A penny for your thoughts

Number 26 in the LSF session: Another 50 ways to break into the Business was - No money, no work, no £1 options, no deferred fees.

Bernie Corbett, perhaps unsurprisingly given his position at the Writers Guild, was pretty dogmatic about it, stating don't do any work unless you're getting paid. However there was the caveat that there are some grey areas especially when you're starting out. But in general he believes we are talking about a multi million pound industry where people get paid for what they do. He suggests a £1 option shows no serious commitment to the project. Producers will be taking taxis to meet financiers and buying dinners so why can't they pay you? Very occasionally, he has known producers to take an option on a film to stop it getting made, because they have something similar in development. A lot of producers live a fantasy life, hoovering up projects, when they don't have the skills, contacts, or experience to do anything with it. A lot of small budget projects will work on deferments and that means later on, not non existent. Get something in writing what will come back to you if there is a profit. Partnerships are more common. If you trust the producer then fine - but get something on paper. It will save a lot of lawyers fees later on.

Chris Hill suggested that £500 shows a certain level of commitment. He's been in both positions, and the £1 option is often there at the beginning and can be tempting to get the ball rolling.

Martin Gooch asserted that he works for free for himself and his mates - and anyone else has got to pay. Or at least get them to buy you are really nice lunch.

Danny Stack added that producers come to him with no money, but with a one page agreement that if there is to be any development money or other money, you get a slice of it. So there is a bit of a carrot there - they're not just taking advantage.

This is a huge topic and it's important for writers to know their options, know what their strategy is, and how to react in certain situations. I've been on both sides of this coin and there are so many factors to take into consideration. First of all, who are you dealing with? If companies like the BBC, Film4, Working Title, Big Talk, Ruby Films etc, etc, etc were offering £1 options or even a few hundred quid, I would be shocked. For organisations like this, who I'm not saying are awash with money because no one is these days, but nevertheless have a certain size and stature about them, to offer something like this, I'd be amazed and insulted.

So let's leave them aside. I'm talking now about indie producers. Not even necessarily small companies. But just independent producers. Keep in mind that at the first LSWF Tim Bevan said this:

Script development was quite incidental. They just had to get the next film made and were never allowing the development process to take as long as it needs to. An Indie is in the terrible position of having all their money in development, but your income is dependent on getting a film made, because that is where you get your fees from. And because getting the thing on becomes the be all and end all, you forget a little bit about the quality of the thing. Bevan came to the conclusion that you need capital. Because you have to spend money on developing a script and at the end of that process, be able to take a long hard look at it, and if it's not good enough, to chuck it in the bin. And an Indie doesn't have the luxury.

I noted at the time that the vast majority of producers and companies in this country don't either, and I think that I heard from Phil Parker the belief that this was the single biggest reasons most British movies fail. Bevan also said that as a consequence of this, it's vital to have a slate. Because having all your eggs in one basket is dangerous and financially crippling, and you never know which project might be greenlit first. But it can cost thousands and thousands of pounds to develop and package a project, so what indie producers have the luxury of doing that for a slate of films without any going into production yet?

Like I say I've been on both sides. I've been paid a few hundred pounds for work and I also admit I've taken a quid (plus other luxuries like a few meals etc!) And do you know what, in terms of career investment and long term, the quid has been far more fruitful and indeed enjoyable than the short term benefit of the few hundred quid. The difference was one producer had no track record and the other one did. And I think for me this is the defining factor. I'm not belying the significance of a few hundred quid (and if you've seen my bank balance you'll know why.) But it's also not a huge, life changing amount of money. And if you tie yourself and project to a producer, that's it, for whatever the length of time the contract states.

