Adventures in the Screen Trade, by William Goldman

I first read Adventures in the Screen Trade (1983) and its sequel, Which Lie Did I Tell? (2000), around the time I went freelance in 2002, on the recommendation of  established writer friends. In those days, I was hungry for advice and hustled round asking questions. One writer recommended the accountant I'm still with, another suggested making a list of all the things I fancied writing so I could gradually tick them off, and someone else prodded me towards Goldman.

I've now been freelance for more than 20 years, bloodied but unbowed. And it's surprising how much that makes a difference to the text here. Goldman is a brilliant writer -- I only meant to check a detail and ended up being drawn in to read the whole thing. Plus I'm a big fan of his movies (here's a young, green me enthusing about The Ghost and the Darkness).

But what strikes me now is how fearsome Goldman is -- confident yes, his enthusiastic stage directions full of what he admits to as "hype" that no director could realise, but also strongly opinionated about other people and their work. It is waspish, gossipy and good fun, but I wouldn't relish working with Goldman. 

I've also got the confidence now to say he's dead wrong about the end of Excalibur (he says Percival not throwing the sword into the lake at the end, as instructed, is a waste of everyone's time rather than a vital part of the legend). He's wrong about the casting of Nanette Newman in The Stepford Wives (far more effective, I think, if the fantasy women are blousy, home-maker, mothering types than the Playboy bunnies Goldman favoured).

"NOBODY KNOWS ANYTHING" he tells us, twice, in capital letters on page 39. But I think I've picked up a few scraps.

The book is full of practical advice that I still find very useful. In sharing his own short story then writing a screen adaptation of it, he asks a series of questions: "What's the story about?", "What's the story really about?", "What about time [ie setting and duration]?", "Who tells the story?", "Where does the story take place?", "What about the characters?" and "What must we cling to?" That all seems obvious, basic stuff -- until he talks through the process of applying them to the story. Following his path, I found myself picking over the paltry bones of an idea I had a while back -- and then filling pages of my notebook with how that might just work. 

That's what I got from Goldman, this time and before when I was starting out: a terrific spur.

Cinema Limbo: Give My Regards to Broad Street

I've once again been a guest on Cinema Limbo, the podcast that picks over odd, old films. In this case, it's Give My Regards to Broad Street, the peculiar musical from Paul McCartney.

Cinema Limbo: Give My Regards to Broad Street (1984)

Previous episodes with me on them:

Cinema Limbo: The Wicker Man (2006)

Cinema Limbo: Smoke (1995)

Cinema Limbo: King Kong (1976)

Cinema Limbo: Ryan's Daughter (1970)

Cinema Limbo: Highlander II - The Quickening (1991)

Blake's 7: No Name preview

The latest edition of the free Big Finish podcast includes a fair bit on my forthcoming Blake's 7 audio story, No Name.

At 39:25 there are interviews with producer Peter Anghelides, me and actor Brian Croucher about the story. Then, at 1:09:53 you can hear the first 15 minutes of No Name. It's the first I've heard of the episode, and I'm thrilled.

No Name will be released later this month as part of the Allies and Enemies set, alongside stories by Lizbeth Myles and Jonathan Morris.

Blake's 7: No Name by Simon Guerrier 

Everyone on Vanstone is hiding something. That’s why they are there. Hiding from her own past, Arlen wonders what has brought Roj Blake to this remote outpost.

Has Arlen uncovered a buried secret? And what does Space Commander Travis want on Vanstone?

Cast:

Sasha Mitchell (Arlen); Brian Croucher (Travis); Victoria Alcock (Mac); Nigel Lindsay (Stor / Lux); Robots (Lisa Bowerman).

Sound design by Naomi Clarke, music by Jamie Robertson, directed by Lisa Bowerman.

Cleaning Up on Free Thinking

Last night, Radio 3's Free Thinking was on the subject of landladies. The guests included magnificent Louise Jameson, and at 13.40 conversation turned to her role as landlady Mrs Pellman in Cleaning Up, the short film written by me and directed by my brother Tom - which is still available to buy from Big Finish. It's a particular honour to be spoken of alongside the great This Sporting Life (1963), a film that's been much on my mind lately. 

Thanks to presenter Matthew Sweet and producer Torquil MacLeod.

