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Writing and stuff...
Dec. 4th, 2008 01:18 pmYes! We've been sent 'Burn After Reading'. That one was very high on my 'want' list. Loads and loads of other ones too, and a large parcel has arrived today as well :)
I know I bang on about Charlie Brooker and Screenburn a lot these days, but seriously, the man is awesome. We watched this week's Screenburn last night, which took a departure from being angry and funny and full of cynicism and decided instead to become a completely different show - a genuinely informative and useful show for any aspiring comedy and/or drama writers like myself. I found it differed from most interview based shows on two levels - firstly, the people being interviewed were genuinely excellent writers, with the creators of Life on Mars and Peep Show, and the Godlike half-man-half-fringe that is Graham Linehan. Oh, and Uncle Rusty. All right, so they were mostly excellent writers. Secondly, I was amazed after witnessing some plain embarrassing attempts at interviewing by presenters of shows like BBC Breakfast and The Culture Show (example on The Culture Show just the other day, Michael Sheen being asked 'Getting into a character... [actor A] says he starts with the nose, [actress B] says she always starts with the shoes. How do you start finding your character?' to which, Mister Sheen looked bemused and sensibly replied 'um... I start with the script.') In this show nobody wasted our time or the interviewees with stupid, 'quirky' questions, but got right down to business and this resulted in a show that was genuinely very inspiring and informative. I found Graham Linehan's final words of advice ('Writing is a lot like doing a poo. If you go before you really feel the urge to, you'll just get frustrated') to be particularly useful... I tend to write best when the bunnies bite hard. I've had a few vague ideas for this new script I was invited to send by the Writer's Room so I'm going to start doing a lot of notes on the characters, the situation and story ideas. The more I think about an original story before trying to write it, the more inclined I'll be to finish it.
I know I bang on about Charlie Brooker and Screenburn a lot these days, but seriously, the man is awesome. We watched this week's Screenburn last night, which took a departure from being angry and funny and full of cynicism and decided instead to become a completely different show - a genuinely informative and useful show for any aspiring comedy and/or drama writers like myself. I found it differed from most interview based shows on two levels - firstly, the people being interviewed were genuinely excellent writers, with the creators of Life on Mars and Peep Show, and the Godlike half-man-half-fringe that is Graham Linehan. Oh, and Uncle Rusty. All right, so they were mostly excellent writers. Secondly, I was amazed after witnessing some plain embarrassing attempts at interviewing by presenters of shows like BBC Breakfast and The Culture Show (example on The Culture Show just the other day, Michael Sheen being asked 'Getting into a character... [actor A] says he starts with the nose, [actress B] says she always starts with the shoes. How do you start finding your character?' to which, Mister Sheen looked bemused and sensibly replied 'um... I start with the script.') In this show nobody wasted our time or the interviewees with stupid, 'quirky' questions, but got right down to business and this resulted in a show that was genuinely very inspiring and informative. I found Graham Linehan's final words of advice ('Writing is a lot like doing a poo. If you go before you really feel the urge to, you'll just get frustrated') to be particularly useful... I tend to write best when the bunnies bite hard. I've had a few vague ideas for this new script I was invited to send by the Writer's Room so I'm going to start doing a lot of notes on the characters, the situation and story ideas. The more I think about an original story before trying to write it, the more inclined I'll be to finish it.
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