Welcome to sitcom geeks. I'm Dave Cohen and I'm still James Carey back back from his little break after the last one But here we are. This is episode 221 so the tension is mounting now and it's actually we're recording recording live recording live before a studio audience Well, actually we got a bunch of sitcom geeks fans or friends. I would say probably I think yeah Let's not let's not run away without else.
Yeah, you know, we got the cool with the cool kids And they're all here with us and we're gonna be chatting to them and they're gonna be asking questions and things a little later But we thought that we would use this episode that we'd look at principally at sort of two areas really we thought we're eight years now since we did episode one and We thought we'd talk about the biggest changes that we think have happened since we started in 2015 And then also we'll talk a little bit about what stayed the same so I guess and we got a few other little thoughts as well, but that's that's gonna be The main thrust the thrust of the episode so let's start James and ask you what do you think you have seen as the biggest changes that have happened Since we started recording in 2015 well, I'm gonna preempt that firstly by saying you made it sound like my holiday has finished It hasn't my holiday is still going and that's why we don't have my regular sound recording equipment with you The second thing is in 2015. This is what was going on sitcom wise. Okay, so in 2015 was the year Miranda was finishing with two final specials It was also the final season of my own sitcom with Richard Hurst blue stone 42 It was the beginning of catastrophe car share and chewing gum And then big year for see the letter C. Yes indeed Yeah, and count half as strong was halfway through 2013 to 2017 was count half as strong and man down and also just over halfway through episodes Which ran from 2011 to 2018 the detectorists which began in 2014 halfway through people just do nothing and It's the final season of moon boy and underby in 2015 halfway through uncle and the only season of pompy doo Which is a I've gotten the neglected verbal sorry a physical comedy.
No, I think there's any speaking in it at all Was that other than sort of job not forgotten in this household were big big fans of that show in this house? Yeah, so that was in a way that was the landscape in 2015 That's what we were either aspiring to or trying to do better than or competing with And so you know obviously there was there was a lot of other stuff too But obviously one of the big changes is those are all those are all terrestrial shows of some form or another BBC one two three channel four We're not really looking at Netflix or Amazon Prime or Apple TV. They were merely a a glint in the eye of Tim Kirkor Whoever was doing all those streaming services so they were you know, I think house of cards obviously was the big show They kicked off Netflix, but that was Yeah, so that is obviously a really huge thing and I'm still unsure as to what that really means And I think there is a great big Contraction coming to some extent because I just don't think they can keep making all this stuff But yeah, obviously the big the big change is the platforms have changed to the point where I'm saying the word platform and nobody's laughing Because if it said platforms in 2015 on this podcast people would have just gone what who is you know, who's this guy? What is this is nonsense?
Yeah, so it's it's um, so yeah, obviously that's a really big thing But I still and I guess that has therefore blurred the lines between comedy and drama But in particular the big changes The expectation that you'll start with episode one And you can have a serial arc a story arc in a way that you just sort of couldn't really before streaming was really Very very common. And so And I think the pendulum is swinging back towards much more episodic comedy because people are still watching modern family in Brooklyn Nine nine and things which don't have particularly big as the way arcs So I think yeah, that's that's kind of that is a really big difference I think is the smooshing of comedy and drama together but also with this overarching story and I'm still pretty ambivalent about that but um, but that's just me although interestingly To talk to if we think about what what's you know What is the ultimate streaming show of the moment and it is of course succession and of course When we think about that and the kind of the core writing team of succession are all people who started their careers writing one line jokes for Weekending or jokes for Johnny Vaughn on the big breakfast. So that's a kind of um, that's another another way of looking at it is to say that You know our contemporaries are are writing these shows on streaming. Yeah, not us I know, you know, I mean, I gave Tony roachies first bloody Some commission there.
Yeah, and does he ever call you does he heck? Yeah, no, we all we all remember pub world of pub Tony. You're you're a sitcom guy really and he would say so really as well But yeah, he also wrote brilliant Holy flying circus. Oh, yeah about the life of brian controversy.
Yeah. Yeah. So anyway hats off to Tony roach Jesse and georgia, of course. I was been on this show as well.
Yeah, so I mean, it's quite uh, I mean, it's quite something really I mean, everybody everybody Is talking about this, you know, and that's like different from when you have your when you have a hit show in the UK or something You know, this is like, you know, people in america are talking about succession You know people who aren't interested in in comedy at all and I still can't quite get my head around the idea that this is a show that You know, these people used to sit and write jokes for weekend. This doesn't quite I can't quite get my head around that But you know, that's kind of if that's where you can go, you know from where you start out So, um, but yeah, I mean it is that that is a massive change and I think you know, generally that I suppose Not so much saying the internet is obviously a huge thing that's changed everything in the last 25 years But I suppose broadband and online, uh, yeah, uh comedy is Again much bigger than again, I think about when we were starting and and there's probably an episode 14 where we talk about Your own youtube sketches. You must be absolutely mad You know, you've got to get all this lighting gear and a camera and do this and that and the other and gradually obviously We came out. I was sort of More pro it than I was and I was much more you've you've been very kind today, but I was against it and I was wrong Or I have at least I changed my mind as the evidence and the facts changed.