So consider this. No one has any money. The world is broke. Many indie producers are as broke as screenwriters. We bring the script to the table. What do they bring? Do your research on who they are, what they've done, what their reputation is within the industry if you can, and whether you get on with them. If this all looks positive, think about where the - for example - £500 is best spent. If there is a finite amount of money in their account, they could stump it up to pay you, or they could use it, as Bernie says, to take key people out for dinner, or maybe fly to the Berlinale, or to Cannes, etc. (Okay to be fair they can certainly get the train or the bus rather than cabs!) But where is the money best being spent? If it's between a short term payment to you, or an investment into meetings and appointments that could help get your film financed, what's more valuable to your career?

I think a screenwriting career is always about the long game. Don't be exploited. Know your worth. Above all know who you are dealing with. But at the same time, getting on the ladder can be an important first step. And it might be that the quid you take now, can turn into something far greater later on.

If 3 is the new 10, is 90 the new 120?

In the LSWF session Another 50 ways into the Industry, number 21 was listed as make the first 3 pages of your script amazing. The first three! Three?? What happened to the first 10!? Here are the notes I made at the time.

Vadim Jean said it used to be ten. But the slate is big and the spec pile is massive. And what it basically comes down to is do you want to know what happens next and that has to be captured within the first 3 pages. You're competing against everyone else, people who have far more of a track record than you and with scripts and a writer that he knows he can take to a broadcaster and get a commission. So you have to force him to read the whole of your script by having a brilliant opening 3 pages. This is even more the case in TV. In film it's easier to make a feature from a new writer. But the principle about the script remains true.

Martin Gooch added there isn't enough time to read everything. He picks up a script and flips to the back to see how long it is, which is something everyone reading a script does. If it's over 90 pages it's bloody hell. Chris Hill commented that he used to be a script reader and could tell within the first page whether it was going to be good or not.

Many of you would've found out this week whether you'd made it through to the 2nd round of the Red Planet Prize, based on the first 10 pages of your script. The BBC Writersroom still states, "Our readers sift all eligible scripts by reading the first ten pages. If the script shows potential, it will be given a full read. If not, it will be returned to the writer without any comments - this tends to be the case with the majority of unsolicited scripts."

So there is certainly still an industry standard connected to the assessment of the first 10 pages. But equally certain is that if you ask any script reader, they will tell you they know if a script is going to be well written within anything from the first to the third page. That's not to say there are any hidden guarantees that a script will be good from start to finish contained within these opening pages. Scripts can still go off the rails. The Act Two active question might not be quite right. A character's motivation can become wonky. And so on. But from a technical point of view, from how a script looks on the page, it's fairly easy to tell if a writer knows how to write yet or not. (I say 'yet' deliberately. Writing improves the more you do it. We all start somewhere and those first couple of scripts are bound to be a bit ropy.) But a well written opening few pages makes it far more likely, given the choice, that a reader will continue to the end.

And this generally accepted decrease in the assessment criteria may have had a subconscious knock on effect to the length of scripts overall. Because in truth, the shorter the better. There's a natural flow to stories and to tell them well, they have to be a certain length. But scripts need to be as tight as possible and anything extraneous should be cut. Normally, the scripts that can be downloaded online are very often longer than 120 pages, let alone 90. There are a few reasons for this. Firstly, the script available may not be the shooting script or even if it is, once the footage has been through the cutting room, it may just run faster. Modern editing is quicker than it used to be and so films tend to run faster than the script page count anyway. A classic example are the long, talky scripts of Sorkin and Tarantino, where the finished film still then tends to come in at a 'normal' length when finally shown. Also, scripts available online are from films that have been made, from writers and directors who get films made. The bigger names they are, the more liberties they can take which don't apply to the spec pile the rest of us are fighting against.

But if you've been following Script Club this year you might have noticed that even these nominated screenplays are shorter than ever this year. So far, Win Win has been the longest and that was only 120 pages. 50/50 is too, but this wasn't the shooting script, which is much closer to 90 pages. Bridesmaids is 109 pages and Young Adult is an incredible 82 pages. (Interestingly the film is just over 90 minutes so this is a rare example where the finished movie runs a bit longer than the shooting script.) Although unavailable online, I happen to know Midnight in Paris is 90 pages and next up in Script Club, The Descendants, is 115 pages. And that's from Alexander Payne, whose Oscar winning screenplay Sideways was certainly a lot longer than this.) Upcoming scripts include Hugo, which clocks in at 120 pages, despite Scorsese not being known for working with brevity of scripts.

