The Perfect 10
Apologies for the late arrival of the next instalment, it's been extremely busy here... But here's number 8:
Exposition and Expression
Or in other words: dialogue. In truth, i think it's almost impossible to teach or learn how to have an ear for characters and their voices. It's perfectly possible to learn how to edit it, improve it, polish it up and make it leap off the page - but only if you have that instinct to hear it and voice it in the first place.
I've read a lot of scripts where the structure is tight, the story is right, the genre and tone spot on etc - BUT where the dialogue is wooden and without life and personality. And I've read scripts where the structure is loose, the story quite confused and all sorts of things are wrong with it - but where the characters step off the page immediately because the writer has really caught their voice. In truth, i think i'd generally rather have the latter kind of script. Because it really takes a true writer to do the latter.
Strong dialogue expresses character. It isn't just words - it breathes life into character. It gives them lines, sayings and sentiments that we remember for life and want to say back to people in order to impress them at parties, in the playground, in the office. (Around BBC Television Centre and Broadcasting House there are numerous walls and screens with great quotes from great characters - because the currency of that great dialogue is so strong.)
The converse of this, therefore, is that poor dialogue is there purely and simply to relate and explain information for the purpose of plot and story exposition. If this is the sole purpose of your dialogue, then you need to do something else with it - or something else with the scene. Often, expository dialogue tends to mask the fact that there is no real drama in a scene - so if you can find a push and pull, a conflict, a beat of story for your scene, then there will be a better dramatic reason for the dialogue to be there. Even better, the more ways you can find to put information across through action and story, the more your dialogue will be the sole domain and medium of your characters expressing themselves.
It sounds obvious - but real people don't tell each other things they already know in obvious ways, and neither should your characters. Real people also don't always say what they mean, don't always mean what they say, and don't always know what they mean and what they mean to say when they open their mouths to speak. Ordinary conversation isn't dramatic dialogue - but good dialogue should at least be able to take on board the idiosyncracies and complexities of real, ordinary people when they try to (or try not to) express themselves. Real people say the best lines that most writers could never conjure up, which is why many writers happily steal from real people.
Subtext is just about the hardest thing you as a writer will need to master. Because subtext is what is being said and expressed beyond, behind, below and in spite of the words actually spoken. Subtext is the silent language that people use when words either don't say enough or say too much. Subtext is story and character that can't simply be vocalised. If you can work meaningful subtext into a scene, then you are doing something really quite special.
© MMX~RS~q~RS~~RS~z~RS~55~RS~)
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@) Paul
I knew your name was familiar, I came across a letter the other day when unpacking some boxes forwarded from my agent in which you said...
'I too have read the play and really enjoyed it. I think it would be good to meet up with Marc to discuss where next with the piece.'
We didn't meet up but we talked on the phone and you sent the play to a producer, with whom I met and he didn't want to do it as an afternoon play, but as a series! Which we developed and put up for offers - sadly the series didn't get made, but the story cropped up on TV a couple of years later.
So I for one am a big fan of yours and the writersroom!
:)
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So you're thanking him for allowing your idea to be stolen? Writers really are an odd breed.
But back to the blog and (good) dialogue is one of the most vital parts of any screenplay, for certain. The importance of it is well stated here, together with some very good markers, but you could have fifty pages on the role of dialogue in a script quite easily without repeating yourself. This is a good little set of rules to have but it really is very, very little. He's probably right in saying you can't teach someone how to produce good dialogue, but you can certainly teach them what not to do, and how best to develop your ear for or your judgment of good dialogue.
The good news is there are many books on the market which claim to help you acheive this, and I would suggest browsing Am... the online bookseller and reading the reviews to find the ones which suit you.
The only humble advice I would give anyone is 'Do not copy from other screenplays', as it will be quickly noticed (I know that a vast proportion of competition scripts get thrown out immediately for this common practice). It has to be first hand quotes from real life, as stated above, or ofcourse your version of it (this means it isn't really stealing, and it is also one of the most creative and enjoyable aspects of writing dialogue, and screenwriting overall - it has to be my favourite discipline).
I would also say that once you develop an ear for good dialogue then you should try to quickly develop your style, or set of styles, to be more accuarate about it, as I believe a good dialogue writer is a good compiler of styles to suit appropriate characters. With this in mind, most valuable rule of dialogue writing - never give the same style of dialogue to all your characters.
