360 Script Writing Festival 2011

Just a quick note! For those who don't know about it, there are still places on this year's 360 Script Writing Festival, which is currently taking place at the BBC in Belfast. We've already had the first day, so hard luck if you missed out on that, I'm afraid. But still plenty going on. Details below...

360º Script Writing Festival 2011

360º is an annual festival of inspiring and professional workshops offering craft skills and industry knowledge across the different mediums: TV, Screen, Radio and Theatre. The festival is one of the best opportunities through the year to meet likeminded and industry people in Belfast.
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WHO IS IT FOR?
Workshops and talks for people interested in making a living from script writing in TV, Radio, Film or Theatre.
WHEN?
Wednesday 26th until Friday 28th of January 2011
Workshops will take place during the day with a social event on Friday evening between 6-8pm
WHERE?
Studio One, Broadcasting House, Ormeau Avenue, Belfast.

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PROGRAMME:

Wednesday 26th January RADIO DAY

1.30 – 4.30pm

Studio One:
MASTERCLASS and WORKSHOP:
Kate Rowland, the Creative Director, New Writing, Commissioner of the Wire on R3 and previous Head of Radio Drama will give a masterclass in Radio Drama. Listen to exerts of a diverse variety of plays ranging from 'as live' to monologue and get started on writing your own radio play.
25 Places – if your play is chosen you need to be available Thursday and Friday to redraft, rehearse and record your play

Breakout Room:
EXPERIENCE: HITCHED
An opportunity to hear Dough Lucie’s radio play which satirise our obsession with weddings and happy-ever-afters. Emma and Richard’s wedding day arrives – will it go without the proverbial ‘hitch’?
10 places

5 – 7pm
Studio One:
TALK:
Doug Lucie is an acclaimed dramatist and playwright who has written successfully for stage, TV and radio. With a razor-sharp observation and ready wit Doug’s voice is one which chronicles and exposes the hypocrisies and obsessions of our time with passion and humour. He will be sharing his experience writing for radio and telling you how he thinks it shouldn’t be done. To help your own writing he is going to give you an insight into how he constructs a scene. All food for thought for the scripts you are working on whatever the medium.
100 Places

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Thursday 27th January THEATRE DAY

Breakout Room:
10am: the 360 radio drama writers need to hand in a hardcopy of their script.

11 – 1pm
Studio One:
TALK:
What happens now you’ve finished that play? How do you target your work towards production? How do you find support in developing it? How can you manage your career? Sarah Dickenson, Senior Reader at Soho Theatre, will talk about the work and vision of Soho Theatre and Writers’ Centre, the Verity Bargate Award, Soho’s national competition for the best new play by an emerging writer, and more widely on approaches to professional development for playwrights within the UK theatre landscape.
100 Places

2 – 4pm
Studio One:
WORKSHOP:
An in-depth and practical look at writing characters for the stage. We will look at how far you can take your characters and the theatrical space they inhabit. We will look at different approaches, angles and tricks of the trade. A workshop with Soho and Tinderbox theatre.
30 places

Breakout Room:
EXPERIENCE: EVERYTHING BETWEEN US
An opportunity to see David Ireland’s hit play from 2010 on DVD with a Q&A session with Tinderbox Artistic Director Michael Duke
10 places

5 – 6.30pm
Studio One:
OPEN NOTE:
The announcement of the 4 radio scripts which will be recorded with actors on Friday with a masterclass style note session for the 4 writers preparing them for the writing their 2nd draft.
30 places

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Friday 28th January TV DRAMA

10.30am – 12.30pm
Studio One:
TALK: What Is A Drama Series?
With John Yorke Controller, BBC Drama Production. John oversees the long-runners, as well as executive producing single dramas. As Head of New Talent John also created and runs the BBC Writers Academy the first full-time training course for new writers in the UK that guarantees primetime television commissions.
100 places

Breakout Room:
Rehearsal and recording of the 360 radio plays with professional actors will take place during the day. If you are one of the lucky people who have been selected to record your radio plays look out for information on your recording slot sometime between 10 am and 5pm.

