam, why should Sam be unable to have POVs other than his own? He has no requirement even to be Sam. Sam could be a six foot mole if he fancied trying out black velvet fur. I don’t know about you, but for me part of a dream’s disturbing power comes from the fact that sometimes I am myself, sometimes I am someone else, and sometimes I am neither, but someone/thing else viewing those characters' bizarre dilemmas (I’ve never actually been a female nurse trapped in a bubble in a stone tsunami, but that didn’t stop my dream of the same haunting me for years of my childhood with its overwhelming 'realness').

There are of course other imperatives - time pressure on the leads, and the necessity to differentiate Ashes stylistically from LoM - it might seem a very similar world, but appearances can be deceptive...

The interesting thing for me is that Sam didn’t take a ‘third person’ POV of his situation – his narrow, very literal, view of the world restricted him to his own POV, which tells you a lot about his character. Alex has a broader perspective, different expectations, an even more turbulent past, and doesn’t share Sam’s occasionally tiresome moral certitude. Her view of the world of 1981 differs from Sam’s view of 1973 as their view of 2007 might. And yet she finds herself inhabiting a very similar world…

Spooky?

Mm.

Intriguing?

I bloody hope so.

* the ‘mutant baby’ metaphor for story development deserves someone’s thesis somewhere, surely?

GOAAAALLLLLLLLLL!

...the ball drops to Graham outside the penalty box... he takes it on the volley... and SCORES.

7m with a 29.1% share. Well done the Graham lad.

I'm Happy, Hope You're Happy Too

I know, I know, it's been so long. Too long, some might say, but hey - we know this is special. That our relationship transcends the petty boundaries of time.

So, anyway - where were we?

The very least I can do is a puff for the show that kept me so busy last year, Ashes to Ashes, so do tune in to BBC1 at 9 pm tonight. Essential viewing, not least because if you don't watch this first ep, the chances of working out what's going on when it comes to my eps (4 & 5) are slim. And you are going to watch my eps, aren't you? Course you are.

Stick with it, even if you genuflect beneath the acting icon that is Simm - it will grow on you, trust me.

What have I been I doing all this time? Writing for Ashes (or A2A, as it has become known in fannier* circles), co-writing a cop show pilot, and becoming a dad for the second time. Blogging got pushed down the list, but I will be updating occasionally in the future.


*if it isn't a word, it should be. I blame Gene Hunt. I clearly haven't evacuated him entirely from my system.

Channel Flicking Pays

I am the living proof. Idly flicking through channels on a Saturday night - hoping to find a really great film that had just started and continued to midnight so that I could get tetchy about not seeing it, and go to bed satisfied that I had spent the day well - I happened to notice some very familiar urban nightscapes. Oh my god, is that - could that be - It is! The opening sequence to the second Taggart* I wrote on ITV3. Yippy day, calloo callay.

Repeat fees! As they're being shown sequentially, that means the 1st one I did was probably shown too. Ha.

Aren't many jobs you can count a good day's work as slumping on the sofa casually pressing a TV remote button.

*Ken Russell's a fan, apparently. Which impresses me more than it probably should.

A bit of a gap...

Mmm, yes, sorry about that. So much for good intentions. Truth is I got bored with the sound of my own blog voice, which along with a flood of work and a hospital visit to repair a wrist injury*, meant that my blog-blathering came to an abrupt halt. This entry may or may not signal a remarkable return to form. My money's on the latter.

Worst thing about the wrist op - apart from projectile vomiting across my own bed in front of my fellow wardmates - was that I had to turn to voice recognition software to churn the words out. It's amazing how accurate it is, although apparently the robotic monotone I have now become accustomed to using does tend to grate on the listener. It's fine for e-mails and the like, and pretty good for notes too, but when it comes to the grimy, claustrophobic furnace at the wordface (Final pain in the arse bloody Draft), it gets very sticky indeed.

I don't know about you, but the act of creative writing seems to come as much through the mechanical act of writing as through the mind for me; something about the physical tappety tap of fingers on keys gives rhythm and drive.

Anyhow - spent a lovely day at the Lighthouse as guest writer on the TV writing course run by Philip Palmer - got good news about a crime series I co-created - got an Ashes to Ashes draft in with the help of the voice recognition software and packets of strepsils - was chuffed to find that my Life on Mars ep held its own with the football - went to the screening of the final LoM ep and secreted a tiny tear in the darkness of the auditorium (cracking ending...) and enjoyed flashing my post-op scar at every opportunity. Makes it look as though I fended off a razor attack, and means the Weegie** hardnut persona is an option should I ever have need to use it.