Your humble servant, SS.
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'So you're thanking him for allowing your idea to be stolen? Writers really are an odd breed.'
Well I don't know you but this does seem to be an incredibly presumptive/smug/fatuous thing to say. I'll read on and see if you redeem yourself.
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Ah well.
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Yes it is possibly all three of those things, but you show me a seriously competetive amateur or pro in this game who isn't conceited and I will give you a trophy to place on your shelf and adore. I've met many, and it always makes me smile when they try to conceal their real feelings and their motives. Lets not be coy about it, Mr. P, most writers are self centred in the extreme, often disconnected from reality and sometimes plain spooky.
All I have done is try to cut out the pretence with regard to my own comments on best practice to avoid those sickeningly false rejection slips and present my real self, as I know so few insiders do.
Another thing I've attempted at least, whether you or others find it useful or unuseful, preachy or presumptuous,(unavoidable if you use plain, direct language as I hope I do) is to impart just a few titbits of advice learned the hard way, genuinely hoping others will avoid the many pitfalls that committed amateurs will encounter when trying to get their work noticed.
No one will deny that it is a seriously hard business to get into, surely, so I just want to do my little bit to help with a few pointers. They are not above criticism or even ridicule if any others so wish to say what they think, but when I know from (my little) experience how hard it is to coax professional writers to actually just share their secrets of success, I just want to try and break the mould a little bit of the notoriously secretive and jealous world of the professional screen and script writer (in fact I'd like to smash it, to be brutally honest).
Thank you for listening, it all helps with the recovery, ofcourse.
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@) SS
Thanks for the offer of a trophy - I'll pass thanks.
The writersroom seems to come in for an awful lot of flack on these and other forums. I was posting my experience as a positive example of how the writersroom actually strive to do a lot of good - and get small thanks for it. So you undermining that positivity was wrong. Paul Ashton is one of the good guys is what I was saying. You were implying some how that the writersroom steal ideas and hand the over to 'pro' writers to get out on television. Another urban myth. I wasn't unhappy to see the idea that they helped to develop on television - because I had written it! I presume it is alright to steal my own ideas?
You say it is hard to coax professional writers to share their secrets, that they are notoriously secretive and jealous and conceited and extremely self centred, and yet when they do come on forums such as these you jump to all the wrong conclusions. A lot of writers get involved in all kinds of ways to encourage others. Maybe it is not a lens you are holding up - but a mirror.
I'd say your humble servant too, but I - being a writer and all that - am obviously far from it.
:)
:)
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I allude to it because it has to be top of most unproduced scriptwriters' list of fears. Is it unfounded? I don't know, do any of us? It certainly remains a major fear, and your own brief story only serves to heighten it, I'd say. The 'odd' remark is a general one, writers ARE odd on the whole, strange obsessive often superstitious creatures who consider themselves best judges and commentators on real life! As if many of them spend much time there! I know I don't.
Lens or mirror, mirror or lens, hmmph, is there that much difference? You look through a lense and you will struggle not to see some reflection of yourself. Anyway enough of this writerly talk. I'm glad the BBC hold no hidden perils for you, but I do fancy their neat little disclaimer doesn't quite quell the terrors for a lot of us. The Writers Room initiative is on the surface a godsend to unagented writers and I applaud its existence, but you will have to say a lot more to dispell my niggling fears about sending, GIVING them something I have spent more time on than my own well being. It is a risk we all take sending in scripts and I will not give up my fears until one of mine gets developed, with my own authorship intact.
I take your word that the blogger here is a good guy, but there may be others down the line who aren't. Where there is competition there is always duplicity and you know very well yourself how furiously competetive what all of us here, ams and pros alike, are engaging in. I'm not overstating it for something to do, or trying to cause alarm just because I love being provocative - my hand quivers like a jelly when I go to drop large one in the big red box, like a jelly, I tell you.
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I am at a bit of a loss here SS.
My own 'brief story' is the tale of a radio play going through writersroom through a couple of readers then being read by Paul Ashton who not only contacted me to to tell me how much he liked it, he put the project with a Radio producer at the BBC who developed it with me into a pilot for a Series. It didn't get made. A lot of pilots don't. I am not bitter. I blew the dust off it a couple of years or so later and rewrote it as a TV piece which was broadcast by the BBC last year with my name on it.