I like to think Yeah, but um, but yeah, no, I because I think in a way I would still Defend the principle of if time is limited and you want to be a writer and you have no interest in performing And you have x number of hours a week to spend Spend it writing a really good script because there aren't many really good scripts So I think that advice still stands but if you can Create some some content some audio contents of visual content that you can point to to aid you and and you just make contacts and friends You get experience like and stuff there are loads of upsides to it But if time is really pressing and you do just want to be a writer as it were and not anything else Then I think those other things can be a distraction So but equally phones have got amazing cameras lighting you don't need to worry about so much and this is the whole grammar of of television that's You know, you could pretend to be a youtube influencer and you really do only need a phone for that if you had a Sketch thing or you know lots of people we mentioned before like staged or jonnie or something He's just shooting two sides of a conversation and it's both him and I see I watch those on instagram So, you know, so the possibilities are there But I think still if you if you have limited time and energy right a script I still I stand by it until the penultimate episode and I reserve the right to change my mind in episode 222 Yeah, I mean that's interesting. I've kind of uh because I suppose what when I was pro youtube I was it was more that I've always been pro the principle of DIY which goes all the way back to my Teenage punk years when the means of production were not available In some cases with very kept out of the hands the means of production because that's just it's right. Yeah. Yeah, I was just watching alan parker.
Yes, so Yeah, there's a video I watched about the tunnel club and he was he was on Doing being that uh, I'm a memory being that character. I heard it. Warrior wasn't it? Yeah.
Yeah, but it was um it was That's that ethos. I've always been a fan of it and I've Subsequently become a fan through ending up writing books and self publishing and things but actually the more time that I spend in the World of self publishing the more I I'm coming back to what you're saying. I'm actually thinking There are so many really crap books out there, you know, uh, it's fantastic that there are no gatekeepers and anyone can go out there and write their book But actually I want more gatekeepers, please Yeah Because gatekeepers are all keeping the gates to influence and pr and there's a machine that's going yeah, you mean that there are fantastic Um, podcasts and books out there about making making the perfect to book cover and making sure your book cover is right for the algorithms of amazon So people will buy your book and uh, you know, and how to market it and how to market for you know, write four books first so that you can package it and things And I just want to get no, no just write one good book first and then worry about the bloody cover and then all that so um, but I feel I am Definitely swimming against the tide there and having always been the sort of yeah diy punk, you know, make your own records, etc Um, so so yeah, so I'm a little bit kind of uh, torn about that now, but you know It's the hypocritical of me. I suppose really.
Yeah, yeah. Um, I'd be yes. I think there's a um There's a whole load of thoughts about why you'd make your own stuff as well. I think there are some good reasons to do it um, but also There's that thing of if you want the thing you're making to be a thing in its own right the thing that publishing houses give you and the things that um, uh, that You know, I just went to see big expectations last night All right, and mark didn't put that on at the Edinburgh Fringe and try to get it into a bigger and bigger space Year after year to eventually end up at the west end he eventually he went from It being a potential west end show based on a radio show to there and actually Once you once you're using other people's networks suddenly you just get a lot more scale a lot more quickly So in a way it feels like you can do something yourself But the numbers are always going to be probably very very small now.
That's fine if you want control you're doing it for fun Uh, and you've tried the gatekeepers and they will said no, but there is a lot to be said for Publishing something uh for trying to make a sitcom that costs a million pounds to make rather than one that costs a thousand pounds to make Uh, and yeah, so I but in a way, I don't think you need to choose I think you can do both and you probably should do both and I'm currently working on a bunch of ideas One of which is look I'm just still poised to do an 833 watershed mainstream sitcom Which apparently they say they really really do want so I should totally do that But also I should be noodling with some other ideas that either I personally can do or can turn into some kind of regular blog audio thing I've got a character idea for something like that and actually here's the other big difference therefore is also the rise in podcasting and audio Which has to some extent undermine the radio for comedy narrative World which isn't quite what it was and so I'm now thinking I've got this idea for a character and it would be good to get it on radio For it feels like a really full idea, but um, what am I getting out of that? Um, that's just that's not going anywhere. Is it for radio for doesn't feel like a destination in its own right? Maybe like it used to the money's terrible, you know money's really bad Um, and nobody talks about it.
It's not cool. It doesn't get you ways into television necessarily I don't think in the way that it used to so I don't know it feels to me that although it's a great place to start writing one line is for existing shows in terms of You know getting a sitcom on the radio which could transfer to the television I nearly transferred to neither of them worked in the end, but that was before 2015 and even they didn't work either So it wasn't even that great to begin with. Um, so I don't know. How do you feel about that day?