What does this all mean for us, apart from the obvious that our scripts need to be as tight as possible? Do shorter scripts mean a lower budget? Not necessarily. But budgets are largely based on the number of shooting days. So leaving aside factors like special effects, or having lots of scenes but in one location (therefore eliminating the need to travel around with the cast and crew,) a lower scene count means fewer set ups which could - only could - mean fewer shooting days. That will save everyone money.

But I don't think this is the main issue. They are too many variables. More likely it comes down to the human factor. To save money, companies are far less likely to employ external readers these days. Or, like Vadim, the people in charge like to read the material themselves. But even in these troubled economic times, the spec pile is not getting any smaller. It often feels like there are more and more screenwriters each year and - at the moment certainly - less and less money and jobs to go around. Because of cuts or out of choice, fewer people are reading an increasing amount of material. It therefore stands to reason that as far as they are concerned, the shorter the better. Obviously, it simply takes less time to read a script that is 90 pages than one that is 120 pages or more. If you've got a pile to get through in a days work, the shorter the scripts the more chance there is to do that. It's human nature therefore to favour shorter screenplays. And this might translate into getting a better, kinder report that goes to the reader's employers. I know that sounds weird, and it might very well be unfair, but what's better - to take a chance betting against human nature, or to leave as little to chance as possible and keep your script as tight as it can be?

You might be asking well, if there is no money around and no jobs available, what's the point anyway? It's true it's tough. I've heard a lot of people say it's tougher than ever. But stuff is still getting made. So the question needs to be what strategy can I be using to best help myself in the current climate? And I'll try and talk a little more about that next time.

21...

... is not how old I am now, even though I'm writing this in the final few minutes of my birthday. It's how many movies I watched on a recent two week vacation in New York. A combination of planes, cinema trips and dvds accounts for what is probably a personal best.

I also read 5 scripts and one book. It was wonderful.

That's what I do. That's how I like to spend my leisure time. That's why I got into this business in the first place.

I think sometimes that gets forgotten. Maybe not for everyone. Not even for me most of the time. But nevertheless it was just a little reminder.

I think if you don't love it, go and do something else. There are easier ways just to earn money, even in a recession. Because you're gonna need that love when no one returns your calls or replies to your emails, when they pass on what you thought was your best work yet, and generally don't give you the time of day.

I didn't do a yearly round up thing over the holiday period and even now, on my birthday, I'm not really big on looking back over the past year or ahead to the new one. But I just wanted to wish those kind enough to read my blog and everyone who has let me read their scripts this past year a belated Happy New Year.

I hope we all go from strength to strength, personally and professionally, in 2012.

Screenwriting, Networking and Pitching Workshop

Philip Shelley & Phil Gladwin are once again running their intensive two day screenwriting course in London on Feb 4th & 5th, and in Belfast on March 24th & 25th. They are also running a one day 'Pitching' masterclass in London on Saturday March 10th.

You can find all the information about the courses and how to book here:

http://www.screenwritinggoldmine.com/screenwriting-workshops

http://www.screenwritinggoldmine.com/how-to-pitch

Special guests lined up for London include Ben Stoll, Head of Development at C4, and Matt Bouch, Producer of Being Human and The Sarah Jane Adventures.

Special guests lined up for Belfast include Vanessa Haynes, Development Producer at Kudos NI, and Terry Cafolla, lead writer on Law & Order UK.