2 – 4pm
Studio One:
WORKSHOP:
Create a series together. Run by John Yorke this is a practical workshop that will give you a chance to practice pulling together the essential elements of a drama series.
30 places

6 – 8pm
Studio One:
360 RADIO PLAYS:
Premiere & upcoming opportunities in Radio, TV & Theatre.We will hear the four newly recorded short radio pieces with drinks and nibbles. This will also be a chance to Network with industry people.

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HOW TO BOOK:
The workshops are free. There is a limited number of places so please book early by contacting Bronagh Taylor on Bronagh.Taylor@bbc.co.uk or call on 02890 338 845.

Please state clearly which workshops you are interested in. When a workshop or talk is full we will keep a waiting list.

The festival is organised by BBC Drama Northern Ireland and Tinderbox Theatre Company. Don’t forget that the deadline for Primetime is 14th February. GET WRITING!!

News N'Stuff...

Just a quick update.

Went down to Dublin last week for a Fair City Story Conference for a couple of days and to do the edit on my Shadow Script. For "Edit" read "Feedback". I was a bit nervous about it, to be honest. I felt as if I'd done an okay job, but there are so many factors involved that it's easy to mess up. Anyway, I sat down with the Script Editor and we had a good long chat about it. Lots of really good feedback and notes. I have to do the re-write on it and send that in. And then she wants me to do my second shadow script, which is great. So, I'm back down to Dublin at the beginning of December for another Story Conference and a meeting for my next shadow. Stage 2....

Unfortunately, due to illness in the family, I missed the NI Screen agents talk last week, so I'm afraid I can't give a report on that. Sorry about that one. To make up for it, I've got some write ups still to post up from the BBC NI/Tinderbox festival. One of which was on agents. So, that's kinda the same thing...

Meanwhile, I've just arrived in London (sitting in Pret a manger in Gt Portland St. Can anyone see me...?) and aoout to meet up with some fellow scribes to talk writing n'stuff... Fab.

How it all began... 2010

Hey! And hello!!! Bet you thought I'd disappeared!

Ok, much more likely that you didn't even notice....

Right, well, I've just spent two weeks stuck under this:

In Lurgan. Lucky old me. But at least I was at home sitting in front of the fire watching lots of fab TV and eating soda farls and potato bread. So, I was a lot better off than both. Any road up, back in Rome now. The sun is shining. Life is good.

Soooooo....after the shenanigans of 2009, parts one, two, three and four (what was I thinking...?) let's get up to date with 2010.

January started off with the second BBC NI/Tinderbox 360° New Writing Festival. Which is a bit of a mouthful by anyone's standards. They had a cracking line up this year - Paul Ashton from the Writersroom, Comedy Writing by Humphrey Barlclay and Vanessa Hay, Michael Jacob from the BBC Comedy Academy, Tim Loane - Writing for TV, Hugh Costello on writing for radio, Matthew Dench on Agents, David Ireland on writing for the stage and current events.

There were the usual networking opps and the chance to get together with other writers and chinwag about writing. Last year I'd sat in the corner with a plastic cup of crap wine at these things, but this year I thought to hell with it and got stuck in. And it's weird, but you realise that chatting to some development producer about cheese n' onion crisps and neopolitan ice cream fetishes (rather than trying to push your script on to them) is actually a bit of a laugh, all the stress goes, and you find yourself suggesting that you send them a script. And they say "Course!" like your their best friend. So, lesson leaned. Networking: Good.

I've got some reports on most of the sessions so I'll bang them up here next week.

Another good thing was that I got to arrange another meeting with the radio producer there I'd been talking to at BBC NI. Last time we'd spoken she'd told me that she was taking one of my ideas to her Execs to talk through. But that had been about four months ago. We'd emailed and chatted but work, life and busy schedules had taken over and I hadn't really heard anything. It's difficult to know what to do in that situation. Which brings us on to the thorny problem of the THE FOLLOW UP.

You’ve had a meeting. They liked something. They’re taking it forward. You're gonna get a commission! You're career has just taken off!! Endless riches and power are yours!!!!! Ha-HA!!