Well, that's interesting about the radio and um, but the um, the phrase that has stuck with me since the vcg conference And I'd never kind of really thought of it this way But it's when Julia McKenzie who's head of vbc sounds or whatever it's called now a comedy Entertainment or whatever and she talks about when she's looking for a show. She says, oh, well, looking for a narrative show She says I'm looking for something that I think can be 18 episodes And I think that's that that's a really interesting that feels to me like we are sort of coming back to her and coming back to your first point about Yeah, write a script and actually yeah write a script and actually be imagining Three series of six of this script. So and that starts to be a little bit more Believable in one, you know when you're writing your pilot and you think oh I want this, you know in my dreams This is 10 series on you know, that's a success thing but actually and then and you get An episode and all that's it or you get a series and that's it or something But actually to think of it in terms of 18 is sort of almost feels like a kind of yeah And that almost that allows you to you know, you still have to reset 17 times But it does allow you to kind of acknowledge some sort of arc and that's so yeah So the yes, yeah, yeah And I think to argue against myself as well the numbers just are so wildly different So again, you know, and who wouldn't want a three series on radio for if you if you love writing sitcoms You want to write a sitcom and you offer that on a plate if you didn't take that you'd be an idiot Because it still probably gets half a million listeners Maybe not quite what it used to get I don't know what to get at 630 But they tend not to do the sitcoms in those in that slot As opposed to if you have if you have a podcast that does really really well And I'm gonna say it like this one this podcast does pretty well. How many listens do we get?
4000 5000 over the course of a month or two after an episode is released Yeah, I mean that puts it in the top 5% of all podcasts, you know, most podcasts get fewer than 100 And then it gets you know, so You know, I think although I'm although it's annoying to kind of have to jump through hoops for something that doesn't seem as significant as a BBC One half-ass sitcom actually a radio for sitcom. It's still a really big deal But again, the money's not great. So don't do it for that But it's a good way of getting experience working with people being a professional. It's a good calling card It's much better to have You could email somebody a link to something that's on BBC sounds or iPlayer rather than something that's on YouTube or Apple podcasts So so that you know, so doing I don't know is it I mean it was until recently very very competitive as well radio for in a way that I didn't I didn't think it was when I first started out But I don't know is the is the gravity sort of shifting is central gravity shifting away from radio for comedy But going into more independent stuff Well independent is still I think it's still the same that it's something like 20% of all comedy shows have to be made by Independent I mean as in like the rest is history podcast it's just off.
It's completely nothing to do. I like seeing the air So well, yes, what podcasts obviously are kind of you know, they are they've always been I mean, I remember I made a Radio for documentary in 2006 that was podcast of the week So the word was actually around even in 2006 so again as as is often the case the BBC were there first But you know events over took them. Yeah, but I think what's interesting and this is also applying with radio And I'm just I hadn't thought about this until Just now and I've been kind of computing in my head the names of the shows that you mentioned at the start there So you mentioned the shows that are about to end Which are things like episodes and your own show blue stone for to but then you said and this year we had car share chewing gum and the catastrophe and all Right to perform the shows. Yes.
Yeah, and even at that point I think we were saying This is not a great time to be a writer because it's all it's all right to performers um and actually If there's a slight change that I've started to notice a little bit now in not not a huge one But in sort of terms of radio stuff that's on the radio that there are I'm not so Convinced that they're always just looking for right to performance now I think they have come back to having kind of almost neglected to the point of complete indifference the comedy writer And I mean it was a it was a very very bad time for topical comedy for a long time and you know the um the writers guild Were we were quite annoyed with radio for because they always used to have open door shows And they sort of gradually cut down and even up to the point just before covid I think they didn't uh when we're never newsjack finished So they had this period of about a year and a half where they didn't actually have any shows at all BBC in-house shows that were for new writers and they They now come back with that. So you've got the shows we've got from radio scotland BBC radio scotland you've got breaking the news and you've got the independent show you've got the skewer And now they've got their own show as well dms are open So which which does happen to have a like a performing element in it as well But I mean these are writer driven shows plus build-air's sketch show, please use other door So there is more of a kind of uh acknowledgement of writers. I think no And I think that's partly the BBC writers room did a lot of work Not not just with drama and comedy drama, but comedy in its own right and it feels like they have now handed that over to BBC comedy And The last conference they did which I didn't go to in Cardiff But it sounds like there's an awareness there are lots of people who are very talented writers or potentially very talented writers And they're just gonna write and they're not gonna be in stuff and um, but I think also particularly There's an awareness that for diversity of voices as well They can't just be as writer performer driven because that is again cutting down your options So there is a greater emphasis and desire for more voices uh more different perspectives on things So, uh, so yeah, it's it's more to be it hasn't it? And uh, and that's probably for the better And I think just to go back and I'll be really interested to hear what comments people have got on this before we talk about stuff that's stayed the same But because because everything has changed and changed back again, it still feels like although there is a desire for mainstream comedy Maybe even a studio comedy You you can't do anything that feels like the last 10 15 years hasn't happened Um, if you watch Frasier from the 90s where you just go well, this is a 90s show Whereas if you made a new show and it's basically just like Frasier, you know, I wish Then people just go oh, it feels a bit this feels a bit dated this feels a bit So I don't quite know what and what the modern sensibility kind of looks like in a mainstream comedy context because obviously You know, not going out still going but one wonders for how much longer that's going to go But what could a new studio sitcom be?
