So I have to buckle down and write a third draft of Ra-Ra Rasputin (or as I call it Ra-Ra Rasputing). The feedback is positive from the 2nd draft, but the executive felt that it was "unproducable" due to number of characters and sets and massive song and dance numbers. He is correct. So I have to try and rein it in a little whilst not compromising my artistic vision. I hope I can create something so expensive and unfilmable that it actually breaks the BBC. Rupert Murdoch is paying me to do this.
Of course I fear that the sitcom gods who write my life are setting me up for a fall. It's much funnier to make me write three versions of a script before it gets rejected than to just get it halted at the pitch meeting. If they really know what they are doing they will get it to the stage where a pilot episode is filmed and it's all looking great and then to break my heart the DG of the BBC will come round to my house, tell me it's shit and then put the only copy of the tape in a big burning bin. That's what I am expecting. So anything other than that will be a bonus.
My wife thinks I shouldn't be negative about it, but I think I'm just being realistic (maybe not with the DG - it'll probably just be a production assistant who does the burning, or more likely in fact no one will tell me that the show isn't happening, I'll just be left to work that out myself by the fact that it's 2028 and I still haven't heard anything). And it's not going to stop me trying my hardest to write the best possible script (to the budget required). I have just had enough of my babies have their heads stamped in to know that there's no point in thinking anything else will happen.
And if it doesn't end up going ahead then I will try and film it myself using finger puppets and me doing all the voices. Maybe that's the way we should do it anyway.
But that's a long way off as I didn't manage to get any work done today as I was too busy sorting out various bits of admin - paying in the SCOPE collection money, sorting out my receipts for tax, signing and posting off some of my show programmes (offer still available), catching up on the Warming Up podcast, cleaning up cat excrement (not my own cats - I've just got so into it that I go and collect it from neighbouring gardens now). All this stuff needs to be done (maybe not the cat excrement thing, but a man must have a hobby) so it didn't feel like a wasted day and on the plus side I wasn't exhausted from the late night drive back from Birmingham. Hopefully tomorrow I can start working on the script so that there's a chance that I might complete it before the man who commissioned it moves to a different job (which is the main reason that most scripts end up failing to get produced - it happens ALL THE TIME).
It's only a limited window because this week Talking Cock comes to Newcastle on Wednesday, Chorley on Thursday (nearly sold out), Pocklington on Friday, York on Saturday (only 800 tickets remaining), Leeds on Sunday (nearly sold out) and Harrogate on Monday. Tell your friends in the area. All details
here.