Then they disappear.

Well, course they do. You have to be realistic about how many projects these people are juggling, managing, producing, directing, writing follow up reports on, reading, etc. They may even be trying to fit in a bit of a life too, the mad fools. And as a new writer trying to get in that door, you are not the only thing on their list. Developing those relationships with new writers is part of what they do, but only a part, whilst for you it is huge. So, you end up with this awful clingy feeling like you're back at school, desperately hoping the person you really fancy who spoke to you last week will notice you again.

Course, that could just be me.

So, what do you do? You don't want to send endless emails, saying,

"So.....??? What did they THINK?? Instant commission or what?''

On the other hand, you DO want to know. And what if, in their busy schedule it's somehow slipped, and they'll actually be really grateful of the reminder? It's always a difficult call, dependant on how well you know them, how busy they are, when the deadline is, etc. You just have to hold strong, keep you desperation and paranoia at bay and send a gentle reminder after a month or so that doesn't make it sound as if you're chastising them.

The only real way to deal with it is just to get on with other stuff, which is what you are forced to do anyway. After a week of checking emails every five minutes and eventually realizing that it's probably gonna take a while, you just get sick of it and go do something else. And all the better if that other thing is some writing. For when they come back and say "no".

Anyway, the festival allowed me to suggest we got together for an update and a month later I was back in rainy Belfast for a coffee and a chat, which was rather nice timing as the commissioning round for Radio 4 drama was coming up. I also re-sent my ideas just to make sure she had a copy at hand, which turned out to be a good idea as she then took it to her Exec and they chose a different idea to take forward this time. Except... I'd written a biographical/true life story set in the 80s.

(Or at least I was going to. This was still the one-page pitch. If BBC NI liked it enough to put it forward to the pre-offers then I had to re-write the one pager. If the commissioner liked it enough to put it into the formal offers round, then I would have to develop a two-pager. And if he still liked it enough to commission it, THEN I had to write it.)

My feedback from the producer and Exec was that they liked the themes and ideas, but could I write a modern version? Which meant no true life story about quite famous person, no 80s context (which was crucial to the way this guy's life played out) and err.... a completely different story. So of course I said,

"Yeah, fine! I'll do that! No problem! Where do you want it?"

The reasoning was that the Afternoon Play doesn't really do biographies or historical. At least, not from new writers. They have enough of that and want contemporary stories. Which is fair enough. They gave me a week to come up with the new idea.

So, off I went and re-thought the whole thing, did some research, developed a new story with the same themes and arena, and sent a new one pager off to the producer.

And waited....

Meanwhile, I'd also arranged a second meeting over on the mainland with the other radio producer who'd been waiting on my re-write of Francesca and Giorgio. Well, waiting is probably not exactly correct. She probably couldn't have cared less. But I'd done the re-write and sent it off to her, along with some ideas. We met and she was absolutely lovely and encouraging and informative. The reallly mad thing was that, having this meeting so soon after the other one, I was struck by how they both said exactly the same things about what works and what doesn't in terms of commissioning for Radio 4. With that in mind, we also discussed F & G. She still liked it but wasn't sure it was something the commissioner would go for (again, it was set in the past, had lots of flashbacks and some other stuff that wasn't usually commissioned). Also, she felt that after the re-write it still wasn't quite there. I had to agree with her. There was something not quite chiming with it. It had been my second script, and I'd learnt so much since then, that fixing it was taking more time and effort than starting something completely new. And to be honest, from my point of view, that little script had done so much for me - getting me these meetings and interest, getting me interest from Fair City too - that I really felt it had done its job and I was ready to leave it.

So we discussed my other ideas. Another thing I learnt that day was that (and this is quite complicated, so bear with me):

Two internal producers from two different geographical parts of BBC radio can't put the same writer in to the offers round for the same slot, even if it is with different projects.

Got that?

Ok, read it again.

Now?

Ok.

