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Sketching the Sketch

 

 

Sketching the Sketch

I suppose there's always the danger in offering to share the writing process with anybody who might find it useful, that the offer will sound like I am sat on a tall tower made up of a collage of my own face, presiding over a master class in my mind. The point is to show and share the journey.Otherwise you only have BBC Writers room blogs/competition feedback (if you are lucky) etc. These are usually technical which can be useful but when its interesting its always personal.So to bring my tower down by its foundations; here's some of my own internal dialogue which I wouldn't recommend. You can see the worst of it at the bottom of the page where it belongs - at the arse end of the universe or at least mine (let's not be pompous and include anybody else's).

Step one: Getting emotional: 'all my sketches fail; what's the point of open submission when the commissioned writer's get it first; nobody gets it; the day job doesn't leave me enough time; I could write better if I was having sex/popular with fucking anybody/Peter Cook/less ginger/close friends have been nothing but scathing and patronising about the material/. For somebody who isn't Salman Rushdie, I have a surprising reservoir of writer's baggage: at least enough to drown a few people with me. And that's before I've switched on my computer and swore at the Windows start up sound. So cold canals and general misanthropy out the way, I go head to head with the blank page.

If I'm really out of practise with writing comedy then this happens first:

sexual innuendo

puns - they just keep appearing

as does every formula since Monty Python - even there I might think something like: 'Hey! The Full Monty Python..' that's a formula they haven't done yet...no: that's two old formats joined together while I make another unnecessary cup of tea because white space is unsettling.

If I do come up with innuendo, puns etc., this is because

a) that's a simple version of how dreams work: coding reality with unconscious pictures - and you are naturally trying to approach even a smattering of a dream state to get creative

or

b) I am a lazy areshole.

Step 2: For me this is often pulling up material from the past as a reference point or stopping at the first idea/draft. This is a mixture of me being scared of not being good enough (which is rapidly proving the case) or the assertion that: 'I've had sketches on TV and Weekending and Radio 2 and screw you'. This is protecting myself, in anticipation of rejection. As if I haven't had enough practise by now. In reality, once I stop making another unnecessary cup of tea, I enjoy the process for its own sake as one of my first loves.

Step 3: Then I get a first draft. Usually, at this stage I find myself still full of shit.

The sketch below is a recent first draft; me being lazy, trying to build it all around the wording of the advert towards the end of the sketch which is a weak angle:

(sorry I can't lay this out properly and the lines have long width but my web provider and my ISPN provider are so terrible they won't accept basic keyboard commands or load pages in less than three fucking weeks)

Recruiting Terrorists

1. Minister:       Prime Minister?

2. PM:              I'm behind the sofa. Now what have I done?

3. Minister:     The UK's a recruiting ground for extremists

                          again.

4. PM:             Not 'Justice for Woolworths'?

5. Minister:   Al Qaeda, Sir?

6. PM:            No thanks - I had pizza last night.

7. Minister:    I think you'll find that was an Al Forno, Sir. I

                        refer to those skint, prejudice people who believe

                       that when they die, they are rewarded with a nice

                       place to live in the afterlife.

8. PM:           The Isle of Wight?

9. Minister: You see we've been saying nasty foreigners

                       trained them but the wording of the advert does

                       give us away: 'Craaazy individual wanted:

                      chance to hit the ground running and make a real

                       impact'.

10. PM:          I know: I wrote it. Plan A for getting people back

                        in to work.

11. Minister: Dare one enquire what plan B is?

12. PM:          Repeat after me: 'hello lover boy; are you looking

                        for a good time...'

(ENDS)

 

The result of mistakenly building it around that 'Craazy individual..' bit is:

a) the flow is stilted and I haven't looked for any other angle or purpose of the sketch.

It may not be palatable to the BBC 7 program - personally I think that's there problem if that were the case but then again I chose to submit.

b) I have neglected other lines

c) one of the worst punch lines in history

So then you start 'killing your babies' as some writers put it. Personally I've always been a crosser outer and I hate kids anyway.

 

So after the first draft you get to:

 

Step 4: Above, I've given myself the instructions to write a sketch but not yet pulled a good angle out of it. So then I get stoned, have a bath - gestation periods are important - more time thinking and less writing is good - always leave that time even if its difficult to find when, like me you are working during the day and trying to write on a topical show after your tea.

So the angle becomes: I notice that its the relationship between the Minister and Prime Minister which is emerging as the joke. And this is good because it leads to dialogue and characters.

Because I am looking for a 'feel' to the dialogue now; I spot the bum notes. Or at least I give it a damn good go. I also start honing for the purpose of fitting an audience of 30 + educated BBC 7 listeners who haven't come for

a) anarchy (shame but once again nobody forced me to submit)

b) Monkey Dust (again, the privilege would have been nice but this is a different show)

So the sketch gets edited for dross and notes I make start considering a structure:

Recruiting Terrorists

1. Minister: Prime Minister?

2. PM: I'm behind the sofa. Now what have I done?

This can stay as it defines the superiority of the Minister which sets up the sketch right away without preamble.

3. Minister: The UK's a recruiting ground for extremists

again.

Topical but loose enough to play with

4. PM: Not 'Justice for Woolworths'?

Not a great gag but the cultural reference is right for the audience

5. Minister: Al Qaeda, Sir?

6. PM: No thanks - I had pizza last night.

7. Minister: I think you'll find that was an Al Forno, Sir. I

refer to those skint, prejudice people who believe

that when they die, they are rewarded with a nice

place to live in the afterlife.

