Thursday, December 23, 2004
They stole my idea.
I'm not sure if I mentioned it on the blog or not but a friend and I had an idea. We'd write a sit-com based around the local music scene. It was a great idea. Aspects of some of you reading this would probably have been incorporated in the show somewhere. It was all very funny... to us at least.
Seems Channel 4 beat us too it ('cause it was a really original idea and has never been done before... er anyway). Their two part drama The Last Chancers started last night. It starred and was co-written by Adam from the excellent Adam and Joe show. Highlights of the Adam and Joe show include the time they went into a shop with the sign "breakages must be payed for" and started trying to break stuff to the value of their budget for that weeks show. Or their cuddly toy recreations of famous films and tv shows. Ali McBear was great and I've never seen Titanic but having seen the magnificent Toytanic I know I don't need to.
Anyway, Adam and Joe show was great but some of the stuff Adam (and Joe) have done since has been distinctly dicey. It is definitely a bad idea to give them any kind of budget for their shows.
The Last Chancers was pretty bad in a lot of ways. It seemed like someones idea of what being in a band like that would be like, but by someone who hadn't been in one. Does them being [i]that[/i] bad make it funnier? Still, aside from the fact I was a bit gutted about them stealing my idea and the fact it wasn't very realistic... oh yeah, it's TV not real life. There was a great article in the Guardian about the BBC show Spooks by David Shayler a few months ago. His point dealt with the unreality of MI5, which is basically part of the Civil Service, having huge luxury offices and brand new computers and flashy TFT monitors on every desk. Right, what was I talking about? It was funny in places but had that major flaw you sometimes find with comedy dramas or sit-coms, it felt like you were watching a comedy drama not watching a real situation that happened to be very funny. The Office is probably the perfect example of a totally real comedy. You've got total suspension of disbelief. The reason it's so cringeworthy is because you totally believe in the characters and situation. You don't think "Oh, here's a comedian pretending to be a bad boss" you think "oh god please don't say that to her...". The Last Chancers felt too much like "some actors pretending to be a bad band". There were some funny moments despite that. The show was stolen by the guy playing the press photographer from the local paper who was absolutely spot on.
Ok, I have to mention Spinal Tap, I can't avoid it. That's how you do a band related comedy. So, anyway, our sitcom would have had the realism of The Office and Spinal tap but dealt with the local music scene. It would probably have won many Golden Globes and Emmys and shit. I found out from Ricky Gervais' acceptance speech for the Best Writer award at the National Comedy Awards (along with Stephen Merchant) that writers don't get paid much so maybe I got a lucky escape.
Er... part two of The Last Chancers is on tonight at ten thirty on Channel 4.
Seems Channel 4 beat us too it ('cause it was a really original idea and has never been done before... er anyway). Their two part drama The Last Chancers started last night. It starred and was co-written by Adam from the excellent Adam and Joe show. Highlights of the Adam and Joe show include the time they went into a shop with the sign "breakages must be payed for" and started trying to break stuff to the value of their budget for that weeks show. Or their cuddly toy recreations of famous films and tv shows. Ali McBear was great and I've never seen Titanic but having seen the magnificent Toytanic I know I don't need to.
Anyway, Adam and Joe show was great but some of the stuff Adam (and Joe) have done since has been distinctly dicey. It is definitely a bad idea to give them any kind of budget for their shows.
The Last Chancers was pretty bad in a lot of ways. It seemed like someones idea of what being in a band like that would be like, but by someone who hadn't been in one. Does them being [i]that[/i] bad make it funnier? Still, aside from the fact I was a bit gutted about them stealing my idea and the fact it wasn't very realistic... oh yeah, it's TV not real life. There was a great article in the Guardian about the BBC show Spooks by David Shayler a few months ago. His point dealt with the unreality of MI5, which is basically part of the Civil Service, having huge luxury offices and brand new computers and flashy TFT monitors on every desk. Right, what was I talking about? It was funny in places but had that major flaw you sometimes find with comedy dramas or sit-coms, it felt like you were watching a comedy drama not watching a real situation that happened to be very funny. The Office is probably the perfect example of a totally real comedy. You've got total suspension of disbelief. The reason it's so cringeworthy is because you totally believe in the characters and situation. You don't think "Oh, here's a comedian pretending to be a bad boss" you think "oh god please don't say that to her...". The Last Chancers felt too much like "some actors pretending to be a bad band". There were some funny moments despite that. The show was stolen by the guy playing the press photographer from the local paper who was absolutely spot on.
Ok, I have to mention Spinal Tap, I can't avoid it. That's how you do a band related comedy. So, anyway, our sitcom would have had the realism of The Office and Spinal tap but dealt with the local music scene. It would probably have won many Golden Globes and Emmys and shit. I found out from Ricky Gervais' acceptance speech for the Best Writer award at the National Comedy Awards (along with Stephen Merchant) that writers don't get paid much so maybe I got a lucky escape.
Er... part two of The Last Chancers is on tonight at ten thirty on Channel 4.
# posted by Mike @ 09:07 