Remember, that is for internal producers. Independents may be able to do what they want. Oh, and new writers can only be put up for the Afternoon slot, not Woman's Hour or anything else. So, having two producers that you're talking to doesn't necessarily double your chances. With two offer rounds a year, that means that, as a new writer, you only really get one shot with one idea for each round. Oh, and the September round is really only to fill in the gaps. The main slot is March. So, that's kinda one chance with one idea per year.

And radio's supposed to be "a good way in"....

And yet, it is! I got two producers talking to me in a relatively short amount of time. And if I can do it, anyone can. So, go for it!

The upshot of our meeting was that we'd keep in touch and I'd send her some ideas over the summer and maybe we'd put something in for the September round.

So, I went home to wait for the news from BBC NI on how my new idea had gone down. Would it be going into the offers round and under the eyes of the commissioner?

The news came a few weeks later.... and it was good! The drama dept had had their meeting and my idea was one of the ones chosen to go forward to the pre-offers round. Excellent!! The commissioner would be looking at it, they'd have a meeting within the month, and I'd know if it was going to the next stage - the formal offers round.

Oooh, the waiting....

In the meantime, I also managed to get Fair City working again for me to watch, so that was back on! I got in touch with the script editor, told her the good news, and she advised me to get up to speed over a couple of months and come back to do the trial. Weh-hey!

That's it for now. Next time.... what the commissioner thought....

How it all began... 2009

Right. 2009.

Well, after 2007 and 2008, what was 2009 gonna bring?

Well, it all started back in good old Norn Iron. BBC NI, who run the Tony Doyle Bursary, got together with Tinderbox Theatre Company and had the rather fantastic idea of running a new writing festival with 2009's bursary, giving it the rather snazzy title of the 360° New Writing Festival. So I headed back to the Emerald Isle for a whole host of workshops and seminars over the course of four days. Events included an opening talk from Tony Jordan which was as entertaining as it was inspiring, "The Perfect 10" from Kate Rowland of the BBC Writersroom, a session by the creator of Sofia's Diary on online drama, and a session on including music in theatre. As ever, one of the best bits was getting to hook up with other writers and talk writing. Kieran (who I'd met the previous year on the TAPS course - top bloke, but don't tell him I said so. He'll only get all full of himself...) was also on hand for a good old chinwag and some pintage. Great stuff. And that was the end of that.

Except...

There were some great sessions and it seemed a shame not to let other people know about them. And also... You know that thing when you go to a great talk and then someone asks you about it the next day and you're all,

"yeah, it was great cause they said... stuff... and they were cool cause.... cause... other stuff...

Er, actually, I can't remember a thing about it now."

I wanted to fix stuff in my head so I wouldn't forget. Anyway, I wrote up the sessions and stuck them on Sharpshooter (I'll put them up here sometime). And then someone wanted to put them up on another site... so then I had to get in touch with the speakers, and Writersroom, and BBC NI, who then wanted to send them out as well, and ... well, it all got very complicated. But the good thing was, I got friendly with a few people through doing that and was allowed to send in my radio script to a BBC producer! No promises, but they would read it. Hah! In my short little screenwriting life, that was a result.

All excited, I went to hunt out Francesca and Giorgio, my radio script. I had finished it at some stage the year before, during one of my "put-the-learning-into-practice" phases. But I couldn't quite remember much about it... Strange... Why was that..?

Cause it was crap. Oh, God... You know when you're learning? And you get to a year later? And look back on something that you did in your first year? And you still know jack? And even if you dont know why, you just KNOW that what you're looking at is baaaad! Well, it was like that.

But worse.

So, I took a deep breath and took it apart. And then put it back together again. Then it was straight up onto Sharpshooters for some feedback. And then I wrote a nice email. And hit SEND.

Eek!

In the meantime, I'd also sent it to a friend to for feedback, who knew another radio producer and did I want them to pass it on? Hell, yes!

Another nice email, and a reply saying she'd be happy to have a look!

Double result!

All that time coming up with TV ideas and scripts (well, a few) and suddenly radio seemed to have doors that were much easier to open. Who'd have thought? Well, that is, if they liked it...

Now for the waiting game....

That's not all for 2009, but this post is getting far too long, so I'll leave the rest for next time.