8. PM: The Isle of Wight?

7 and 8 are shit.

a) nobody needs the pizza joke explaining. It's a nice throwaway only.

b) And the long lead up to 'the Isle of Wight' isn't worth it - because it sounds like something from a seventies sit com - who out there really owns that cultural reference anymore if they're being imaginative? And if you think about it - such topical shows as you get on BBC Radio don't insult the audience (who might be from the Isle of Wight) they always seek to deflate those people who are distant but pompously making political decisions on their behalf.

9. Minister: You see we've been saying nasty foreigners

trained them but the wording of the advert does

give us away: 'Craaazy individual wanted:

chance to hit the ground running and make a real

impact'.

10. PM: I know: I wrote it. Plan A for getting people back

in to work.

11. Minister: Dare one enquire what plan B is?

12. PM: Repeat after me: 'hello lover boy; are you looking

for a good time...'

(ENDS)

The problem here is still a truly crap punch line. A glorified children's TV presenter could have come up with it between ripping people off on phone lines.

So when it becomes more about the relationship between the two people and the 'punch line' almost writes itself on account of that. Therefore the sketch became the following:

 

Gordon and the Minister - runner number one

1. Minister: Prime Minister?

2. PM: I'm behind the sofa. What have I done, now?

3. Minister: Apparently the UK's a recruiting ground for extremists.

4. PM: Not 'Justice for Woolworths' again?

5. Minister: Al Qaeda, Sir?

6. PM: No thanks - I had pizza last night.

7. MINISTER: If I can refer you once again to your First Political Reader,

Prime Minister: 'Peter and Harriett are playing with a big

red ball but Bin Laden has to stay inside because he's a

very naughty boy'.

8. PM: I was a naughty boy once. Funny thing was I hardly

had any clothes on and I was in my early thirties...

9. FX: Cuckoos and whistles

10. MINISTER: If we could tiptoe gently away from sordid reminisce and

sit gingerly back down on the limited edition sofa of

reality? You see the wording of the advert in the paper

does have a UK feel to it: 'Craaazy individual wanted:

chance to hit the ground running and make a real impact'.

11. PM: I know. I wrote it: somebody has to have a job.

12. MINISTER: You do realise Prime Minister, these people would only

be employed for very brief periods of time? If I may make

a suggestion?

13. PM: (Giggling) Okay

14. MINISTER: Perhaps if you wore this awareness raising t-shirt with

some of the issues explained in cartoon form...and

paraded yourself around the Middle East for a week we

might all find a solution to live with.

15. PM: Its just my size!

16. MINISTER: I can't take all the credit: the Cabinet were only too happy

to have a whip round.

(ENDS)

Admittedly it's not a great punch line and I would have liked some tighter lines - but it fits a flow and importantly, suits the style of the show, which does not shy away from enjoying the language in the writing as much as the crash of the symbol at the end. For me, it:

a) shows the relationship which hits the zeitgeist; Brown is losing control

b) demonstrates a structure which can be repeated over more than one sketch if I want - and that is hopefully because, on first hearing, the lines imply this conversation takes place at No. 10 every day. The hope is that the listener gets placed straight into a world without writing any utter shit such as:

'Well you would say that again as you think you're more clever than me'.

c) it has a sound FX which uses the medium - if the medium isn't acknowledged why write in it?

d) stronger angles distract from the advert a little so I might get a way with it

Though the question always remains, whenever you share process - does the painstaking approach ever achieve true genius? Obviously not. The only way you get the spontaneous stuff you really like is to be at work writing - because you only bump into the one liners by accident when you are looking somewhere else. One of the most favourite lines I ever came up with was:

Buddhist pantomime: he's beyond you!

But I didn't get that one by sitting down 'to write a line about culture clash which combines traditional English Christmas traditions with oriental transcendence'. I dreamt it and wrote it down when I woke up.

Note: For layout and real advice - get full notes from BBC Writer's Room - radio scripts number their cues from 1 again on each page of a sketch - only TV scripts have sequential numbers throughout.

Beware of taking my advice because because I'm the world's biggest loser when it comes to getting materail on anywhere, especially the BBC. If you want failure to rub off on you keep reading, otherwise go to your bar full of successes and hang with the beautiful people. (I'm also ginger; I have many ways of completing the set. I don't have a sex life either if that makes you feel better. It doesn't make me feel better)  After a few initial topical sketches on WeekEnding (mainly because I had time to be in the corridors of BBC Radio Light Entertainment when I was still doing stand up), I have had not one single line, gag, sketch, nanosecond of material on TV, Radio or in print for ten whole years. This, despite writing up to fifteen hours a week honing one or two pages over six week periods at least twice a year when open submission programs or competitions appear.

Who does that? Who sets themselves up to be deemed as worthless and talentless so many fucking years!? Sometimes I think 'because I like the process' but tonight I think: 'middle aged failure; full of shit; talentless, embarrassing. I file invoices seven hours a day aged 42 while 25 year olds have seniority and I can't even get another job and this is me for ten years now. Throw yourself off a tall fucking building'.

Then I wrote some more. They didn't get on either. They never will. Now writing isn't even stopping me from going insane. Perhaps this will be the last words I ever write..