Um for the mainstream studio sitcom, I guess it was Kate and Coji on ITV as well But again that felt like quite a bit of a throwback in some ways, didn't it? Well, I I still have this idea and I didn't quite get around to uh pitching it to a comedian who I thought would be very good at it the other day but um I still think that there is a way to do audience sitcom Which which is that you do it sort of like live at the Apollo Or or like how Stuart Lee did his show in a pub Um, which is that you have a comedian being a comedian, but you have actors and so you it's like you kind of create a something That's a stage show and okay. It's not a real sitcoms Setting, you know, it's not there's no sofa or there might be a sofa But there's you know, we know we know that we're in a theater and we know there's an audience there but that feels to me like a kind of and and It's a sort of the best the best of audience sitcom, which is great actors who are you know, great versus actors, you know, you sort of you're Tony Gardner type people plus a like a Lee Mac or you know, al Murray or someone who Can't necessarily act but can command that audience And then you have the kind of techniques that they have now that that I don't know if you've ever been to see like a national theater Play at the cinema. Oh, yeah, which we've been to a couple of those and they're quite extraordinary You go and you're watching a live show from the national theater, but you're you're in your local cinema watching it and um You know the technology the cameras and everything it's just really you're not And you can see the audience and you can you know, it's obviously a stage But you know, we don't mind that now we don't mind the laughter as well whereas a sitcom a new sitcom I think we don't you know with a sofa in one corner and a coffee shop in the other corner and you know and Kid the kind of kids who were in my family, you know, that's sort of yeah, I don't mean my family.
I mean my family. Um God, it doesn't it's not gonna. Thank you for clarifying. Yeah But you're thinking so you're saying I don't know that if you just filmed it really tried like that I don't know if you then broadcast it.
I think people would if it was funny. I think just people would like it They wouldn't care exactly but I but maybe they would I don't know but it wasn't funny They'd hate it because then they always did that with the audience that comes anyway I mean remember what Daniel Peake went through with big top. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. He talked about it Yeah, he said he was basically a war criminal, you know for about two months. Yeah.
Yeah, you know, so That kind of comes with the territory with with comedy. Doesn't it anyway? Yeah, yeah Any any comments about have you got any of the big changes since 2015 Dave? We've been through this all week.
I think that's kind of I mean I was going to say, you know, in a sense that one of the big changes is the fact that there are fewer audience shows. Um, but then again coming back to that list that you said at the beginning one show that you didn't mention that was the most popular show in 2015 and it's still the most popular show Mrs. Brown's Boys. Okay.
Yeah, the elephant in the room. So yeah, So big shout everybody for every Mrs. Brown's Boys fan who is listening to us now. Yeah, and the microphones of State Mute.
There you go. But you know, people still love it. And you know, that's a kind of it's still going and saying not going out is still going out as we say for how long who knows and maybe upstart Crow. I don't know if that's still going to be going or or whatever.
But I mean, you know, they keep saying that those commissioning editors, they keep saying, yes, we want audience sick call, but you're not writing them. Yeah, and we're saying you're not we're not writing them because you're not making them. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. I love this. Yeah. I just love everybody to send an audience sitcom.
The next time there's a there's a open door thing from BBC comedy, everybody has to send an audience sitcom. Yeah, I mean, I've been being 100% honest, I think, which is probably unwise, but I'm going to do anyway. Bye bye. When people say though, but we're not writing them, they're so hard to write.
And when you do write them, the possibilities of success seem so incredibly small. And yet you do have to invest literally weeks and months of your life trying to work out this incredibly difficult beast, which also has to be, you know, mainstream and representative and funny. And who's your slam dunk casting potential? There's no point in having your main character being someone who's incredibly difficult to cast in a way that's just going to make it a complete no brainer.
And so unless you've got all those things lined up, it's it does feel like a bit of a waste of time because you can already predict why they're going to say no to it. And because just saying yes to anything feels incredibly risky. So yeah, I don't know, the longer I've done this, this job as it were, the harder I know it must be for them to greenlight something. So when they say, well, why don't you just write more studio sitcoms?
It's like, yeah, but I know how high the bar is and how narrow, you know, it's like Indiana Jones and the things coming down and his hats on the other side. And it's a pretty close run thing to get anything on. If you're just a writer, now if you're if Sarah Milligan wanted to do a BBC one studio sitcom, I'm sure she could. And that would be that would just happen.
