Catherine Tregenna

Catherine Tregenna started her career as an actor before becoming a writer on series including EastEnders, Casualty, and Cowbois ac Injans. Her play Art and Guff was produced at Soho Theatre, and her most recent work has been on Torchwood and Law & Order: UK.

How did you get started as a writer?

I was acting in a Welsh language series called Pris y Farchnad which was risk-taking and innovative. When the author decided he didn't want to write the third series, the director, Tim Lyn, suggested that three of the lead actors worked alongside him and co-wrote it. It was experimental and very creatively demanding as we were thrown in at the deep end but I got the taste for it.

I then wrote a play called Art and Guff for the sheer enjoyment of it over one summer and it got optioned by Soho Arts Theatre and performed there. After that, I went on a course on BBC Wales and, as a result, was invited to write on a new regional series called Belonging. I was terrified but very keen to prove myself, which I'm happy to say I did. They ended up giving me three episodes out of six. After that, I created The Bench about a magistrates' court. I believe it was a bit of a golden era in regional drama in Wales!

What advice would you give to anyone wanting to write for a living?

Keep the faith, keep writing. You can't show what you can do with a blank page. If you're rejected, ask why. Know you'll make mistakes and that you may have to prove yourself first on a show like Doctors or Casualty. If you get onto a show like that, respect it, respect the fact that the people working on it are living and breathing it. From outline to scene breakdown to script, you will get notes. You'll feel like you're being criticized but don't get too defensive.

Some writers spend more time arguing with notes than trying to understand them and implement them. Notes are a necessary evil. You do a first draft, you get a whole load of notes. Rant at the computer, take deep breaths and work out which ones REALLY don't make sense. Pick your fights and listen. Script editors and producers who give you notes want your script to be the best because it also reflects on them.

Don't be a doormat though. Air your opinions and explain your decisions as clearly as possible. If you're with the right team, together you'll find the way to best tell your story.

What's your writing routine?

Routine? I wish. It varies. Say someone wants a script in three weeks, there are a few days of mulling and then a lot of panic laced with fear where I genuinely believe I have forgotten how to write. And that I won't deliver, that I'll have to get a proper job and stop pretending that I know what I'm doing.

Post panic, I just put the time in. I sit at my desk in the morning in my study and set an alarm and stay there until I've at least written something down, even if it's rubbish. So I get into a routine after about a week. I try and enjoy it. I make notes telling myself to enjoy it but a lot of the time, in the early stages, it's hard and I don't like what I'm producing. But then it starts cooking in my mind. I'm a slow burner. I revisit. I do a lot of thinking. It comes together but it's not magic. Magic tends to come to me at the end after perspiration and discipline.

How does your writing process work?

I think the dialogue is the fun bit at the end, the icing on the cake. Some writers just let fly with scenes and dialogue but I like structure. I always break my stories down, at first in a loose story beat outline, then in scene breakdown. That way, I know where I'm heading. Sometimes I find out that my scene breakdown is going in the wrong direction, that I need to go somewhere else but that's the nature of the job.

I have worked with good ensemble teams. In Torchwood, Julie Gardner, Russell T Davies, and Chris Chibnall gave notes at every stage, as well as the producer and script editor. We discussed the story and often came up with new variations. The energy in the room was focussed and the story mattered so if last minute changes were for the better, we embraced them. I think we always tried to find the heart of if. The mechanics came later.

I find out how the story can be summed up: eg "Three people come through the rift on a small plane from 1953 into modern day Cardiff. One falls in love, one discovers her independence and another one never quite adapts. One flies away, one heads off to London on a great adventure and the other one kills himself." That was an episode of Torchwood called Out of Time. What it was really about was how the crack Torchwood team who'd seen and dealt with monsters and aliens would be emotionally devastated by three lost strangers.

I try and find the heart of the story, then I build the strands. I scrawl loads of notes. I find the characters, mould them. I am happy to rethink them, their nuances. I do this one strand at a time and follow their story through. When I have about ten/fifteen loose scenes, I work on the other strands one by one. I work out over how many days the story will play out. When all the strands are complete, I put together a scene breakdown. After the scene breakdown, I write the dialogue. I choose to write the dialogue for the scenes in order so I always feel the flow of the episode.

You were nominated for a Hugo Award for your episode of Torchwood, Captain Jack Harkness.

When I was told about this, I am ashamed to say, my response was "What's a Hugo award?" I'm not a massive sci-fi buff, though I do appreciate the dramatic possibilities of the genre. When the Hugo award was explained to me, I was pretty chuffed. Then everyone told me Steven Moffat would win and he did too, most deservedly. Captain Jack Harkness was a love story which was written in less than a fortnight due to production pressures and what shines for me is its simplicity which is also its strength. It had a lot of feedback from people in the gay community, people found it uplifting. What a brilliant thing to be able to have two men in uniform in the Second World War dancing and kissing in public!

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