Skinning up

A little while ago the BBC Writersroom advertised a competition to write a webisode of Skins, for young writers who had never had work produced. “Aha, that’s me!” I thought. I was wrong – the upper age limit was about 23.

But that’s the point of Bryan Elsley’s vision: not only is he making heavy use of a US-style writers room, but he is stuffing it full of young and untested writers. The result is undeniably dynamic, and as I’ve said before, even if Skins falters it is sure to do so in an interesting way.

That said, I do wonder to what extent the show represents a new way of making TV, to adapt to a changing audience to whom a screen in the corner of the room is not so important as it is even to people my age (26 – but a technological revolution away from today’s teenagers, or so I’m forever being told). When all’s said and done it’s still a 10 x 45 minute ensemble drama, and it’s not the only show to be making heavy use of web-based promotion and extra material.

So, Skins embarked on its brave new era this week, having ditched all its main cast and brought in a whole new set of characters. I was excited and impressed when this gambit was announced; inevitably, after only one episode it’s hard to tell whether it has paid off to the extent of bettering the previous series – but there’s a lot of promise on display so far.

The obvious point of comparison is the start of series one, and there are big differences immediately apparent. The first is that we are seeing the group of friends encounter each other for the first time, whereas they are already established at the start of the first series (bar the arrival of Cassie in the first episode). There are pros and cons to this new approach: as the characters are on a journey of adventure and discovery, so is the viewer; then again, we are not being given privileged access to a warm group of friends as before. It’s quite a contrast.

But Skins itself has moved on since those first episodes, where the breadth of the humour and the deliberately OTT hedonism alienated many critics who subsequently missed out on the show’s blossoming into a powerful drama and had to pretend for series two that they’d liked it all along (I can claim a bit of credit for seeing promise and watching it from the start, despite the promotional approach frankly not doing the show justice). But the kind of stylised storytelling that gave us a character called Mad Twatter seemed to belong to a different show altogether by the closing episodes of the first series.

Episode 3.1 dipped into that style briefly, and a bit incongruously, with the broad and crude humour of the school hall scene in which the staff welcomed the new intake. Two of the old teachers were present again – both of those who featured in the disco dancing sequence with Cassie in series two. Not sure I remember the bloke being Welsh, though – nor did the comedy accent (if that’s what it was) add much. Cook’s deception of Effy’s dad early in the episode was deeply funny and told us about his character; the comedy farting was kinda funny, but by contrast didn’t add much.

Overall the new cast of character – and their actors – show enormous promise. I’m not sure any is quite as immediately sympathetic as Sid was from the get-go in the first series – perhaps shy twin Emily comes closest. I fear Effy might be showing signs of degenerating from enigmatic ringleader to tiresome slut, but all being well we can trust the writers to avoid that – and even if she does lose some of her sympathy, it will be in keeping for Tony’s sister, I suppose. But why is she best friends with Pandora? No indication is given – when we first saw the pairing, Pandora was with Effy very much on sufferance. That said, I suspect there will come a moment when Pandora shows her mettle, and I’m looking forward to it; in the meantime, I can’t help but love her introducing herself with “Hi, I’m Pandora, I’m useless.”

The nods to the previous series, such as Sid’s locker, were nice touches and got the balance write between self-reference and looking forward. The skateboarding sequence at the start was fabulous, but it was perhaps a bit easy to overlook how good it was, considering that the previous series started withan even-more daring three minutes of contemporary dance.

It’s certainly a promising start. I can’t help but feel that some critics have approached it expecting the kind of pay-offs that routinely cropped up in series two, and are disappointed that we only got a load of set-ups, and that consequently it felt a bit slight. It shows the dangers of opening episodes, I suppose: they can often frustrate, and seldom satisfy. But if anyone tunes out on the basis of this, I’m willing to bet they’re mugging themselves: Skins is a bold show made by some of the country’s best TV talent, and while the opener might have been “merely” decent, there is surely much, much better to come.

Lovely noise

Here’s a smart deal, in the ever-evolving world of music, record companies and how the hell do we actually make any money from music?? Fight Like Apes have hit on a neat offer – I’m sure they’re not the first band to do it, but it’s the first time I’ve considered taking advantage of it. Album plus gig ticket for thirteen quid: job’s a good ‘un!

Two drawbacks. Firstly, it makes it a bit harder to arrange a group of people to go to the gig: it’s one thing for one of you to book however-many tickets, but it’s another for that person to have to dish out a load of CDs subsequently.