Script Club 2012

I don't know Stuart Hazeldine. I've met him twice at LSWF and he seems like a nice guy. As is customary at these things when on a panel, you are always asked how did you get started in screenwriting. So I've heard Stuart tell the story a couple of times that he knew he wanted to be a screenwriter, had never seen a script, was at some sci fi convention and found a copy of the Blade Runner shooting script on sale. He bought it, used it as a template, and he was off and running. That was it. From seeing how that one script worked, he launched a career. What if it had not been on sale that day? No idea. I'm sure he would've found another opportunity to find something similar.

From when Stuart was starting out until now, getting hold of scripts has become staggeringly easy. Sometimes you can even read them before the movie has come out. Reading scripts is the surest and cheapest way for screenwriters to improve their writing. Better than any guru lecture or how to book.

So it amazes me that I still meet and work with writers who have never read one. Never. Not even one. I'm not having a go at anyone, I promise. I always make the case to producers about new writers that there was a time that every single screenwriter had never written anything or didn't have a single credit. Everyone started from that point. Even Aaron Sorkin. Similarly, there was a time when none of us had ever seen a screenplay.

That's fine. But that's got to change quickly if you want your career to progress.

It's with that in mind that Dave Melkevik's Script Club is back. Go over to his blog to find out more information and get involved. One script a week. That's maybe 1-2 hours of your time. And it will be a damn sight more useful to you than watching much of the TV that is on at the moment.

LSF 6: Your script and the 20 common pitfalls

The title of this session, the last I attended, was a bit of a misnomer. So much so that in the Q & A that followed one cheeky beggar asked, "so what are the 20 most common pitfalls?" It was pretty funny actually. But in reality what the session did provide was an overview of how your script, and indeed your actions and etiquette, are perceived by people inside the industry, and from that point of view it was invaluable. Moderated by Industrial Scripts supremo, Evan Leighton-Davis, the panel included Danny Stack, Steven Russell, Daniel Martin Eckhart, and Paul Andrew Williams.

What common mistakes did you make sending scripts out early on?

PAW: Sending them out for one, because they weren't very good. Early scripts were written in pen on A4 paper. Probably best not to do that. Didn't read any book on scriptwriting and still hasn't. Had no real idea of what he was doing, but clung onto the idea of 'what happens next,' to just keep driving the story forward. Then he started to get feedback etc and gradually his work improved.

DME: Wrote 7 or 8 specs before getting anything produced. It was a learning experience and even when looking back at them now still quite likes them. Also had no formal training, but just loved movies ever since being a kid and had an instinct for how scripts should feel and look like. One of the big problems he had was with script length - they were always too long.

DS: Every screenwriter that's ever lived makes the same mistakes when starting out. He was writing specs when working as a reader and you see scripts and the mistakes they make and realise omg I do the same thing. You always think your scripts are better and fresher than what's out there but when you read a lot of scripts Danny realised he needed to work harder to be better, more original, more imaginative, etc. If you download scripts online and just read a few a week, that's some of the best education you're ever going to get. Because you'll see mistakes and think okay I'm not going to do that. But equally, you'll see things like stylistic techniques and think that's a great way to do that, and so on. Readers get maligned for supposedly wanting to find things that they can be critical about - but equally we want to find things we love and our passionate about and can push as much as we can.

Any script pet hates?

SR: Intensely dislike camera direction in a script. It's not the writers job. 'Angle on' and the phrase "we see..." pops up a lot and it's a dry way of doing things when what you want is for the script to be emotive. It's a bit lazy and you need to work harder than that.

ELD: All the execs he knows just hate exposition. Telling the story through dialogue or quite transparently telling the story that way. It's the laziest form of screenwriting. That's a very common mistake for new writers.

DME: When you're an experienced writer and have had a few scripts produced, you can take liberties and get away with a lot more. But when you're a newbie starting out you want to do everything you can to avoid everything there is that will stop someone reading your script. Some script you download are from very experienced writers and they will have camera directions and lots of other stuff we're told not to do, all over them. And what's more, it might all work wonderfully. But when you're new - just don't do them.