How on earth does that lead you to believe if you send your script into the BBC they will simply nick your idea and simply pass it on?
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'most writers are self centred in the extreme, often disconnected from reality and sometimes plain spooky.'
Do you include yourself in the above, Shining Shadow?
If you work hard, ARE talented, and get out there and look for the advice that's everywhere on the internet etc, by established writers, you'll be noticed.
'notoriously secretive and jealous world of the professional screen and script writer (in fact I'd like to smash it, to be brutally honest).'
Sounds a bit paranoid to me, very in fact. What secrets? It's called talent, dear.
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@Paul
Many thanks for this blog on dialogue. I've been writing for quite some few years now but have been fortunate enough to have had positive feedback (yes, Shining Shadow, it can happen to YOU...) on a number of scripts I've sent in to the writersroom. I live in permanent hope of making it through to the next rung on the developmental ladder one day.
But the thing that has been commented on by the script readers is that, while I have a strong story and interesting characters, the dialogue has sometimes let me down. It's the hardest part of a script to get right.
Sounds like stating the bleeding obvious but I've found it helps to read it out loud. Either you yourself when you've finished your script (and it's incredible how many writers send their work off without doing this) or, if you have any budding amatuer actor friends, get them to read it/act it for you. Their feedback will be very useful.
Mrs M
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@) Mrs M
Two tips for you.
1) Attitude of the character who's dialogue you are righting. It's the attitude that counts most - it what brings your dialogue and therefore your character's alive.
An example I like to quote from scripts on the writersroom site.
---------
GRANT:
Give us a pint Nina.
NINA: And what’s the magic word?
GRANT: (DOUR) Lager!
------
It's only one word but we pretty much get Grant's character and attitude from it even if we hadn't met him before.
2) and the second tip which kind of goes with the first is... economy of expression. Look at every line of dialogue and see how spare you can make it. If it can be said simpler it should be. Most polishing is done with the razor blade! Even if it is a long courtroom speech every single word has to really earn it's place. Be ruthless with yourself. Think of your man selecting his team, he can oly put fifteen men on the field, consider how mch work he does to make sure they are the absolute best fifteen - who work together like a dream. It's the same with your words. They have to really earn their place in the mouth of an actor.
:)
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@Mr P,
Many thanks for your above tips - it always helps to be able to see good examples of economical yet character driven dialogue. One day I will get it right.
I will be setting about my latest script with the razor blade shortly, once Jose has finished shaving the dog...
Mrs M
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P, glad you enlarged on your brief story, and while I happy it had your name on it, you must have heard the same horror stories I have, of countless pretty niche and personalised ideas, having been sent in and then politely rejected, ending up on TV in the creator's own bedroom. If that doesn't fill one's bedsheets with paranoia I don't know what does.
Ant...ofcourse I do and ofcourse I am. I reluctantly prefer it to naivete. There are hundreds of talented amateurs out there who get little or nothing commissioned...talent is one element you need, but it's not enough on its own to get you the breakthrough. Good luck to you if you think it is...dear.
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Of course there are hundred out there, talented or not, because it's a popular and competitive field, so how can more than even a small percentage expect to be commissioned?
One of the problems is, that there's more than one person wih a similar or even the SAME idea, so whilst it might look as though you've been ripped off, it means that actually, your idea wasn't as unique as you thought it was. I'd say the amount of real ripped off work is very, very small.
Agree, you need talent, a little bit of luck, right place right time syndrome. Sheesh there's no amount of extra things you'll need, but that's the name of the game.
The people that write, write, write, honing their craft all the time, who don't waste time with thoughts of secrecy and skullduggery, will be the people who get the work. After all, don't forget, producers, directors, fellow writers have to work with you.
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Oh, HAVE made it and DO make it on talent alone.
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The word 'people' should be after Oh...
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I phoned up a producer about ten years ago, the only time I'd ever done it, after a debilitating round of rejection letters, I said 'You tell me what more I can do to get this stuff taken in, I've had professors of English lit saying how sharp it is, and I hadn't paid them anything'. She said, and here's the thing that made me suspicious of the game we're in ever since, 'You need to get yourself known to the right people, get out there and sell yourself'. The dreaded noughties obsession with 'networking' had begun. I said 'You don't understand my dear, writers are not salesfolk, they are not minglers and doorsteppers', but I could hear she really meant it, poor luvvy.