Bigger problem still: their London gig is at the Camden Barfly. Now, Camden is easily my least favourite part of London, and the Barfly probably my least favourite venue (now the wretched Astoria has been rightly condemned to demolition),  so it has to be a gig I’m really really keen to see before I’ll even consider going there. I’m looking forward to hearing the album, but I’m not going to commit to the gig before I’ve got to know it. Actually, there’s a third problem: what if loads of people buy the album and gig tickets, but the album’s a disappointment and the gigs are officially sold-out, but half-empty in practice? I suppose they’ve got the cash by then, so it hardly matters.

Whole lotta nerve

Here’s a little interweb delight for you: Neko Case has made the lead single from her forthcoming album Middle Cyclone available free for download. It’s a jangly and upbeat number called People Got A Lotta Nerve, though maybe the music belies the lyrics a little.

Additionally, it’s being released in aid of the Best Friends Animal Society, with Case and her Anti label pledging a donation to it for every blog that re-posts the track. So here you go.

People Got A Lotta Nerve – Neko Case

Human nature

“Bloody hell, is that Julie Gardner?” I thought to myself. I imagine if you work in television, you find yourself thinking “bloody hell, is that Julie Gardner?” at least once a fortnight, and the answer will usually be “yes, it is Julie Gardner!” Over the last few years the BBC executive has been associated with some of the most exciting drama projects on British television, most famously the revived Doctor Who, Life on Mars and now BBC Three’s Being Human.

It was in fact celebrity-spotting heaven for geeks at last night’s preview screening of the first episode of Being Human at the National Film Theatre. The event was publicised as including a Q&A with cast and crew, and I was impressed with the turn-out: Russell Tovey and Leonora Critchlow were both there, though only the former was on the Q&A panel; producer Matthew Bouch and writer Toby Whithouse were also on-hand as was executive producer Rob Pursey. I know what you’re thinking, and yes, that is Rob Pursey of Talulah Gosh, Heavenly, Marine Research and now Tender Trap! The Rob Pursey! Must admit I had no idea his day-job was as a TVwriter /  producer, but it is – if Ash Stewart had been there I’m sure his head would have exploded in a spectacular but inconveniently sticky fashion.

So, is the new episode as good as the pilot that I have raved about on here before, despite the re-casting and reported tweaking of the format? (NB: mild spoilers follow, but – I believe – nothing that should ruin the episode for you.) The answer is: yes, it undoubtedly is; indeed, much as I still love the pilot, I can see why they have made the changes, and they seem to make a lot of sense.

The first surprise is that the episode does not re-tread the plot of the pilot, in which George and Mitchell move into the house and discover Annie the ghost in it. Instead, it picks up more or less from the point at which we left the characters at the end of the pilot: the trio are installed in the house, and Annie is newly visible to humans… some of the time. Indeed, George’s containment cell is made unavailable to him, which leads to a frantic search for somewhere else safe to transform.

There are big changes to the casting. Leonora Critchlow replaces Andrea Riseborough as Annie, and is every bit as good as you’d expect. Brilliant though Riseborough was in the pilot – and I was certainly sorry to hear she was no longer involved – I do wonder whether the frail and kooky insecurity she brought to the part would have worked well over an entire series. Critchlow brings a warmer take on the part, though her acting chops are every bit as impressive – the sequence in which she attends her own funeral and screams at her relatives who cannot see her is devastating.

Additionally, Aidan Turner replaces Guy Flanagan as Mitchell, and is altogether more of a hunk and a lothario in the role. He’s very good, and it should please those who felt Flanagan was a bit “drama school”; myself, I thought he brought an understated charisma to it, a bit like Paul McGann in Withnail and I. But I’ve not got anything bad to say about Turner’s performance, which puts Mitchell’s dilemma across very powerfully. The re-casting apparently arose at least in part because by the time the show was commissioned the cast of the pilot were no longer under option, though it seems likely from the Q&A that the tweaking of the format was at least partly responsible too.

One other point on which the pilot was criticised was the rather gothic depiction of the scheming vampires, particularly the character of Herrick as played by Adrian Lester. Herrick has now been re-thought, although the overall threat from a vampire plot has been retained; but in the guise of Jason Watkins, Herrick is a more down-to-earth and ambivalent villain, and all the more menacing because of it.

The greatest strength of the series is of course the writing from Toby Whithouse, and the deftness with which he has crafted the characters. It was interesting to learn from the Q&A that originally the show was envisaged as a house-share series for BBC2, as more of a This Life style drama without any “genre” elements. Much of the character development had already been done on George, Annie and Mitchell before it was decided that they would be a werewolf, a ghost and a vampire. There’s a lesson in there for the developers of other shows – perhaps if ITV’s Demons had started with the characters rather than the monsters it would have been more engaging – decent though it is.

