Writers Academy 5
Small Children
This week's entry is prompted by one comment that suggested we might be excluding writers (mostly, it was assumed, women) who had to care for young families, because of the full on-nature of the course. Sally Abbott completed the course in December, and she's about to start her first EastEnders commission. She is happy to point out that she is of a "certain age" (40 last birthday), and is also a mother of two children under ten (9 and 6). I asked her to talk about her experience of the Academy....
"First off, the thing to get is that WA is HARD. Really really really hard. Long days. Long hours. Lots and lots of exercises, homework, TV and films to watch. Scripts to write and rewrite. Confidence crises, confidence boosts. Ups, downs, you name it. Even without children it's tough.
Through a friend I managed to get hold of Abi Bown (another graduate and mum) before the interviews and asked her for advice - it was simple - get very good childcare. With any job you need to get a good support network around you if you have children. With WA you just need to have a lot of contingency plans in there.
My husband was massively supportive and I couldn't have done it without him - he's self-employed and, after prioritising his career for years, we agreed that September to December 08 my career would take precedence - he'd be the first-call parent not me. It meant he had to turn a few jobs down but he still went out and worked. A couple of times he had to work away - but one week my mum came to stay and the other was a writing-at-home week so I was just about able to work around it. My brilliant child minder, Julie, agreed to do additional hours as and when and at last minute - in the mornings and early evenings (and she didn't go off on holiday - phew!!) and I had a load of friends in my village and my in-laws on standby. A big plus for me was that I only live about an hour's journey away from Elstree.
Many people at the BBC (like Ceri) are working mums themselves - they know and understand what it can be like. Some stuff to sort out is simple - e.g. having a tutorial in the middle of the day to allow for school runs (once a week we used to go to TV Centre in White City for tutorials with John Yorke and Ceri). I had an agreement that if lectures over-ran and I had to get home then I could go. Simple. Also, for this year we've built in breaks for me in January and August - small things to keep the balance right for the year.
The work at home, in some ways was harder. I had to literally cut myself off from everyone to get through the workload and it was difficult. And mother guilt is a killer. The worst. Something has to give, to be compromised. However, I got a breakthrough about half way through when I realised that I could actually do part of my work with the kids: on the Academy you have to watch a lot of films - to identify your protagonist's wants and needs, the turning points, inciting incident, etc... tricky... Unless, as it turns out, you're watching it with a 6 and 9 year old who see things very simply and very clearly. They don't get bogged down in detail - so Saturdays became our day for being together watching lots of films. That was our family time - a good compromise, I thought. And they're now BRILLIANT at structure.
The other stuff's just hard - the writing, rewriting, structuring, restructuring but you just have to get on and do it. It's the same with any job. I didn't want to have special allowances made because I was a mum - I still hit all my deadlines (bar one which was two hours late... ahem). I was knackered and got emotional but I did it.
So... lastly, I just wanted to write and say to other mums (and dads) - it is possible to combine the Writers Academy with young children. And you know that, as a parent, you bring a wealth of experience and a voice to the shows that they want - that they need. Whatever you do, just don't let yourself be the person who stops you from going for it."
© MMIX~RS~q~RS~~RS~z~RS~21~RS~)
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Thanks for that, Ceri and Sally. A very honest, inspiring account.
I think writing transcends age, and what might be right for someone at twenty, (though not for all twenty-somethings), could also be right for someone in their forties or fifties, or older still. Again, not necessarily all forty or fifty-somethings.
It's all about what's on the page, and what stage you're at as an individual. It's very refreshing to hear about a mum, juggling work and home life (not unusual in itself) when the love of the job shines through.
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Yeah not that easy maybe to juggle watching films with writing and looking after kids, though I fancy it still may be a tad easier than digging holes in the road in the wet and cold.
I also think the dire flatpack committee written shows the beeb are churning out now could do with a few road diggers behind them. Then they might have less domesticated twaddle and a lot less political correctness in them.
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There's not a great deal to worry about, is there? The BBC no more excludes women of a certain age than many employers, college and uni course designers, or any organisation that uses people to function: nearly all of them. If you make a choice to have kids, deal with it. If you don't, deal with that - it's all relative. Sally's solutions are simple - get some support, get on with it, enjoy it, be inclusive. We all make choices - I loved making the choice to have kids - they've given me more joy and fulfilment than anything ever could, but now they're old enough and don't need 24/7 parenting, I could do W.A. But I wouldn't have done 2 years ago. That's my choice, me taking control and I'm no more frustrated that I couldn't have done W.A. back then as play 5-a-side every night of the week (as is my joy) or do that flippin' fantastic MA at Middlesex - I live in the North boo hoo.