If they who judge our work know so little about what a writer is, how on earth can they be the best judges of the characters on the pages that we send them?
I still hope this is an isolated incident, but I never phoned another producer again in case they said the same sort of thing. And the recent fashion for selling pitching opportunities at specious industry festivals has further depressed me, to the point of almost giving up. This is not how good drama and comedy should be discovered, no, no, and again no!
TV writing was infamously once a closed shop, my fear is now that its encouraging a large scale commercial exploitation of the many lining up to get in.
More feedback from the producers on WR to allay my anxieties would be welcomed, and the first thing I'd love to know is why they ask for credited writers only for their academy applications? Doesn't this mean they are not developing real amateurs at all, and not bringing new talent into their industry? Read the script, producers, if you love it why can't that be enough for you? Very loud eh???
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SS I didn't enlarge on my story I simply explained it to you, once more, because you seemed unable to understand what I had actually written.
'If they who judge our work know so little about what a writer is, how on earth can they be the best judges of the characters on the pages that we send them?
You also seemed to be labouring under some romantic vision of what a 'writer' is. A producer really doesn't care if you live in a garret, wear a fez, or strut about in a cape in the splendid isolation of your own company. They don't give a fig what you think about yourself - all they want to see is a good script. There is no conspiracy. It really is that simple.
Ideas are ten a penny - cheaper even.
Good stories well written aren't.
If you really want to make some inroads stop talking to professors of English Literature and start listening to the people who you are running down - who actually might be able to help you.
You have to want to be helped mind.
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I once had the most marvellous idea for an action/adventure film set in the UK and Russia. The big set piece of the movie was going to be a tank chase through St Petersburg.
How annoyed was I when I saw Goldeneye the next week?
As Mister P points out above, ideas are floating in the ether all the time. In my case, it was well-reported at the time that all of the semi-decommissioned Russian military hardware was being stored just outside St Petersberg. If your taste runs to action-adventure, it's actually more likely than not that you're going to have that idea.
We all live in the same world, read the same magazines, watch the same TV. It's no real surprise that a lot of people have the same ideas. Some of those people are going to get their idea commissioned, and some aren't.
If two people have the same idea, and one of them is made into a film and one isn't, it doesn't follow that one has been stolen from the other.
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Er, Mister P and Antoniablue, I should say.
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ShiningShadow: The Drama Writers Academy is just one of the schemes that we run at the BBC, and is specifically for writers who have a commission or two under their belt already to prepare them to write for the BBC's continuing drama series.
For those without credits, we had the Sharps initiative last year, and hope to run another similar scheme this year. Anyone who could apply for the Academy would have been disqualified from Sharps.
We also accept scripts from anyone at any time via our unsolicited script system. No credits necessary.
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Yes, the script system, I keep forgetting that one, probably because I still haven't finished the one I took a week off work in November for to complete. What can you get done in a week? V little.
And how about CoC? as this will be the academy/training initiative that interests me. I believe I recall being put off or excluded by a similar credits only stipulation on that one too. I'm a bit sketchy tho on that one. When you have a spare mo could you please confirm this and state if and when it will run again this year, as I can't find any current info on that one. Ta. Just to confirm I mean College of Comedy. I'll have another look on the margins to see if I can see a link to it if I've missed it, anyway.
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College of Comedy opened its doors again last week. Details are here. I'm afraid that, like the academy, it does require some form of professional credit.
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Yeah it was in the back of my mind that there was. Those are pretty tough preconditions by the way, certainly for me. I was hoping it would include sketch and one liner credits for radio comedy. Ney mind, cheers anyway for the link.
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From the page: "Applicants will have had their work broadcast."
I'm sure Micheal will correct me if I'm wrong, but that doesn't seem to rule out sketch credits.
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iammisterP - hello, i do remember your script very well and am delighted something eventually came of it, even if writersroom can't exactly take direct credit for that. alas, this is often the way of things for us. but thanks for your posts, it's very good to hear a real story rather than an urban/online myth
shining shadow - i think Piers and iammisterP have really said all that needs saying on the subject of 'theft' - suffice to say that i'm not aware of any instances where it has happened through sending work to writersroom.
'you WOULD say that', i hear the bloggers cry/type - but it's simply the truth. and if you only knew the countless occasions where extremely similar ideas come in unsolicited to writersroom simultaneously and independently, you would probably feel a little less anxious about such possibilities. as iammisterP said:
Ideas are ten a penny - cheaper even.