WGGB First Novel Award shortlist

The Writers' Guild of Great Britain has announced its 2023 awards shortlist, the winners to be announced at a ceremony on 16 January. As chair of the guild's books committee, I've been running the First Novel Award, and our three shortlisted titles are:

An Olive Grove in Ends by Moses McKenzie

Braver by Deborah Jenkins

The Return of Faraz Ali by Aamina Ahmad

Charles Hawtrey 1914-1988 The Man Who Was Private Widdle, by Roger Lewis

Charles Hawtrey of the Carry On films had an alcoholic cat. It was,

“pampered with port-soaked sugar lumps, its bread and butter sprinkled with Cyprus sherry, [and] used to walk into doors and see double when chasing mice.” (pp. 70-71)

This is just one extraordinary, sad and savage anecdote in Roger Lewis's pithy biography. Lewis has been diligent in going through BBC and BFI paperwork and in talking to those who knew Hawtrey in person. As well as the cast and crew of various productions, Lewis spoke to cab drivers, publicans, neighbours, and is good on the gulf between the cheery, cheeky persona captured on film and the angry, lecherous drunk of real life. 

Hawtrey's meanness is quite something:

“Of necessity [Lewis claims] he was frugal, penny-pinching. He maintained his account at the Royal Bank of Scotland (Piccadilly branch), because he believed the Scots would keep a beadier eye on their customers’ shillings. He’d lug bags of carrots from Leeds to Kent, because vegetables were cheaper in Yorkshire. He pilfered toilet rolls from public lavatories — or at least his mother did. She was notorious for wiping out supplies at Pinewood and, when rumbled, tried to flush away the incriminating evidence, which blocked the drains, closing down production on Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. Hawtrey was told that in future his mother would have to be locked in his dressing room.” (p. 72)

That's a fantastic a story but I'm not sure it can be true as Chitty Chitty Bang Bang began filming in June 1967 and Wikipedia claims that Hawtrey's mum Alice died in 1965. Lewis doesn't provide a source.

There's lots on money here. Hawtrey and his costars did not get rich from the Carry On films but producer Peter Rogers did. Instead, Hawtrey converted his house in Kew into bedsits — though implied to Roy Castle while making Carry on Up the Khyber in 1968 that he owned a “block of flats”. But Lewis says this enterprise didn't work out, and Hawtrey ended up being “ripped off” (p. 89). He retired to Deal, got banned from all its pubs and finally collapsed in a hotel doorway.

It's a troubled end to a troubled career. Hawtrey “never mixed with the rich and famous” (p. 12), and yet and some notable early roles. As well as playing several women on stage, he understudied Robert Helpmann as Gremio in Tyrone Guthrie’s production of The Merchant of Venice at the Old Vic, the cast including Roger Livsey as Petruchio and, in a small part, the future novelist Robertson Davies. A couple of years later, Hawtrey was in the cast of New Faces, the show that debuted Eric Maschwitz's hit song, “A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square.”

But Lewis shares excerpts over three pages from polite, curt rejections from the 1940s and 50s. Then, on page 61, he gives a long list of names at the BBC that Hawtrey wrote to in radio and TV, but concludes that these were,

“all radio or television apparatchiks, and not a single one of these names rings any bells with me” (p. 61n).

In fact, the list includes television pioneer Rudolph Cartier, Cecil McGivern (Controller, then Deputy Director of Television) and Shaun Sutton (later Head of Drama). I recognised various jobbing staff directors from the drama department, and Graeme Muir from light entertainment. So Hawtrey wasn't just writing to “everybody at Broadcasting House, from the Director-General to the janitors”; this is evidence of his range and aspirations — a serious, dramatic actor as well as comic foil.

Clips from a Life, by Denis Norden

It's been a busy few months running the First Novel Award for the Writers' Guild of Great Britain - the shortlist to be announced shortly. Now I'm back to reading stuff related to my forthcoming biography of David Whitaker, former chair of the Writers' Guild and first story editor of Doctor Who.

Before that, Whitaker was script editor for Light Entertainment at the BBC, at the same time that Denis Norden and Frank Muir were employed as advisers on comedy. Whitaker then succeeded Norden (and Hazel Adair) as chair of the guild. So I scoured this memoir for any telling detail.

As Norden admits, it's is a rather loose collection of memories, jotted down as they occurred to him and then assembled in rough chronological order. There's a lot on his love of puns and odd turns of phrase, and much of the history is given by anecdote. He doesn't mention Whitaker but provides some fun tales about people in the same orbit - Ted Ray, Eric Maschwitz, Ronnie Waldman, the sitcom Brothers in Law starring Richard Briers and June Barry (Whitaker's first wife), and the early days of the guild.