As I have said before: there are a million and one things you can learn from home - don't say there aren't; W.A. isn't the only way into the BBC - just write something really good and the amazing Writersroom readers will definitely, definitely spot it; and as for Road Diggers - I used to work in an abattoir so there is hope.
Good luck. KPIMM.
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Doesn't actually address the issue of whether or not the structure of the WA might change, or the alternatives to the current structure, perhaps into a two year part-time course.
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And if it was p/t over two years wouldn't that exclude even more anyone not living in or nearish London? My feeling is W.A should suit the BBC and the people they need to bring in run it - condensed as it is into 12/13 weeks gives it great energy and focus, and for us out of towners, a chance to plan over the short term.
Now, if it went regional...that would be something. Other than that, I think it's structure's pretty spot on.
KPIMM
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You can't suit all of the people all of the time.
If you had to go for a job interview, with specific start and finish times, you'd only go for that interview if you knew you could manage it. Companies nowadays, are more flexible, and so are the BBC, from what Sally says in her musings.
If you're writing great stuff, get it out, and it'll be championed, and you can then take it from there. WA won't be right for everyone, but it's another really good opportunity.
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@5 "Now, if it went regional...that would be something."
-Exactly.
Get it up to Manchester as well. The Beeb is committed to moving away from a London- centric focus so it may happen.
@6 "If you had to go for a job interview, with specific start and finish times, you'd only go for that interview if you knew you could manage it. Companies nowadays, are more flexible, and so are the BBC, from what Sally says in her musings."
-Um, isn't that a contradiction?
First you say 'if you don't like the hours don't apply for the job' sort of thing, but then say companies *are* flexible, bit confused. The WA doesn't seem to be flexible at all from what I read above.
I've been for plenty of job interviews when I knew the hours would be difficult to meet, but once you have the job, you have more leverage to change the job from the inside. But that's a side issue!
But I suppose the intensive nature of WA is inevitable as the WA is geared towards getting writers moulded into the meat grinder system of soap and serial drama which requires constant material and constant output. They can't afford to train writers over a long period.
As someone who detests soaps and most Beeb serial dramas (medics n'cops) I don't have much sympathy for that need, but I can understand it, I suppose.
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@ Bloofs:
What I meant was all companies have some sort of regime, but many are also a bit flexible. Sally said in her post that she'd been able to leave meetings early etc, so there's still some flexibility with the BBC.
And it's not about not applying if you don't like the hours, just that people are at different stages, and Sally can manage at the moment, kids and all. She might not have been able to manage it a few years ago, or even a few years into the future - teens can play havoc with your attention!
It would be great if it did come up to Manchester, perhaps alternate years?
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I actually can't help agreeing with Bloofs about the nature of this thing, or as it seems to outsiders. It's being sold and talked about as though it's a major achievement in to get in it, almost as if it's the only way in, and as a career in its own right. We don't really know how good it is in there but like Bloofs I have my strong suspicions it really isn't that great a move.
Just look at the rubbish that the beeb is churning out - some of it is so bad they have to end the show after just one series - anyone in production will tell you that constitutes an expensive mistake. Most of these drama series now follow the group written model and it really shows.
The formulas are transparent, the rules are obvious - like every show must include a disproportionate number of ethnic minority characters, whether it looks real or not, and usually it doesn't - two out of the five characters in the dreadful 'Bonekickers' were black. That equals 40% of the cast of archeology professionals. This did not reflect reality at all, as I reckon you'll be hard pushed to find just 40 black British working as archeologists in the whole of Britain.
It is one of the faults of this dire system of theirs - the beeb are infested with PC and liberal attitudes and it is resulting now in dire, unrealistic, limp and worthy flatpack assembled rubbish drama shows. Does any decent creative writer with original ideas really want to be a part of that?
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My main issue was that, fine, Sally Abbott can cope with the demands of the WA. Good for her. But I would be interested to hear why the BBC itself feels it can only run the WA in this current format.
It's probably because they need to get a lot of training in, in a short time so that they can get writers on the production line. So I suppose if you're not interested in serials it's a bit of a moot point anyway.