But short of that. So yeah, I've got a couple of really strong ideas, I think at the moment, but I'm already being told unless it has this, this, this, this, and this, they're not even going to take it seriously. And I would happily push back on three of them, but I'm not going to push back on six of them. And suddenly, the idea is already in danger of being something that I now don't want to write.
So yeah, it is very, very tricky. On the chat in the comments from folks who are joining us live, as it were, we've had a question about AI, which I think is a really good one. We should probably get to that as it turns out, what's changed. So I don't think AI has changed anything up until this point.
And I think in terms of proper comedy, I don't think it's going to change anything, particularly soon. But there are things where you think, wow, I think a robot could have written that, you know, in terms of, there are certain kind of procedural, you know, could a bot write NCIS, you know what I mean? It's like, because it's, there's not so much data to go on. There's NCIS, Los Angeles, NCIS, Orlando or something.
There's like, it could certainly write your draft or two before you then had to kind of go in after it. But I don't know, I don't, I don't, I don't fundamentally believe that AI can write actual, even serviceable jokes, but others might take a different view on that. I do like the idea that we can, that the word bot has come back in, which is great for pure alcovity writers. So this bot, just interrupting my own podcast to tell you that this may be our penultimate episode of sitcom geeks episode two, one, one, but there remains a huge backlog of episodes that you can go back and listen to.
And just for the rest of this year, we'll see how it goes. We're going to keep the Patreon open. And if you go and open up our Patreon page, you'll see that there's a big back catalog of audio stuff that was only for patreon's and will only staple patreon. So go and have a look at that.
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So I'm going to go back to the show. Before we, maybe I was listening to a thing about AI. And I have used chat to DPT much to my horror. It was incredibly helpful.
It's really, really, really useful if you say, okay, I've written this pilot script. It's about a man who's, he can't come to terms with the fact that he's lost his job and then suddenly this thing's happened and then this happens, this happens. And make that, put all that information into 25 words, please, and really sell the idea to me in 25 words. And it comes back with, and you go, 10, here's 10 versions of it.
And this was just for something for a book thing that I was just entering. I was like, push for time. I needed the 20 word praise to my novel. I said, this, this, this.
And it went, and I had 10 ideas. I mean, I didn't use it, but there were like two or three things in the 10 ideas. I'll have a bit of that. So it's incredibly useful from that point of view.
I think, and in terms of comedy, it's that the joke, it doesn't quite, even now, and probably for a good few years, it doesn't really understand jokes. And I think that's, so it should work in commissioning then. Thank you. Yeah.
So, so it'll be writing the kind of shows that they love at the Guardian. Yeah. It's such a funny sitcom that's, you know, because who needs jokes in a sitcom. But yes, it doesn't, it doesn't quite get the kind of the, the element of surprise or the removal, the momentary removal of sympathy, as Dennis Norton defines the joke.
So, so I think we're, we're kind of, from that point of view, AI is a little bit away from being, being used in comedy. But I think there are, there are much bigger threats than AI at the moment. And, you know, the kind of, I suppose what's going to happen to the BBC is a really important thing in Britain, really. The BBC collapses then, you know, so much, so much stuff that's out there at the sort of starting out level disappears.
Yeah. But, yeah, I think there's another, just just on what we were talking about, about the audience sitcom and not writing them, I've got a comment from, from Ellie saying, and then the Haywood saying, we should just, why don't we just write them anyway, just to show people what we can do? Do you think there's something in that? Yeah, definitely.
So, it's definitely worth writing one, especially if you've got a show that really does feel like a panel should be a sitcom. So, and again, you will, I think it might get further because of its format and because, you know, so I wouldn't shy away from it just because I think that it is such a, it is such a high bar to get over or a low bar to get under, you know, however you want to phrase it. I think also, particularly if, if you want to write a studio sitcom, the thing is, you know, write one if you actually want to write a series, but, you know, I'm very conscious of just knowing, I'm trying to finesse for me, and one of the reasons I'm stopping doing this podcast is I'd like to spend more time writing and coming up with shows and all that kind of stuff. I need to work out what ideas can I write, do I want to write, what ideas do they want me to write?
There's no point in me writing an idea, trying to pitch an idea that they would have no interest in someone like me writing. So, it has to be organic, if that makes sense. It's not all just about voice, it is also about interest and skills and aptitude. And I should lean heavily on the fact that, you know, although I'm a, you know, I'm a Southern white male, I live in the country and I'm from an agricultural background and I've got loads of passions about church stuff as well as countryside stuff.
I'm also obsessed with World War II and I had a radio foresick on Call of 33 and maybe I should do more in that area. And so, it's just a question of, rather than thinking what's the kind of show that can get on, it's like, what kind of show could I really do well and put myself, make myself stand out as a writer for this sort of thing, even if I'm probably going to be discounted for other kinds of things. That's just not much pointing me pitching. It's not going to be pitching a show to BBC3 now.
It's not, it's not for people like me to either watch or to write for. So, I think it's just knowing yourself, knowing your audience, knowing what, you know, what they're hoping you're going to do. Obviously, I've got a track record now, which I can't get away from even if I wanted to as well. You know, that's the other thing.