Good stories well written aren't.
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Yes I've heard this several times now but that statement misses my point entirely - it is the theft of IDEAS that worries me.
Scenario -
A writer is knocked out by another writer's idea and they take it. They use it to form a script written in their own distinct style.
I have heard that this does happen, generally, I don't know how common it is, but it does happen. And the law says there is nothing wrong with this!!!
British/European copyright law is a total mess and almost worthless (I am told). It does not protect ideas, it does not even protect titles or characters. The only protection it gives is to material structures in writing, which means it only really protects against plagiarism.
So worst case scenario - you buy a bag of my best ten ideas for less than 1p (just take them) and add your own expensive style and structure. You then have your script snapped up by a leading producer. I have no legal claim on the ideas (which I created) in that top script, and of course I have only postage proof of their origin. Because you have not taken my literal constructions, my style and structures, and can prove it, I am left with nothing but a nagging sense of foul play and growing paranoia.
A classic example of this was the claim against Dan Brown by the Holy Blood...writers, and they lost! But to my eye their central ideas were clearly stolen. So the law on this is worthless. I happen to think that good ideas are valuable. Writers like Dan Brown obviously think so too. So I maintain that putting a script based on an original idea of my own in the post to the BBC or to anyone makes me nervous!! And it will until the stupid law changes.
The only slight way I agree with the posters who argue to the contrary is that genuinely good writers will not/should not seek to steal others' ideas but instead will back themselves to create their own. But really the whole system relies on nothing more than the good will and integrity of all writers, and this is very worrying.
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As you rightly point out, the law does not protect ideas, but only the expression of ideas.
The only way to become a screenwriter is to sell your screenwriting, not the ideas contained within. The legendary "Joe Eszterhas scribbles an idea on a napkin and sells it for two million dollars" story, when retold, often misses out one vital point:
That two million dollars is payment for a script from Joe Eszterhas about that idea. Not for the idea itself.
As I've pointed out above, ideas aren't actually valuable. The ability to write well is. And that's not something that anyone can steal from you.
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Yeah, I wouldn't argue that at all, good writing is definitely the most important product. However, good creative writing will always contain good ideas, and with the law as it is, there remains that niggling concern for many writers.
I do though, probably because I'm British, trust the beeb's WR far more than I do those American script agents and screenwriting comps on the web. And I do think it's a (slight) risk worth taking, for certain. I also feel more assured since you yourselves have taken the trouble to say what you've said, but then I'd expect nothing less from the BBC. And WR iitself is a superb initiative. But many writers have insecurities and unfounded fears, I'm one of them and not even the BBC will cure them.
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Additionally, there is the problem of unconscious plagiarism.
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Ssshhh, Minnie, you're not supposed to talk about that sort of thing here. It makes the natives nervous. Some of them like to think it doesn't really go on. (But any keen eyed watcher of TV knows that it does. Dinstinctive styles of vernacular dialogue in a new show get swiped and used by all and sundry ((and no they do not pay royalties to the writer who first introduced it to the screen!)). And they think we don't notice it going on. I didn't know anyone who talked like the characters in The Office or see anyone talk or behave like them on TV before the excellent sitcom was aired on the BBC. Now I could name you half a dozen shows at least which have since totally copied that exact style of characterisation. Is it subconscious, Minnie, or is it simple theft? I know one thing - it is not original. But some professional writers and/or producers have no sense of shame or integrity, it seems. It appears that originality of voice (and the preservation of its ownership) no longer matters. What matters is feeding your own babbies, and feeding the most voracious of them all, television.
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Yer, I totally agree people have definitely ripped off The Office, especially that American show with Steve Carrell! It is very disappointing that every time some new show comes on television it seems like a cheap/worse imitation of things past. The least these shows could be is rubbish AND original. Mind you the writersroom does provide useless writers like myself some false hope! Best of luck Shining_Shadow
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So you never saw a 'mockumentary' before the office SS? Operation Good Guys for example?
And could we at least have the half dozen shows you refer to please, with some examples of how the 'Distinctive styles of vernacular dialogue' have been stolen. I presume you mean Mister Gervais is stealing that Reading accent and using it in Extras as well. But perhaps you could clarify?