@Antoniablue
-OK I see your point more clearly there.
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Why don't we change the format of the Writers Academy?
We've thought about it often. But this format does seem to work. It's really on-the-job training for a very specific set of programmes, rather than a writers course based round an academic model.
It's based at Elstree, where two of the four programmes are filmed, and it's intensive nature does seem to prepare people for the full on nature of writing Continuing Drama.
Also, and uniquely, it is designed and taught by the Controller of Continuing Drama, John Yorke. i.e. you get one-to-one time each week with the person running the department you'll be working for. In order for this to happen, John has to fit his teaching time around running the department.
I totally agree that this puts writers based away from London at a disadvantage, but we've tried to redress this by paying people's living expenses for the classroom weeks in Elstree.
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Moan, moan, moan, moan, moan.
Writers Academy, where you are taught to write EastEnders, is a course based at Elstree, where EastEnders is produced. Complaining about that seems as ridiculous as complaining about a course for oil-riggers taking place on the North Sea or a course in the Welsh language taking place at a Welsh university.
But not quite as ridiculous as complaining that Bonekickers had two black characters in it. How many black characters would be appropriate? Should there really be a precise correlation between the percentage of black people in Britain and the percentage of black characters in any particular series? How many more Bengali characters are needed to make EastEnders representative of East London? How may Poles? How many Jews? Do story considerations not come into this? Does the fact that two of the Bonekickers characters were related have any relevance? Can anybody, faced with the disaster that was Bonekickers, focus on the ethnicity of the characters as a criticism?
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Well the fact that this made 40 % of the cast meant that it was TOTALLY unrepresentative of the profession it was dramatising. This unreality was a core part of why Bonekickers was a disaster, so I for one can focus on it without any problem. So just for once maybe their policy of putting black people in EVERY drama show that gets made REGARDLESS of its setting or themes, came back to bite them.
No one is talking about precise correlations here except you, in a vain attempt to score some invalid point, no doubt. What I am referring to is the lack of common sense, and the problem of adhering to a now rigid politically correct framework before the show's character has even been established. Yes, I can tell you that for a good many viewers the problem of unreal, unbalanced and FALSE looking TV drama is a problem. This is one of the main reasons a why a seperate black TV channel has been campaigned for by the black community for several years now.
THEY, my friend, are the people who complain about the use of token black characters in every drama series being made, more than anyone else, and in case you think you think you were engaged in some noble attempt to shut some bigot up with your scathing putdowns, I happen to be one of them. This habit, of which the BBC is the worse culprit by far, is deeply patronising. I also think you possibly don't really know what you are talking about, judging by your very confident assertion that reflection of reality in TV drama does not matter.
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Is it a shining shadow because you don't like to cast a black one?
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Exactly. Well spotted. You should write for the BBC by the way, or maybe you do.
They call me Mister P.
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Hang on they can't call us both Mister P.
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Can black actors really comprise 40% of the cast and simultaneously be a token presence? Wouldn't a token presence mean a solitary black actor?
And why should a silly fantasy adventure series not have two black leads? Nothing else in the programme leads us to believe it is designed to be an accurate portrayal of the archeological profession, after all (Excalibur, the Holy Grail, magic across the ages and everything else...) Seriously, how many black actors would have been acceptable to you in Bonekickers? None, presumably.
Good call on being patronising though, whilst calling me "my friend" and telling me I don't what I'm talking about.
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Ok, agreed on that one, I take the 'my friend' bit off. But I still don't get your version of tokenism. It could really have been 100 % of the cast and still it would have been a token gesture - because it does not reflect the black to white ratio of this particular profession in the real world environment. The fantasy stuff has little to do with it as that was the fault of the creative team. The choice of choosing ethnic minorty characters was, as far as I know, nothing to do with them. It is a standard prerequisite for all drama shows now and that stupid and wrong looking directive is exactly what I am ranting about.
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@12
-Do you always have to be close to the place the show is actually produced, in order to write for it, though?
I thought that's what IT was for? Send the script down the pipe etc
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Bloofs...
The point of being near the show for the initial weeks is to meet the people making it, visit the sets etc... the actual writing can be done from anywhere.
Interesting debate on ethnic casting above... how do you think this applies to continuing dramas?
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Differently. They can come and go naturally in soaps. It's only really in the unreflective type of drama series that their standard presence looks silly.