It's, it's all kind of baked in. So, I think it's a question of leaning into that. So, if you love Studio sitcom, when you want to write one, then write one. I think you should.
I think there's something as well in what you've just been saying about your personal career and your personal hopes, James. I think this is something that hasn't necessarily changed, but I think I've become a bit more clear about which is about networking. I think it has changed a little bit since COVID that I do sense now that even though they might be taking less stuff, BBC, that they are at least interested to hear what people want to do. And the fact that there is now the show DMs are open, which is a new show, which is not, it's not a topical show, it's an open door show and it is a mixture of sketches and people recording their own little bits.
So, there is now a kind of a connection, a two-way connection that hadn't been there for a while. And I do think that what you just said was really interesting about, well, there's no point of writing this, but I think when you're starting out, it's really good to get to know these younger radio producers who are looking for you, and I think I have mentioned this a lot over the years, but I think even more so now what I would do is even if you haven't got a script yet, you know, you're starting out and you've written stuff or you're interested in stuff, is to get hold of the producers of the shows that you like and you and just go to them and say that I'm starting out as a comedy writer. I don't, you know, just educate me, tell me what the how the process is and tell me. And they might say, well, you know, we're looking for a vehicle for, I don't know, whoever the latest comedian is, or Daniel's lost or something, God, I'll show my age.
He was the young happening thing, he's probably about 96 now, but they, you know, not necessarily that kind of thing, but just to say, well, just to get a snapshot from a producer, well, at the moment the department's making this with that person and they're making that with this and, you know, they've been, they've been looking for a show to replace just a minute or something, or they've been thinking about, you know, which obviously they're not, but, you know, so just to learn more about the profession, that's the first thing. And then the second thing, again, off the back of what you were saying, where you're talking about your passions, your specific interests, and it is important to kind of go with your obsessions and, you know, to think, not, you know, I hate that word, passionate, what are you passionate about? Well, if you've got to be more than that, you've got to be obsessed with it, you know, you've got to be seeing this thing from every angle and thinking, oh, you know, and I'm no one else, no one else is seeing it like this. I genuinely can't imagine, I know a lot of, I know a lot of comedy people in the Christian space, James, but I can't think of anyone, there's a few, but I can't think of any do what you could bring, yeah, although also you've got to be realistic and read the room as well, because I did have a producer say to me, you know, his parents live in the countryside and they, their church go as well.
And there's nothing for them. And is there, is there a church based sitcom? And obviously I'd be in a prime position to do it. And I just said, no, I don't think there is, I think if you pitch that, I think they would just go, but nobody goes to church, who would watch this?
This is a completely alien world. And so, I did always attempts to do it. Yeah, and I, you know, so there's no point trying to do Dibley again, because that ship sailed and Dibley was a bygone world, even when it started, there was a lot of nostalgia. Obviously there was a difference because they just started to attain women as priests.
But now if I wanted to try and do that, I'd have to think of a much smarter, more interesting way into, into that world, rather than just, I know how to do this, and I'm really passionate about it. That's still not enough. You do have to meet them halfway. You do have to preempt what the question will be, which is, I don't go to church, and I don't know anybody goes to church apart from my crazy aunt Debbie.
Okay, and there aren't enough crazy aunt Debbie's to watch this show. So just think, well, what, what's to one side of that thing, so that you can still write about that thing, but in an interesting way? And I, you know, I've got a project I'm still really excited about, and it's not, it doesn't look like it's happening, but a production company been pushing it really hard, which has a church-related thing, but also has a supernatural element too, and I'm really excited about it. So I just thought, oh, that feels like much more of the moment given that we live in a world where stranger things is an absolutely huge thing.
So an idea that's, that's kind of religious and supernatural and funny, well, that could be a way of doing it, but just trying to go, it's just a sitcom set in a, you know, rural church of England church. And you can say, look, more people go to church on a Sunday morning than go to football matches. You know, true fact. No one cares.
No one cares that that's true, and it's not going to get you anywhere. You know, there may be a particular window in the world about, you know, there was one of pilot on Dave, I think, which was a more Pentecostal kind of Nigerian style church, which kind of was interesting and felt like a window in a world that could have been done. So you have to kind of meet them halfway, think how can I, how can I do a show that I want to do, but in a world that isn't as interested in it as I am? From Marie says, there's a big born again movement in Devon.
So that's not, that's kind of- I'm thrilled to hear that. You're down your way. And she also mentions that everyone else burns. And actually, there's also, I'm thinking about Rev as well.
That was years ago, Dave. Years ago. But, yeah. But you know what I mean, in terms of, I think that was commissioned for a variety of reasons.
And it was a window in a world that was in urban church that we hadn't really seen before. Well, since my pilot that I wrote, The Vicar of Deford in 1993, that was exactly the same story. Oh, okay. ITV pilot that was.