For example, there's the striking fact that Hazel Adair, co-creator of Compact and Crossroads, who was Norden's co-chair, “at the Guild’s first Awards Dinner opened the dancing with Lew Grade” (p. 281).

Norden's eye for comic detail means there's plenty of vivid, wry observations. I particularly liked this, on the cultures of cinema:

“During the early forties I did some RAF training in Blackpool, where I discovered the cinemas were in the habit of interrupting the main feature sharp at 4 pm every day, regardless of what point in the storyline had been reached, in order to serve afternoon tea. The houselights would go up and trays bearing cups of tea would be passed along the rows. After fifteen minutes, the lights would dim down again, the trays would be passed back and the film wold resume. Anyone unwise enough to be sitting at the end of a row at that point could be left holding stacks of trays and empty cups.” (p. 33)

Countdown to the Moon #771

This afternoon, I had a long chat with Nathan Price on his Countdown to the Moon project, discussing Artemis, the TV coverage of Apollo and then all sorts of other stuff. I've had lots of this kind of thing rumbling through my head for a while, so enjoy my attempts to put it into some kind order...

The things I held up at the beginning are:

The Moon - A celebration of our celestial neighbour (ed. Melanie Vandenbrouck, 2019), which accompanied the National Maritime Museum's exhibition The Moon

Doctor Who: Wicked Sisters (2020), in which Dr Who meets early lunar colonists all making the "great leap" in giving up their Earth citizenship. Oh, and some Sontarans.

Mastodon

I've set up an account on Mastodon, if that might be of interest:

@0tralala on Mastodon

Doctor Who Magazine #584

The new issue of Doctor Who Magazine is, of course, devoted to the return of David Tennant as the Doctor, with plenty of exclusive chatter with the new cast and crew. How lovely to see Scott Handock is script editor on the new series - an age ago, I gave Scott his first writing gig.

Also in the mag is "Factory Records", in which me and Rhys Williams look at the set used in filming the Dalek production line sequence from the end of Episode 4 of The Power of the Daleks (1966), written by David Whitaker. So often in Doctor Who, limited time and money mean what the writer intended must be cut down to something less thrilling, but this is an example of the opposite happening. The CG recreations are by Rhys, Gav Rymill and Anthony Lamb.

There's also a Sufficient Data infographic by me and Ben Morris, this time looking at the Doctor's regenerations. I'd not seen The Power of the Doctor when I wrote the brief, or I'd have squeezed in the regeneration/deregeneration into the Master and back.

Vortex #165

The new issue of Big Finish magazine Vortex includes a feature on the Blake's 7 set Allies and Enemies, which is out next month. I've written No Name, the second of the three one-hour audio stories, and have a few things to say in the mag.

In other news, things are bit busy. I was in London two weekends in a row, most recently to attend the screening of the Doctor Who story The Time Meddler at the BFI, plus various clips from the forthcoming Blu-ray release, which include the documentary I worked on about original story editor David Whitaker. I'm pressing on with research for my book about Whitaker, and my other book about one of the Doctor Who stories he wrote, and I'm working on another book, and a book award, and various bits of audio drama, spec work and everything else. It is all go.

Doctor Who Magazine #583

The new issue of Doctor Who Magazine is largely devoted to forthcoming TV episode The Power of the Doctor, and features big interviews with stars Jodie Whittaker, Mandip Gill and John Bishop, plus chief writer Chris Chibnall. 

There's also a feature on the sets of Trap of Steel, the second episode of 1965 story Galaxy 4, by me and Rhys Williams, with CGI recreations by Rhys and Gav Rymill. There are some very good puns in the subheadings - "A Scanner in the Works", "Asphalt Jungle", "Rill Met by Moonlight". I didn't write those.

I did write this issue's "Sufficient Data", which marks the centenary of the BBC by looking at every hundredth episode of Doctor Who. As ever, the inforgraphic is by Ben Morris.

The "Coming soon" feature previews the forthcoming Season 2 box set, comprising the 41 episodes originally broadcast 1964-65. That preview begins with Toby Hadoke talking about "Looking for David", the documentary that he fronts and I worked on and appear in. 

An excerpt from the documentary will be shown at the BFI in London on Saturday, 29 October, and I'm hoping to be there to see it. I'm also continuing to research the life of David Whitaker for my biography to be published next year, and this week chatted to the widow of the best man at Whitaker's second wedding. 