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Yes I had seen a mockumentary before, but it's not the format that I was referring to. The office, I believe, introduced a new style of characterisation to our screens, certainly for sitcoms - a style I can only attempt to describe as a laid back naturalism with plenty of pauses for that trademark 'awkward moment' (which is being set up all the time) to be enjoyed by the viewer. The only thing I can think of which resembled the style before The Office is the TV rock mockumentary movie This is Spinal Tap, the clear inspiration for Gervaise's idea and his favourite film.
But much more than this mockumentary tool was new to us in the style. I would describe The Office's really distinctive style of character acting as a playfully unserious, deliberately unadult tone which is sort of mocking or sending up the formality and seriousness of everyday adult behaviour. I hope that makes some sort of sense, these things aren't that easy to explain literally. Although it looked to me totally unique at the time, I do wonder if Gervaise and Merchant weren't inspired somewhat by Friends which used a similar jokey depiction of adulthood. Anyway, whatever influences were there, it did look to me to be an original and unique blend of characterisation. The dialogue was delivered in a quirky style, and it was all very relaxed and natural looking.
Since then I certainly have come across the style several times while watching other sitcoms mainly. It is a very noticable style. I could name six at least if I found the time to research the titles of the shows I have in my head. Some were 3 or 4 yrs ago and have probably finished now. But I'll do my best from the top of my head. One was certainly Hardware, a fairly interesting but very short lived sitcom, and I think the Martin Freeman casting may have been the reason for its similar style, but I remember very clearly thinking that it was 'copying' or 'cashing in' in some way on the success of the Office, which I think was still running or had only just finished. I didn't catch much of the Green Wing for some reason but I have a feeling I saw elements of the style there as well. More recently I have noticed a similarity of style in Outnumbered, I show I otherwise like, and even more noticably in Free Agents, a show which isn't my cup of tea, probably because I find the acting style so heavily remeniscent of The Office and Extras.
Extras ofcourse can be forgiven totally, as it is the creators' own style or brand. Likewise with The Office USA, they bought the rights to make their version so there can be no issue there. But very distinctive new shows often do have an awful lot of imitators and I wonder sometimes if the originators of them see it all as a compliment or a rip off? That may depend on how successful the influenced shows become I suppose, I don't know. But just to briefly extend my point, many really distinctive and original shows have their admiring imitators. Curb Your Enthusiasm is getting British 'copies' now, I believe, as did Seinfield, and the Americans have a strong influence on British TV in all genres now. Our own Fawlty Towers has had a monumental influence on sitcoms. Who patrols the borders of influence/theft on TV? No one it appears. You can't go too far in your imitation it seems because there is no law on it. I just find this a little odd.
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The 'style' you are struggling to describe is Cinema Verite, I can't add the accent. It certainly wasn't original and it certainly hasn't been stolen since. It's a form. It's a genre. Things in art and stuff like that get to be called a genre when there a few of them and stlyistic pointers emerge. None of the stylistic pointers to be seen in the Office, for example, appear in Free Agents. Naturalism is not to be confused with manufactured 'pseudo' realism.
And watch Operation Good Guys!
:)
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'What's that up your bum bum bones'
'Bouquet garni'
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Det. Insp. Beach: I'm not remotely interested in your drugs bust. What I want to know is... how long have we got until the full dress rehersal?
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No I'm sorry Mr P but I was not referring to CV. I thought that if I had chosen to put in lot of labels then I run the risk of being thought of as cocky, so I didn't. Also I believe the style I am talking about is unique, and so no labels will satisfy. CV would apply only to the first paragraph anyway. It would appear to me you may have read this first para and quickly constructed the conclusion you really wanted.
I explained at length in the second paragraph that Gervaise added much more to the mockumentary style than for example was in the Spinal Tap version. It is there that I attempt at least to describe this unique style. I didn't watch the show you say I should watch, so I don't know whether this was already in the public domain or not. I do know that the style I saw unveiled in The Office was hugely influential, and still is, and I assume still that it was the creation of Gervaise and Merchant. It is a very strong, unique style of its own. This style is a massive deviation on pure Cinema Verite and it isn't even reliant on the CV format at all, and that is why it is now widely used in many other comedies. I kept using the term characterisation for a reason, as this is what it is such a singular example of.