Having said that, I think I'd like to see a few more bad black characters than there tends to be in soaps. I can understand producers being uncertain about doing this, but I think at some stage someone is going to have to broach the difficult subjects that exist out there.
The other thing is them appearing in groups and gangs, as that is where you often see them in real life. In soaps they tend to appear in ones and twos, although I haven't seen Eastenders for ages. But ethnic characters fit much better into soaps generally than other shows, I think. I'm no real expert tho.
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Some of this ethnic debate is purile - sorry Shadow, disagree with almost everything you say. My sister went out with a bonekicker and there are black people, shock horror, into that. Race/ethnicity had nothing, nothing to do with why BK was so bad: sorry scripts, a v.uncomfortable looking Adrian Lester, certain other actor as dull (again) as you can find anywhere IMHO, ridiculous plots but the sense that somehow this was all ok because the Life on Mars guys did it...well. It was just crap, plain and simple. I cared not two hoots what colour people were...as if that was the problem :-^
I've worked at the very top of the creative industries and been intimately involved in ensuring fair representation and opportunity for all kinds of people (yes, women and disabled people too...and Dads!) and sometimes it can seem as though something is going on that is unfair or unrepresentative, but I'd much rather take that desire to include and employ some groups of people that have, really have, struggled for years to get a reasonable voice heard, than not.
What is Shadow actually saying: that 8% of the British population is not white, so only 8% of every form of job, or college course, or school or community, or telly programme/theatre show/film/radio play should be held or realised or occupied by black or minority ethnic people? Ooh, bloody hell, what happens if like, in Newham, more than 8% of the population are BME?! Bring in the thinning-out Cops quick. Honestly.
Perhaps the BBC does need a new pair of balls - sorry for the male analogy, you know what I mean - but look, BK was terrible for sure, but Moses Jones is flippin' fantastic. If we can see that, the BBC can see that - it's all about the journey together.
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'I've worked at the very top of the creative industries'
What in the name of marmalade is that supposed to mean?????
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First I apologise to others if my comments about rigid ethnic casting looking stupid on many shows has diverted the nature of this blog discussion. Please bring it back to mums and kids etc.
Secondly, I am only talking about TV drama! Not every college course or job etc. as you have put it.
I chose bonekickers because archeology IS very well known to be generally a white middle class career and past time, in Britain. Whether your sister went out with one who's 'into that' or not, the use of two out five of the experts in the drama was a TOTAL NONENSE any way you look at it.
These things do matter, as it is in the correct representation of reality that much of the credibility of a drama series rest upon, certainly in the early stages.
I am in no way suggesting we need to be quite as scientific or petty in selecting the ratio of drama series casts as you suggest, just that simple common sense should prevail, so that if a show's character line up looks simply wrong from the outset, then surely it's okay to ditch the PC directive for this one show, for the sake of dramatic integrity!
What I'm saying is neither complicated or controversial, whatever some writers are wanting to distort it to look like. Read the negative feedback from ethnic groups at the BBC forums on this topic and you will see that this is a very common complaint, that the BBC in particular are completely overdoing it on the ethnic representation front. Or go to Dotton Adebayou's website.
Moses Jones was good partly because it looked right. Blacks in their own environment. This is not rocket science.
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Mister P: specifically as Chief Executive of three leading regional and one national arts/film organisations. I refer to my own experince as being a CEO demands you develop, oversee and implement policies relating to a whole raft of legislations and good practice guidelines. The BBC is duty and legally bound as we all are, to implement theirs.
Shadow: BK was nonsense, period. Because of my own, direct experience of being around archeologists, it does matter that I've met some black (and Asian, and Chinese, and North African) archeologists as that meant I had no issue whatsoever with the ethnicity of the cast. The rest of BK, well, it of gets recommissioned I'll eat some hats.
And 'blacks'? Black people please. It does matter.
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Good point KPIMM and what does 'in their own environment' mean??
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"Mister P: specifically as Chief Executive of three leading regional and one national arts/film organisations."
-Cool, a CEO called me 'breathtakingly snotty'. :-)
Makes a change from the usual riffraff!
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Actually, that was someone else!
My blushes!
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Shadow. I aree with Katyperry - you're wrong on so many levels it's incredible.
You hijack a debate - about opportunities for working mothers to progress in the Writers Academy - for your own agenda. That being the 'Political-Correctness gone mad!!!!' hysteria that's all too prevalent in society today (under the guise of 'common sense', of course).