Okay. And then the Vicar of Dibley happened a year later. Oh, wow. It sounds like a Vicar of Deford.
The same time as Father Ted. Okay. Yeah. And in fact, the head of Channel 4 at the time when I had my Vicar of Deford rejected by ITV, I took it to Shameless Cassidy at Channel 4, who said to me, he said, well, actually, I'm not really interested in a sitcom about a Vicar at the moment.
He said, if you could make it about a Catholic priest and you could set it in Ireland, then I might be interested. And I said, I don't think I'm capable of it. I'm not the eye. Yeah.
And I won't be whole one year, two years later. Father Ted. So, yeah. You do need to sort of, you do need to be aware of potential mission creep if you have a passion about something so mariezed on the chat, everybody else, everyone else burns, which is not a show I would want to write because it's fundamentally basically saying this is a religious thing that is ultimately controlling and the people are mad and they're hateful because they want people else to burn.
And anyone, anyone who was in their right mind would want to get out of it. And so, you know, I'm not advocating Secretary and Christianity, but that's not a thing that I would personally be interested in writing about in that particular way, but I mean, never say never, but so you just got to be aware that you still need to picture shows that you actually want to write. If you come up with a version of the show that you want to write that you think you can sell and suddenly realize you don't want to write it, that's really unfortunate. I feel a little bit like, you know, towards the end of Spinal Tap when they decide to say, we're on episode 221 of sitcom geeks and, you know, we're going to move, we're going to have a change of direction in what this podcast about.
So, we're now going to be a podcast about pitching your favourite religious, like, I was using it as an example of how you can be passionate about. There's a toxic version of it that you actually don't want to do because it's actually the opposite of what you want to do if you see what I mean. I can think of an idea that I will tell you about it after, but I think that James could write and I couldn't possibly write, but I think James could. But anyway, before we finish on what stayed the same, I think as we agree, you know, you still need to write the script and that's, as you said, right at the start.
And having been able to pick up credits in 2015 and then not being able to, we are back now to the situation where you can still, you can pick up those BBC credits. They're just not going to get you as far as they would have done 10 or 15 years ago. But it's easy now to make your own stuff and have something else to point to as well. And the thing that you often point out, people still like, Cawadi, people still like to laugh.
They like laughing and they like the telly. And so you're not wasting your time if you want to write comedy for the telly. I still think this is not a minority activity in terms of, you know, you're not trying to do anything particularly obscure here. So although there may be a bit of contraction in the industry over the next five years, I think, particularly in actual fact, comedy might do like this because comedy can and probably should be cheap, drama is expensive.
Whereas once comedy starts getting expensive, it tends to become less funny. That's kind of, that's definitely a power law within movies, the more expensive the movie, the less funny it is. So yeah, it'd be interesting to see what happens as a result of that contraction contracting. Just before we go, if you've got any questions for us, huge crowd.
But this is one interesting thing that you added when we talked about what's the site, what's changed and what's made the same. You had a good question, I thought, for you and for me, which would be, if we were starting out now, what would we do to break into the business? So what would you do, Jane? Yeah, in a way, I don't quite know how to answer my question because like, am I 47 in this thing or am I 23?
If I was starting out now, I guess I went down the radio for route and I went down the Edinburgh Festival route and I don't know whether I would do that now. Maybe I would make my own stuff. Maybe I would probably try to make YouTube stuff and audio stuff might be my way in because obviously I like doing audio and showing my credentials in that way. And also, I would be entering the competitions.
They just weren't anywhere when I started out in the late 90s. So I would be trying to do the writers room. I would be trying to do those other things. But so yeah, in a way, I probably would be going through the recommended routes.
Would I go to study, study, study, study, study, study screenwriting? Would I do a master's? Probably not. I didn't do that because again, there weren't really any screenwriting full courses and I'm fairly happy not to have done that.
I'm not saying that anybody who has this wasted their time on money at all, but I just think that would have worked particularly for me, particularly because sitcom is the main thing I want to do and those things are all a bit broader. But yeah, I don't know what I would have done. Again, Dave, you were starting out a little bit before me or a fair bit before me before I had to. Again, the world was very different again because obviously it was the comedy store players and the live comedy was becoming much more of a thing that had been post working men's clubs and stuff, alternative comedy and then improv and all that kind of stuff was a thing for you, wasn't it?
Yeah, I mean, I was just really lucky that I decided to give up being a journalist and I moved to London just at the time when all the young ones crew were becoming famous and so there was this nascent comedy scene in London in the early 80s and nobody to play it. And so a bunch of us turned up who were kind of okay, but not particularly brilliant, but we learned on the job. So we got good at doing stand up and at that same time we got to know the radio people. So there was this kind of we were able to the weekend go and do gigs and then during the week go into the BBC radio anyone could walk in, really was like that and hang out there and meet producers and come up with ideas and be in the room when someone says, hey, we need a sketch for this or we need a joke.