The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, by Anne Brontë

It's taken some weeks to get through this 16-hour reading of The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, which I last read while at university a millennium ago. On 10 June 1847, Gilbert Markham writes a long - very long - letter to a friend explaining how he got together with his mrs. She was Mrs Helen Graham when he met her, and it turns out that she and her son were in hiding having fled an alcoholic and violent husband. Gilbert doesn't know this for some time into their acquaintance, and gets increasingly cross and frustrated as he falls in love...

Alex Jennings reads this version, though one long section - when Helen tells her own story - is read by Jenny Agutter. That underlines that this is a woman's story largely told by a man, but written by a woman. There's a lot on gender roles here, and the constrictions imposed by sex, class and power.

What's more, the conceit that this is an account of events that really happened isn't unusual for the time, but in this case it all feels more credible than the better-known and more goth-fantastic works of Bronte's sisters, ie Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights. I'd need to read those again to judge whether it's more disturbing when such wicked men and part of everyday, ordinary life.

This novel builds on Anne's Agnes Grey, in which there was also a lot on the awful trap of making a bad marriage. Here, Helen is motivated to escape not by the threat to herself but to the lasting impact of her husband's behaviour on her son. He wants the boy to follow his example, and had him drinking wine and joining in the parties. In that way, it's about not bad individuals but a culture. How strange to be immersed in this as revelations came out about our now former Prime Minister partying through a crisis, "entitled" to do so by culture in which he grew up.

Blake's 7: No Name cover and blurb

Big Finish have released the cover and blurb for Allies and Enemies, the trilogy of Blake's 7 audio plays out this December that includes my story, No Name:

From the start of the rebellion to its brutal conclusion, Arlen has hunted for Roj Blake.

Cally fights beside her. Jenna Stannis works for her. Space Commander Travis is her mentor. As she plays each side off against the other, how will Arlen decide who are allies and who are enemies?

Saurian Major by Lizbeth Myles 

Saurian Major is a key Federation communications hub. Federation Officer Arlen undertakes an undercover mission to destroy the rebel factions that threaten it. The last person she expects to find is an Auron outcast among the humans. Will the mysterious Cally disrupt her plan?

No Name by Simon Guerrier 

Everyone on Vanstone is hiding something. That’s why they are there. Hiding from her own past, Arlen wonders what has brought Roj Blake to this remote outpost. Has Arlen uncovered a buried secret? And what does Space Commander Travis want on Vanstone?

Sedition by Jonathan Morris 

Jenna Stannis knows that smuggling guns will help free Solta-Minor from the Federation. And she suspects that’s not the only reason why Arlen wants her help. But Jenna doesn’t know who else is on the planet. How can Travis have survived Star One?

The cast includes Sasha Mitchell reprising her role as Arlen from the final TV episode of Blake's 7. The director is Lisa Bowerman. Produced and script edited by Peter Anghelides. Cover art by Mark Plastow. 

Doctor Who Magazine #582

The new issue of Doctor Who Magazine features Sacha Dhawan on the cover as the Master, part of the 20-page preview of next month's epic TV episode. To tie in with that, this month's Sufficient Data infographic is devoted to the Master's TARDIS. As ever, it's written by me and illustrated by Ben Morris.

On page 11 of the mag, m'colleague Paul Kirkley recalls queuing for Tom Baker's autograph at the Friar Street Bookshop in Reading back in 1997. I was there, too - and here is a photograph of me with both Tom and hair.

Tom and me, 1997

At the time, I'd just started my MA in science-fiction and had lofty hopes of writing things relating to Doctor Who. I'm now producing two Doctor Who audio plays starring Tom. Blimey.

Doctor Who Magazine #581

Bit late on this as I've been away, but the new issue of Doctor Who Magazine boasts an extraordinary cover by Oliver Arkinstall-Jones, and a lovely tribute to Bernard Cribbins by Russell T Davies. How lovely, too, to see my former colleague Mark Wyman back in the pages of DWM.

There are a couple of things in this issue by me, too. First, me and Rhys Williams detail the studio sets used for Episodes 1 and 2 of The Abominable Snowmen, recorded on 15 and 16 September 1967 - the latter the day on which my mum and dad got married. Rhys and Iz Skinner have then recreated this set-up in CGI. Truly, the set designers made those old TV studios bigger on the inside.