ELD: Every single reader, the first thing they do is turn to the back page to see how long the script is. And you can make their day a little bit by keeping it as short as possible. Put yourself in their position, they've got a pile of scripts sitting there and they are going to be more disposed to reading the shorter ones first. And script lengths generally are creeping down a little bit. People are aware of that.

DS: Between 90-105 pages is becoming the standard now. It does depend a little bit on genre because horror might be on the shorter side for example. But scripts much longer than this and people will start raising eyebrows. And from a reader point of view, they'll be thinking oh I'm not going to read that one tonight. People talk a lot about the importance of the first 10 pages (or less, like 3 pages, these days) and that's all true. But what can then happen is after that point things start to go off the rails. So much effort has gone into the first 10 pages but then the structure falls away or the characterisation gets a bit wonky. And it should go without saying that as much time, effort and hard work needs to go into the rest of the script as it does with the first ten pages, but sometimes what's on the page doesn't look like it has.

As far as etiquette goes, how important are all the things that go on off page as it were, like making a good impression and getting on with people, etc?

SR: It's hugely important. We spend hours and hours working with writers and the relationship is really important. So if people are being difficult you're going to wonder whether it's worth it. This one writer had sent a script in and then just kept emailing 'have you read my script yet,' over and over again. Until it reached the point where they would just send an email with a question mark. Yeah, don't do that.

PAW: It's always a struggle to get your script read. But when you do pick your battles. Pick what you really care about and choose carefully what you're going to fight for. Is it a deal breaker? But at the same time keep your ego in check.

What are your thoughts on self promotion?

DS: You've got to be yourself but there's no harm in promoting yourself in a positive way that isn't a load of rubbish. Humility and humour go a long way, especially in email. In fact it's surprising how common it is for people who call themselves writers can't actually write a good email or letter. Or you might get what is obviously a generic email, and they've forgotten to put your name on this one so it just reads Dear,. The other thing is constantly asking if you've read the script yet, and then saying if you haven't here's another draft, can you read that one instead. And so begins another cycle of torment.

DME: Producers are human beings too. They want to work with people they get along with. Working on anything from TV to features, it's a long process. You're not talking a couple of months, you're talking a year or two. If you come across as difficult and someone who can't be challenged/argued with (in a constructive way) the producer will think I'll find the next best guy. Maybe it will be someone who is not quite as good a writer as you. But he can get along with him and grab a beer and have a laugh. Don't be a precious artist and think what you've written is just genius and you're doing them a favour even letting them read it. That's really important especially at the beginning. You need to start playing the game.

We're in the social networking age. How important is an online presence and what are the cautionary tales?

DS: The great thing about the internet is that it's ours and we make the content. So you can make yourself out to look really good, but by the same token you can end up looking like a complete idiot. And unfortunately it's very easy to do the latter and not so easy to do the former. So if you're going to have a website maintain it well. If you're going to have a blog have something to say. If you're going to twitter don't slag off people. Facebook is the same. Unless you protect your content it's a public forum. Execs will check out your blog before or after your meeting, so be careful what you say. If you think starting a blog will help you jump the queue in terms of getting work it won't. You can sometimes get work through relationships that have begun through your blog, but it will probably take years. There is still an attitude at the moment that writers don't need any online presence, which is a valid opinion. But that might change. We leave digital footsteps everywhere and the internet is such a part of our lives, that if an exec google you, like we all do, and don't find anything, it can look a bit weird.

DME: Today you can get away with nothing. But in five years time you might not. People need to be able to find you.

LSF 5: In Conversation with Ashley Pharoah

The penultimate session I attended at LSWF was an in depth conversation with Ashley Pharoah, one of the most experienced writers working in British television today. (As ever these are my paraphrased notes.)

How did you get started?

Ashley always wanted to be a writer. He knew nothing about scriptwriting. He listened to Radio 4 plays and wrote a 30 minute play, sent it off to BBC and about 6 months later they got in touch and said they’d like it. He got paid £300 and that changed his life. This was something he enjoyed doing so much and you could get paid to do it. Ashley went to the NFTS, didn’t eat for about 5 years, and then properly started on Eastenders.