*I went into hospital, they put me under general anaesthetic, and then they broke my arm. Admittedly that was part of the mending plan, and they did have the decency to put it back together with a couple of bits of meccano and a few screws, but all the same... Ouch.

Software

I vowed to myself when I started this that I wouldn't talk about screenwriting software - what software should I use? is one of the most common and least important questions that beginning writers ask - but I stumbled across a really nifty thing today that seems like something I might actually use, rather than the kind I have on my hard drive and only ever open up when I feel like pretending to be the kind of writer who has a method rather than being the kind of writer who frightens himself into producing stuff through an excess of anxiety.

So, yes I use the antediluvian and arse-achingly awful in just about every respect Final Draft*, mainly because when I was starting out I got a free copy. It works as a basic script formatter, but on every other level is a disastrously misconceived piece of crap. I foolishly upgraded from FD5 through to FD7, but have gone back to FD5 since the only useful structuring tool available within it - the navigator, which shows your script as an outline using scene headers - was rendered useless in FD7 when they made it possible to view alongside your script, but impossible to shift scenes about using it. Morons.

The INSTANT the latest version of Write Brothers Screenwriter comes out, FD gets binned.

Glad to get that off my chest.

The only time you need these script formatting programmes is approaching production, when the script gets 'locked' in order to make it simpler to issue revised pages to the various production departments. Up till then, nobody gives a damn what you use as long as they can read it.**

The programmes that I find genuinely useful, particularly in the early stages of structuring, which is the difficult bit, are Word, Storyview***, and the absolutely terrific, and not just because it's free, Keynote, which is simple to use but infinitely customiseable and powerful once you get into it.****

And the nifty wee thing I found today? Bubble.us, a brain/mind mapping type thingy whose beauty lies in its simplicity and speed. I often do bubble maps (much prefer the idea of a bubble map to a mind map - bubbles are multicoloured and go pop in an enchanting way, whereas mind maps sound like an away day in a motel off the M25. With lukewarm milky coffee and stale biscuits.) when looking for scene/story ideas, because it doesn't feel like writing, and in the early stages I prefer to feel like it's all provisional and fluid and not really writing yet.


*I'm not linking to it because I don't want to be responsible for someone spending their money unnecessarily. I HATE that sodding programme.

**Word will do fine. Better than fine, because at least you can move headings about in outline view.

***rumour is Write Brothers are going to incorporate it into the next version of Screenwriter. Please please pleeeeease....

****check out the add-ons and plug-ins - some are very good indeed.

Six Day Hangover

Well that was quite a do.

Strictly speaking it was a one day hangover that eased smoothly into flu*, but still. Still shaky, but manfully hauling myself to the desk I think, of course, of you, dear readers.

Jesus.

It was a memorable night for many reasons - finally meeting the legend that is Tony Jordan was definitely one - but the biggie has to have been me forgetting it wasn't a Friday night, and the last train was at midnight. Not one o'clock. Which is when they bring the shutters down at Victoria.**

Damn expensive, london cabs.

Lots of drunken bets laid that night were well off the mark, as ep 1 didn't get anywhere near the ratings anyone would have expected, though ep 2 did very well on BBC 4. I hardly dare draw attention to this post...

Head still monged with viral garbage, and having had a glimpse what being 80 might feel like (physical frailty is no fun; stairs are a test of stamina and courage), I have to do proper think work today. The very idea of an idea makes me want to boak, but that's the job.

Cheered by a phone call from a producer saying that yes, she'd like to go with the approach I'd suggested for a prospective development project but all the same - I'd rather be in bed.


UPDATE: It's not a bloody diary, ego boy. Or not just. It's about new/starting out writers getting a glimpse of the process.

Sorry.

Same day of the party, we did another brainstorm session on the Top Secret Project, with 2 drafts of ep 1*** and treatments for eps 2 & 3 also on the table. We finally wrestled with all the awkward questions we'd circled round and decided to leave well alone at previous meetings, only to find they were, of course, the questions we really needed to answer. We stripped down, we greased up, and we grappled. And by god I think we floored 'em. As with every meeting so far on this project I've gone in wondering how on earth we can really make it work, and come out enthused. Maybe a good sign. May not be.

Next stage for me is to do another treatment/beat sheet for my ep.


*the genuine bone-aching article. I immediately suspected HN51 but fortunately, just before isolating myself in an oxygen tent, I recalled that the (tiny) hors d'oevre served that celebratory evening didn't include turkey guts. To the best of my knowledge.

**this may possibly be related to the enormous amount of wine and the very little food I consumed. I blame shyness - free wine never comes with a 'don't dare touch me, bone-headed writer with the restraint of a vulture in an abattoir' warning. Which it should.

***Already. I know. Lead writers work for that additional adjective.