You know, Andy Hamilton might come in with a thing. So I only want to joke we need for this. So obviously that world has long since vanished, but I think what I would do, I would try and take a long term, a very much a long term approach now. I would say, okay, there are x number of topical comedy shows and I would try each one to see or try my hand.
And there are now certain given good ways, good work practice ways to approach a show which I never had when I was doing week ending and stuff and I didn't get a line on I'd go into a really bad mood I didn't get a sketch on I'd go into a sort of fog and a bad mood and then I wouldn't do any right in the sketches for three weeks I'll show them. That's the real losers in this one. My comedy goal, but you know you say like so breaking the news is like 10 weeks, a 10 week run, three lots of 10 weeks, so you'll say okay runs from whatever February to end of April. Okay, you have to give in jokes on a Tuesday night or a Wednesday morning and a Thursday morning.
So I'm going to really concentrate on my efforts into writing some as many jokes as I can for that show just in that kind of period and anything else will take second place and hope to build something from that and then do a similar thing with the skewer. And meantime, like you say, be mindful of the competitions and be kind of in the background, but above all, I think the thing that I've already mentioned, I would be wanting to get to know radio producers and I'd probably go to comedy gigs and watch comedians and see if I could write jokes for them as well. But I'd take one show at a time. I wouldn't try and do everything at once.
I'd say okay, this year I'm going to spend 10 weeks on these breaking news and then I'm going to go to Edinburgh and I'm going to watch 50 shows and meet as many people as I can in Edinburgh and then I'll come back and maybe do another topical show or write the script. Yeah, and that you sort of highlighted the fact that in a way that it's almost overwhelming the number of things that you could do now to kickstart your writing career, whereas they just weren't these alternative ways in. It didn't seem like 20 years ago. So it makes it sound like therefore I'm saying, oh, it's much easier now to get into it.
But of course, there's now 20 times more people trying to get into it than there were 20 years ago. So it swings around. But I think what you said earlier is really right. And it's something that I still keep needing to remember is the fact that it's a five year plan that you need.
Now, Stalin didn't get many things right, but a five year plan, that's one of his better ones. You can't change everything overnight. I think I do look at some of Stalin's five year plans and I think well, maybe they were not big on laughs. We've got to be honest about that.
Same with Mao as well as Great Leaps Hall. But the problem is the way we experience media and when we experience, oh, there's a new series on what someone I've never heard of and it feels like they've suddenly become famous in the last year. They've suddenly become successful. And we've not seen the fact that they've basically been noodling around for seven, eight, nine years and they've done three different Edinburgh shows, been in two other shows that you've never seen.
And now finally, this is the thing. And then it doesn't even go. It does one series and no one cares. And that's the end of that.
So it just always feels like everyone else is doing better or getting on faster. And you just have to avoid that terrible disease of comparison. It just isn't going to get you anywhere. And I've got to, and I get it too.
It doesn't go away. So I've got to make sure that I don't look around and see, well, how come all these people who are less experienced than me are getting shows on TV that just doesn't get you anywhere. What I need to do is how can I improve my skills as a writer? How can I be the kind of writer that gets offered the kind of work that I would like to do?
And that again requires just thinking, OK, what am I? What am I gifts? What am I skills? What am I opportunities?
What can I do to show that I could do like an adaptation of something or I could do, you know, a TV movie style thing or I could do, you know, so I have to be constantly looking at my portfolio rather than moaning about other people doing this, that, all the other. So yeah, so it's just always thinking long term as well, but just making sure that you're just doing something now, just nudging something along, start something, maybe have another little side project and think about that too, and then see how they play out and then do the next thing and the whole time is getting out there and talking to people because again, the internet gives you the illusion that you can do everything from home. And you just can't, you do need to get out a bit and mingle, darling, mingle. There's nothing like being in a room with people laughing, you know, it's just that's never going to go well, I guess it might go away, I think it did with COVID.
But it's what we have over those boring, old drama people. Yeah, who have a really clear pay structure and just, you know, it's a really clear way of working like kind of stuff. Yeah, who cares. Yeah.
Just to mention with that comparison thing again, and I mean, that certainly did for me in my stand-up days when I'd been going down to eight years and people who'd been going for two or three years suddenly were doing TV shows that I wasn't being asked to do. But the person you have to compare yourself with is the person you were a year ago. And then, and then, and then if you're, if you're a worse writer than you were a year ago, then maybe that's, you know, you got a problem. But generally, you're probably a year better, you know, and so next year maybe you'll be a bit better as well.
So, yeah. So what I think we should do is we're going to wrap up the main podcast and we're going to keep talking over on patreon's. So if you want to listen to the rest of it, then you can do that by joining us on patreon. So why don't we do that?
So thanks very much for listening to the podcast. I'll be one more episode next week. You can send us an email, sitcomgeexagmail.com about your favorite or least favorite last ever episode. And we'll be talking about that next time.
So thanks very much for listening and cheer up. Thank you very much.