How did you get on Eastenders?

A director he was at NFTS was working on the show and said the scripts were awful. But the weird thing was whilst at college the thought of writing for TV, an even more so a soap, was appalling to Ashley. So even though he was on the dole and completely skint, a part of him still thought was it worth the shame? (which he blushes about now.) But he sent in a spec film script which was a good writing sample, and it was good enough to get him an episode, and he ended up being there for 3 years. Film school turned out to be the theory, whereas working on Eastenders was the practical. Hearing actors say your lines – and psychologically, seeing your name on telly, he felt like a real writer.

When you’re creating characters and series bibles etc, what sort of things do you think about?

Ashley doesn’t really do series bibles. They are really hard to write and really hard to read. He’d much rather write – and read for that matter – a script. All the bibles he’s been involved with have been retrospective ones put together by script editors for the purposes of series continuity. He might have done more work on characters etc when starting out, but nowadays he’s likes to discover the characters when writing the screenplay. Does it matter where they went to school or what they had for breakfast? What matters is action. Character is action.

Can you talk us through how the commissioning process might go?

Different ways. You've got to get that first meeting with a commissioner. Ashley met so many people on Eastenders like other writers, producers, script editors, that went onto work on other shows. John Yorke was his junior script editor on Eastenders. Often young writers will show Ashley ideas for a series and it’s not really. It might make a good movie, or three parter, or serial, but it’s not a series. There has to be something in the kernel of the idea that will generate conflict for a long time, so if a commissioner turns round and says okay what might happen in series 7 episode 3, you have some idea of where you can take the series. Something in the one page pitch that tells you there is potential for endless conflict. For example Wild At Heart. A show about an English family in Africa. Company Pictures asked him to come up with a Sunday 8pm ITV show. And he’d done so many he said no. But this was going to be set in Africa. So it was a traditional dysfunctional family, but the environment was new and could exert so much pressure on the characters. And if the original family left, you could bring in a new family into that environment. And they’re just doing series 7 now.

What can writers do to improve their chances of getting a series green lit?

It’s complicated and the worst thing you can do is to try and double guess what they want – which we’ve all done. You obviously need to get your script in front of someone who can green light a series. Ashley's in the fortunate position now of getting those meetings – although even then it doesn’t mean getting the series. With his new show, Eternal Law, about angels being lawyers on earth and learning about humanity etc, it was a bit high concept and he didn’t want to give people the chance to turn it down just from the pitch. So he wrote the pilot on spec and took that to ITV because he wanted to retain control of the content. That’s what got him the meeting and although the pilot script changed a bit, the kernel of the idea was in place.

How specific should you be about talking about things like channels and time slots?

If it’s your own stuff, probably not as much, but certainly have an awareness of the different styles of broadcasters and, really crucially, the difference between 8pm and 9pm slots.

You've done quite a lot of supernatural and high concept stuff, when are we going to see a return to more naturalistic stuff like Our Friends in the North?

Ashley's actually done a fair bit of both. Ever since Cathy Come Home people think television is about social message and political change. And of course it can be. But it's always bothered him that television is seen as social realist and cinema more poetic. It began to change with Dennis Potter. With Life on Mars they tried to have a high concept show that had emotional truth, and hopefully said something, even ironically, about the political situation. Things like Our Friends in the North dominated for around 50 years. So a few high concept shows doesn't hurt.

How does the collaboration with Matthew work?

They're very different people and very different writers. When they were in America pitching to people, Matthew described them that if they were doing an episode of ER, Matthew would do the helicopter crashing on the roof and Ashley would do the old man dying. Matthew is more of a movie writer in that sense and Ashley is more interested in the emotional core. In series television it works really well to bring different strengths to a project. Ashley doesn't think, coming from the more socialist realist background, that he could have done shows like Mars and Ashes without Matthew. But he likes to think they would have been weaker shows without him trying to keep them real in terms of emotional truth. Ashley and Matthew write episodes separately, and they are not joined at the hip. They did try to co-write in the same room once on a project for Aardman but it was a disaster because they are such different writers they kept just trying to rewrite each other. But what it means is that they can go off and do their own thing.