You are perfectly free to jump to your own conclusions, but I know what you say I said is nothing like what I did say. I may have been long winded I agree, but I found this necessary to try to describe what is a very unique style of charaterisation. It is totally independent of the documentary style realism that applies in CV. I only attempted it because you asked me to explain myself and give examples, so this is what I did. You don't have to agree at all, nor does anyone else but then I don't agree with your snappy interpretation of what I meant, because I simply didn't say this.
ever your congenial correspondent, ss.
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'This style is a massive deviation on pure Cinema Verite'
If you don't know something it is okay to admit it in my book.
Accusing creative artists of artistic theft isn't nice.
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Mister p have you seen Reno 911? Sort of like an American operation gg it's a bit hit and miss but then again most comedies are. First series of operation gg was good but after that I think they jumped the shark with the going abroad storyline (if my memory serves me correctly as I haven't seen it for quite some time!).
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I don't think they jumped the shark but I know what you mean. What was great was the improvised element of it. There were some parts I literally haven't laughed louder at. I met them once and the main guy thought I was someone else and was actually quite rude to me - but I forgave him later when he and his team wan't there. :) They haven't had the credit they deserve.
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Bury your head in the ground then. It happens, that's a fact. It's also fairly easy to spot. On the CV thing, you're the one who brought the term up, not me. And how else do you want me to put it, that 'the Gervaise/Merchant style which is now copied by many shows is nothing really to do with with the term you brought up'. I'd probably be accused of being long winded. The mock documentary format was merely the format for that one show, not the style developed by G/M within it. That's the thing I say has been used, copied, stolen, whichever way you want me to say it. You say it's not a nice thing to say. Then the creeps who blatantly do this sort of thing really shouldn't do it - it's a far less nice thing to do.
You got what I clearly wrote all wrong and simply based your assertions of my not knowing what I was talking about on a false premise of your own making. Then you go in for the cheap one liners, which bother me none. I could say it's okay to admit your prejudice based probably on earlier comments has made you over reactive and force you to contradict me at all costs. I don't mind the outspoken bit at all, it's what a writer should be, but surely you should read what your adversary writes first?
I will never be intimidated by prickly writers who play the silly game of believing other writers and film makers do not steal ideas or styles. That is the utterest nonsense. On the medium of TV it is so evident it happens, and on the medium of cinema, even more so. I'm not saying it happens through Writers Room to new writers, no, from what I've seen and heard so far, I feel this is a decent, safe platform and would use it myself. The big risk is with screened material already in the public domain. What happens is, many not so creative, not so honest writers get themselves believing that they, everyone, has some sort of common ownership over it, so it must be okay to recycle it with their own name on it, and reap the rewards of any success. That is exactly where copyright law falls flat on its stupid face, and it is a problem. If it happened to you I'm pretty certain you wouldn't like it. And not every writer who once wrote a hit is living well of its earnings, so it hits them hard. Copyright law for moving picture media is a highly controversial piece of ineffective, confused mess. Even the lawyers say this. It overprotects ownership on some aspects and gives zero protection on others. Creative media is by far the most at risk because of it what it describes as abstracts which effectively must belong to everyone and no one in particular. This is the farcical rule which allows great shows like The Office, among many others to be simply ripped off by anyone with the desire to do so. Their unique style, for me, should be protected for a certain time period in just the same way that much of the concrete material (but not all) is.
regards ss, no offence intended, none taken and all of that
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I think from looking on wikipedia that ogg did jump the shark. Reached it's peak moved to a new setting and no longer held the same appeal. I know it was based on farce anyway but it no longer had a semi realistic back drop to provide the necessary offset for their mad cap behaviour (IMO). I support what you say shining shadow as it defends people who try hard to generate original work and wouldn't do the dirty on other writers. I haven't experienced it personally but seeing as there isn't really anything in place to guard writers ideas and concepts I can imagine it happens.
I AM ROSEMARY SHRAGER LOUDEST CHEF IN BRITAIN HEAR ME ROAR!!
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Consider my my head buried. I'll leave you with the spade SS, you seem rather adept with it.
:)
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Yes our styles are as different as our opinions. Writng these posts gives me the chance to have a good blow out with the words I have to tear ruthlessly from any drafts I may write. So it's my kind of treat for them after not making the first team as it were. Oh, and I prefer the term shovel if you don't mind.
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I always think it is best to call a spade a spade.
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I am becoming quite suspicious of the writers room. I have sent them in two of my scripts and have seen ideas from them appear.
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