One thing I found interesting was that the first episode felt able to open with a voice-over and flashback sequence, these being two things that new writers are constantly warned off, on the basis that script readers tend to view them as suggesting the writer is using cheap gimmicks rather than having a command of their material. I’ve heard and read this so many times that when I now see a voiceover or flashback it jars with me – and if I remember rightly, the pilot steered clear of them as it tried to establish the show, even though it was from an established writer. Maybe it’s just a coincidence – after all, the new episode has to convey the set-up very quickly at the start.

In sum, Being Human is a great achievement for the writer, cast and crew; I thoroughly recommend you watch it on BBC3, Sunday January 25th.

Cynical, moi?

This is perhaps a slightly cynical post. I’m putting it up for the sake of possible future visitors, who may never get directed here. Put like that it sounds decidedly optimistic… something is out of character round here, anyway.

Truth be told, I should have done the googling six months earlier than I did. After taking an extremely enjoyable ten-week course of evening classes at City University, on Writing Television Drama, I should have been on the look-out for a writing group near me. I had signed up for the course on a bit of a whim, for the enjoyment of it and for its own sake; but it was a stimulating set of classes from Edel Brosnan, and I resolved to keep writing, with a view to seeing how far I could take it.

And then of course I did nothing for nearly six months. Well, next to nothing: I was ill, work was busy, and there was an intermittent possibility that my fellow class members would re-assemble as a writing group. This looks like it might be about to happen on a small scale – two people plus me is hardly a group, more a gin appreciation club – but it’s a start. Still, what were the chances of a writing group existing within walking distance of me, in West London?

The answer to this question was in fact: actually rather good, if I had but looked. So it was that, belatedly, I ambled along Acton High Street last night to hear a section of my work read out loud for the first time. For when I say I did nothing for six months… I just about managed to complete two drafts of the screenplay idea I had been working on as part of the course, so by the end of 2008 I did at least have something to show. I’m not going to spell out what it’s about here – Steven Moffat once said something about it losing the magic if you say it out loud, which is almost the same thing – but for ease of reference it’s called Who’s Laughing Now?

By this point I had spent so long on it I had no idea if it was any bloody good or not. The group was given a section of seven pages or so, and parts were allocated to helpful attendees (myself, I ended up playing a cockney wideboy and one of a set of identical twins later in proceedings as we went through other scripts). I had heard a lot of horror stories about hearing your stuff out loud for the first time… but actually it was, to say the least, OK. There was laughter from the readers at the funny bits, and afterwards there were a lot of questions about what would happen next, and suggestions for what other bits would be good either before or after the extract.

This was pretty heartening, but also made me think about the things I need to be sure about in other parts of the script: the motivation of the central character needs to be clear, which is stating the obvious a bit, but it’s never an unhelpful reminder. Now, I deliberately chose the section of the script I’m happiest for the read-through, as in other sections I think I can see problems and want to fix them myself before getting feedback from others – no point getting other people to point out the issues I’m already alive to… But it allays a nagging doubt that I might have been on completely the right track.

It also shows there is a lot of work still to do. Firstly, I need to re-write the script (90 minute, a TV single) into a 45-minute radio play for a competition that closes at the end of February. Nice and easy, then. After that, the TV version needs another draft, after which it probably needs to go in a drawer. Then I need to write some different things, amass a portfolio of scripts and implement a selling strategy. Oh, and somewhere in among all that I need to get good.

The selling strategy is the reason for the cynicism of this post, incidentally. Many writers blog about their work, in extremely entertaining terms – a selection of my favourites are linked on the right, but I’ve got at least 20 in my RSS reader. Having a web presence is, according to all the best advice, a good way of convincing possible future commissioners that you are a professional and can be trusted – so, this blog needs to be populated with some posts about writing as well as the usual nonsense!

And I now join the honourable tradition of updating my blog when I should be working on my script. Professional to the core.

Geek attack

Perhaps I shouldn’t admit to finding this so fascinating, but there are a lot of complicated stories around old telly – specifically, around what exists, and why it comes to exist in the form it does. It seems strange that mainstream artefacts of our culture – programmes that were enjoyed in the homes of millions of people – often no longer exist, even though they might have been made less then fifty years ago, which is no time at all really.

So if you’re at all interested in reading about how it has recently become possible to take a black and white copy of a programme that was originally made in colour, and turn it back into colour again, I recommend this article.