Why do you write on series TV as opposed to feature films?

Because he has a mortgage. Like he said at film school he never would've dreamed of working in TV. But attitudes have changed and a lot of the snobbery has gone, mainly because of US shows. And in any given week 90% of the best writing on screen is on TV. Going to the cinema now, unless you've got your kids with you and you have to put those glasses on, there's nothing to watch. It's become a theme park. You strap yourself in and have an amazing special effects ride, which is okay. But we don't see our life on there. Compare that to going to the movies a lot in his twenties, and something like Chinatown, which was a mainstream Hollywood movie, would that happen now? Having said all that, Ashley does write movies but they never get made. Whereas his TV stuff does and he gets paid and you have a lot more influence, from casting, seeing the edit, the rushes, the music, etc. When working in that environment Ashley sees himself as a writer that's a filmmaker. But in the movie world, he feels like a cleaner again. He's sat in meetings with a production company, the director and him, and the conversation has been about what's going to happen in the next draft, and no one actually looked at him. It baffles him that they are not interested in using his knowledge and experience, and it's his script. And it baffles them that he would want to be involved in the stuff he's involved with in TV, like the edit, casting, rushes etc. In film writers just deliver the script – and maybe they'll get fired and another writer will do the next one. And so on.

How much do the actors contribute to creating the characters?

Obviously they do contribute. And if you're very lucky something magical happens between them getting the script and what they do on screen. When it works well it's really exciting and dynamic. But when it doesn't, it can be quite painful to be a screenwriter.

For long running series is there room for others thing apart from crime, life and death, family, etc?

Well that's not a bad start. The soaps do cover that and the obvious reason is that it gives you natural intensity and conflict. Of course there is room for other areas of story telling. But funnily enough when really powerful writers reach the stage where they can write anything they want, and stray away from genre, it can often not work. Because no one is editing and reigning that in. When Ashley's stepped out of genre in his career he's come a cropper a couple of times. He thinks genre is a help. The example he gives is the sonnet, one of the most rigid forms of writing – but it's produced some of the greatest ever. He likes being told this show is going to be on ITV, 8pm, you've got 44 mins, 3 act breaks. It's a challenge.

But series television is a really hard place to be learning on the job and Ashely has seen writers come unstuck. For example the first series of Life On Mars had gone out and Kudos knew of a playwright they really rated. This writer had never written a TV episode of anything and they wanted them to do one in the second series. Ashley and Matthew hope they are generous people, but realised what massive pressure this person was now under. If someone said to Ashley can you write a play by next month he'd say no, he's never done it, he would need to learn the craft. And it chewed this poor person up and it was unfair.

But on series TV writers are really well paid. Ashley now exec produces most of his shows and sees the budgets, so knows he sees what directors, producers and DP's get and it's not as much as writers. It's really annoying when writers on series television do sloppy work and at some stage you do see it. And he just thinks you lazy bugger. Because it's not just about talent. And the danger is falling into a comfort zone where you make a good living and as long as you don't stick your head above the parapet you're okay. And the other thing is that the quality of directors coming into the TV industry is getting worse. When Ashley started out the director was the most important person but it was generally a good democratic thing. Now writers are the most powerful. They get shows greenlit, actors do to, but directors don't. So the talented ones go and work in movies where they get the reverse of what Ashley gets in that environment. A few years ago the Directors Guild tried to get more power in TV and Ashley could understand why. But in cinema they insisted on retaining the horrible 'A Film By' credit, which is the most disrespectful credit in the history of cinema. And until they say they don't want to do that, why should they have a piece of the TV cake?