Out of nowhere you criticise 'Bonekickers' without making a single genuine point about the dramatic failings of the show (and there were quite a few). You just calculated the ratio of blacks to whites in the cast, found it unacceptable and went off on one! Did you get past the race thing? Did you see any of its other failings? Doubt it.
You want black people to appear on TV more in groups and gangs - like in real life?! Complete and utter twaddle! It happens that there are gangs of black people (like whites people), but I walk down any street in my city (Leeds) and see black people walking alone or in pairs every day. I work with them (in IT by the way, just in case you thing I'm a dealer) and they come to work on their own, not in gangs.
You'd like to see more bad black characters? Why? There are already bad black characters on TV and good ones as well - like white characters. What's your problem with black people?
Did you ever consider the correct representation of reality a few decades ago when TV showed virtually no blacks (other than as criminals )? I doubt it.
So finally, you apologise for hijacking the debate for your anti-liberal rantings....and then go on to make another idiotic statement -
'Moses Jones was good because it looked right. Blacks in their own environment...' ????
What? Either badass cops, or gangsters? That's it for black people?
You're a true hero of the insane anti-PC mob.
Whatever issues I may have with BBC commissioning I listen to people like you and think 'Thank God for the BBC!'
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It's the the PC mob who are insane, and I find your attitude depressingly limp, just like most PC apologisers. Not only that but but you seem to be willfully misinterpreting my main points. My main grumble is at the general blanket ban on any common sense wih regard to specific make ups of DRAMA SERIES casts (I said soaps are different). The now automatic inclusion of token black or Asian characters per se is clearly ridiculous, and makes it hard for many shows to be taken seriously from the very start, however good they may be.
Your comments are truly laughable, Jimbly. I'll put it to you like this - So if someone wanted to make a drama series or serial about five senior members of the BNP, for example, focusing on the enclosed and excitable rantings at one of their notorious meetings (very possibly set in Leeds), you would be expecting the cast of five to comprise of three white and two black, and two of them attractive women) would you, just like all the other identikit dramas now?
Well this is exactly the sort of stupid mistake the insanely PC BBC are making now because their programme making agenda has been completely hijaked by limp minded loonies such as your good self. It DOES matter and many viewers are noticing it and complaining about it, whether you or the BBC like it or not. To me the Bonekickers cast example I deliberately picked was very nearly as crassly wrong and stupid looking as the daft scenario I just put. And you and others are defending it!
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Picking the BNP as an example is just silly.
I don't think that many people see black or white, they see people, and how they tick, what motivates them. I'm interested in a story, not the ratio of black to white. It's a multi-cultural society this, or hadn't you noticed.
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Picking the BNP as an example is no sillier than than making a British archeology based drama series have two of their five experts as black people - it was just NOT REPRESENTITIVE but was purely a result of their rigid and barmy PC policy of sticking black and Asian people in every show made regardless of whether it looked right. When will you people get it? IT LOOKED STUPID.
And I totally disagree with you on this being a multi cultural society, totally. This is a badly fractured society with separate cultures that DO NOT integrate well and have no intention of integrating well.
If TV wants to accurately represent our society then THIS is the sort of thing they should be showing, different cultures NOT GETTING ALONG with each other. If automatic liberals such as your good self were to really open your eyes then this reality is exactly what you will see.
And another thing on the so called siily drama idea of the BNP - a film is being discussed being made about this exact thing, and the production company is negotiating terms with guess who, the BBC among others for a suitable airing slot.
I can happily tell you that not all viewers and TV licence payers are as unworldly as some of the daft commenters on this site.
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I don't know where you live, but as far as I can see, we do live in a multi-cultural society. Yes, people stick in their groups some of the time (and why not) but they integrate and mingle too, and work together day after day, and even live together!
Whether that is functioning well is another matter.
For example, I work with a lot of Asian people, sit next to a Chinaman on the bus into work,, and my customers are all nationalities.
So, from my pov, you're pure wrong.
Oh, and it's not just different cultures that don't get along, it's people from the same culture that don't get along, or do, whichever happens to apply at the time.
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Some people look at a character and see the colour of their skin, some people see a person. Simple as.
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Shining Star.
Apologies for the delayed response.
Enjoyed your comments. Especially your use of capitals to emphasise JUST HOW RIGHT YOU ARE!
You're an idiot, be proud of that. I'm all for inclusion ;-)
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