For emphasis: a black and white programme. Turned into colour. Well, I was impressed. And don’t be side-tracked by the mention of computer colourisation at the start of the article: obviously this technology has been around for a while, and there’s nothing special about applying a made-up selection of colours to a black and white image; the real meat is the bit about restoring the original colour from the black and white image. So read on…

Word of warning to those not familiar with vintage Doctor Who: the episodes concerned are, sadly, dreadful. Technically and historically fascinating though the whole thing might be, I’m not sure even I’d actually buy the DVD.

2009 Albums

I’m not a great one for new year’s resolutions. Not because I can’t stick to them, or because I think they’re a waste of time, but more because I tend to forget them. I’m pretty sure I made one for 2008… but probably in February, and I now cannot remember what it was.

In the face of increasing numbers of wretchedly young people actually Doing Things With Their Lives (Lewis Hamilton, Rachel Riley – who I hope does not get too much of a hard time as The New Carol, or at least not unless she really deserves it – and now Matt Smith, to name but three), I have set myself the relatively attainable goal – I hope – of figuring out over the course of 2009 what the heck I’m doing with mine. Actually doing anything about this analysis will probably have to wait until 2010.

More realistically in the short term, I’m resolving not to let myself fall behind with music in the way I did in 2008. I’m probably never going to be as hungry for new music to enjoy as I was a few years ago, but even so my best of 2008 summary suffered from the absence of a good few records that I really should have got hold of before the start of December (I Am Kloot, Young Knives and Santogold would all have featured if I had got my act together).

With this in mind (plus also the general wretchedness of January and the deperate need for something to look forward to), I have been looking for release dates of records I already know I want to hear; realistically, I expect most of my album purchases this year to be by artists whose records I already own. And as I approach 27, that’s maybe how it should be. But actually finding a single site showing UK release dates – even highly provisional ones, as I fully accept they are liable to change – is bloody hard. In fact, I have failed to do it.

There must be one – right? I mean, the music industry must need one. Maybe there is a subscription-based service or something. Either that or my googling skills (or the search engine optimisation skills of the owners of any such hypothetical listing) are inadequate.

Still, here’s my list of people whose records I’m looking forward to and, where known, release details. Presented in order of release where know, and then by how much information I actually have.

• Fight Like Apes – 26th Jan (“Fight Like Apes and the Mystery of the Golden Medallion”)
• Emmy the Great – 2nd Feb (“First Love”)
• Howling Bells – 9th Feb (“Radio Wars”)
• Morrissey – 16th Feb (“Years of Refusal”)
• Neko Case – 3rd Mar (“Middle Cyclone”)
• Immaculate Machine – 21st Apr[North American release date], (“High on Jackson Hill”)
• MJ Hibbett and the Validators (“Regardez, Ecoutez et Repetez”)
• M Ward – (“Hold Time”)
• Junior Boys (touring the UK in March, so I’d expect the record around then)
• Camera Obscura
• Jarvis Cocker
• Doves
• Handsome Family
• Erin McKeown
• Noisettes
• The Pipettes

I would of course be pathetically grateful to anyone who can provide me with further information, and/or point me towards a better source of information than Amazon.

Doctor Smith

Today is a day that arrived a good ten years earlier than I expected. Today the next actor to play the Doctor is younger than me.

When the talking heads on Doctor Who Confidential let slip the first clue – that the new Doctor is the youngest ever – I envisaged writing something along the following lines in this post: a young Doctor strikes me as a mistake, but Steven Moffat is a great writer and producer who is rightly paid to take these decisions, and he will get it right and prove me wrong.

Moffat himself evidently had the same preconceptions, and expected to cast an actor in his forties.

But actually… my first reaction is that Matt Smith is likely to be very good. From the clips shown – and I’ll confess Ruby in the Smoke and Party Animals are both programmes I intended to watch and then didn’t, bar a perhaps unrepresentative ten minutes of the latter – he seems to have that magnetic charisma on-screen that the part requires. He also has a face that is 50% chisel-jawed heroism and 50% wonky excess head area – a quirky combination that must be right for the role.

So: four more David Tennant specials, then Matt Smith in 2010. Excellent!

Just in case anyone missed it: Smith’s first appearance is promised for Spring 2010. The date of Tennant’s last special has not been announced, but the latest rumour seems to be Easter 2010 rather than Christmas 2009. Could it be scheduled to kick-start the first Moffat-Smith series? Could be a great move, or a dreadful one. Or maybe it’ll be a Christmas Day regeneration after all.

Though, to come back to the age thing… if ever there’s something to make you feel like you’ve totally wasted your life to date, it’s seeing the title role in Doctor Who go to someone younger than you.

The Krypton Factor

ITV’s revival of the Krypton Factor slipped on to the airwaves on January 1st, with apparently little fanfare – at least, that’s how it seemed to me, although maybe if I watched ITV more often I would have seen more promotion for it. Few people seem to have got very excited about it one way or the other: nobody is hailing it as the greatest quiz ever; nor is anyone claiming that the revival has ruined the format (as far as I can see). For my money, an essentially sound format has withstood the updating exercise, although the peripheral problems that the original experienced have been replaced by a new set of peripheral problems for the new version.

The challenges remain fiendishly difficult. The opening mental agility round in particular was horrifically tricky – although I did better than the first two contenders. Mind you, I wasn’t slammed in a needlessly over-dramatised “cube” to answer the questions – more of this gimmicky tendency later. In the web age, further problems are now available for viewers to try via the ITV website, which is quite neat.

The other big studio-based challenge – usually to reassemble some shapes in some obscurely difficult way – seems to have been retained similarly in keeping with the original; ditto the general knowledge round. The other rounds have been subjected to quite a bit of tinkering. The observation round, for instance, is now based on clips from old TV shows, rather than a specially-shot skit as in the 1980s – undoubtedly a bit of cost-cutting! But it still works tolerably, and is surprisingly difficult.

The obstacle course has been changed substantially, however. It is no longer the traditional army course near Ramsbottom, but a new one in Yorkshire – but that’s neither good nor bad of itself. More significantly, the contestants have to go two at a time, so we lose the ability to see all four competing against each other simultaneously; instead the result is decided by the times set by each, which does add a bit more suspense, I suppose. More serious is the fact that the round is edited together: with a good time being sub six minutes and a poor one over nine, we do not get to see the contestants’ attempts in real time, which frankly makes the whole thing look a bit nonsensical, as the viewer really has no idea how each contestant is doing unless it’s either conspicuously well or conspicuously badly.

Worst of all is the treatment meted out to the aircraft similator round: it’s gone! Dropped completely. Now, it might no longer hold the novelty it once did, as today’s games consoles can produce better graphics than the most sophisticated simulator of 1990, but it seems a bit much to lose the entire round. The Krypton Factor was always pretty slow-paced, with regular and very slow scoreboard reports from Gordon Burns and ponderous introductions and explanations, but dropping a round does not help! The new version is undoubtedly pacier in style, but compensates by injecting short films introducing each competitor – I can live with these, except the producers have clearly told the contestants to big themselves up, as is currently fashionable. Still, there are worse things.

Those worse things include rather needless gimmickry: the “cube” in which the contestants take the first round is one example; the fact their heart rates are being monitored at the same time is another. On the up-side, the new set is heavy on lighting effects and manages to be visually stimulating while maintaining the old colour-designation of each contender, without obliging them to wear an item of clothing in that colour. Overall, the show could perhaps have been made more tacky and gimmicky than it has been, so good on the producers for showing some restraint, even if maybe not quite enough.

On the presentation front, truth be told, Gordon Burns was always likeably rubbish: he was presented as an authoritative figure, though why on earth he was qualified to comment on the particular skills demanded of each contestant was never really explained. His presentation was reliably cardboardy. Ben Shephard is a bit more natural in front of the camera, but too often descends into lightweight smarm; rather than being informative or authoritative, his commentary is too often unhelpful and snide. But this is on the evidence of one show: he could well improve over time, and is certainly not recovering from a bad start.

There is also a fundamental problem with the format that the new series has not tackled: owing to the scoring system, it was always possible to win the show even if you were rubbish at one or two rounds: the inaugural winner of the new series came dead last in one round and joint last in another, but won the rest and snuck it by one point; the second-placed contender scored more consistently albeit that he won fewer rounds – it’s hard to argue that he wasn’t at least as worthy of victory (although they do operate a “highest scoring losers” system, so he may yet reach the next round). In particular, the general knowledge section can still be a bit more pivotal than should perhaps be the case for a quiz that mostly tests a diverse range of skills rather than knowledge. On the up side, Shephard still announces the scores by saying “in the lead, with a Krypton factor of ten, is – “.

Titles are new, of course, although the graphics remain based around a stylised letter “K”; in a bigger departure from the original, the iconic theme by Art of Noise has not bee retained, even in a re-worked version. Bit of a shame.

Overall, the series seems to remain fundamentally sound; it’s not perfect, and it seems unlikely to become appointment television. But it is still an example of an old format remaining essentially workable on modern television, and shows that innovation for its own sake does not lead to good programming.