Then, to accompany the series of articles by Lucas Testro on writer Donald Cotton, including his original, hand-written drafts for 1965 story The Myth Makers, my latest "Insufficient Data" infographic is the Trojan horse as designed by the First Doctor. Ben Morris' illustration, of an outline scratched into an ostracon, is a delight - and more real history than myth.

LokI: A Bad God's Guide 1 and 2, by Louie Stowell

A couple of long car journeys have been greatly aided by this pair of excellent books written by Louie Stowell and read by Ben Willbond. The Norse god of chaos, Loki, is in trouble for playing yet another prank on Sif - this time cutting off all of her hair. As punishment, Odin (or "poo-poo head" as Loki calls him) exiles Loki to Earth, in the puny body of a schoolboy. Worse, Loki must go to human school with oh-so-perfect (but dim) brother Thor, with other gods pretending to be their human parents. And then there's some bother with Frost Giants.

They're two fun adventures full of good jokes - not least where the diary Loki is keeping responds to any dishonesty in his account. There's also lots of comedy at the expense of our mundane, human world as seen by immortal gods. Loki, for example, is astonished by our "crime scenes" full of stolen loot - or, as we know them, "museums".

But there's something deeper here, in a story about a boy who wants to be good but doesn't always think about other people or consequences of actions. In the first book, there's a moral dilemma in his being able to raise a huge sum of money for charity - but only by humiliating his timid friend. The Lord of Chaos wanted to talk about that afterwards, and other bits of the story.

The second book gets into the matter of who tells heroes' stories, and which heroes are left out of these narratives. I'd very much like to see the hinted-at exploration of Cif's previously untold adventures. There's also something on the complex, tricky emotions of friendship that my children found very relatable.

Ben Willbond is a perfect narrator for this, and as well as him doing the different voices (I think there's something of Timothy West in his Odin), sound effects nicely underline some of the jokes - ie when some animal does a poo. All in all, a really good production and a good escape from the traffic.

Here lies David Whitaker

Today, Matthew Sweet and I journeyed out to Chiswick to find the grave of David Whitaker (1928-80), original story editor of Doctor Who and the subject of the book I'm currently writing. It's taken me some time to track down the location of the grave and I wanted to pay my respects.

Having researched David's life for so long, it was oddly emotional to actually find and stand with him. And it was a far grander grave than I'd expected, with an aptly book-shaped headstone. Matthew, who has done this sort of thing before, was ready with a bottle of water and a sponge.

Afterwards, we took the bus up to Hammersmith Bridge, on the way Matthew pointing out the house where Jon Pertwee used to live. We crossed the river -- over the spot where the TARDIS lands in The Dalek Invasion of Earth -- and went for a pint in the pub opposite Riverside Studios, where Doctor Who used to be recorded. There's a blue plaque to Verity Lambert, original producer and David Whitaker's boss. What wonders they created together. We raised a glass to them, just as the storm broke.

Before

Cleaning

David Whitaker's grave

Verity Lambert's blue plaque

Chris Chapman and Toby Hadoke's documentary Looking for David - on which I was researcher - will be included in the forthcoming Doctor Who Season 2 Blu-ray set, announced yesterday. Details of my biography of David Whitaker will be shared in due course, but yesterday Obverse Books announced that my book on The Edge of Destruction, the two-part Doctor Who story from 1964 by Whitaker, will be published in October 2023.

Doctor Who: Season 2 Blu-ray

Yesterday at 3 pm the masters announced that the next Doctor Who Blu-ray set will be Season 2, the 39 episodes originally broadcast between 31 October 1964 and 24 July 1965. The trailer, below, includes a brief clip of me in what the official blurb refers to as,

"a deep dive into the life and career of story editor David Whitaker in LOOKING FOR DAVID."

Doctor Who Magazine special edition - Guest Stars

The new special edition of Doctor Who Magazine is devoted to the subject of guest stars in the series. I've written the entries on:

• Jean Marsh (Sara Kingdom, The Daleks’ Master Plan)
• Mary Peach (Astrid Ferrier, The Enemy of the World)
• David Troughton (King Peladon, The Curse of Peladon)
• Peter Miles (Nyder, Genesis of the Daleks)
• Simon Rouse (Hindle, Kinda)
• Pauline Collins (Queen Victoria, Tooth and Claw)
• Georgia Moffett (Jenny, The Doctor’s Daughter)
• Faye Marsay (Shona, Last Christmas)

It was a fun but fiddly assignment, with just 175 words for each one - plus a sentence on other roles they might have played. The sort of thing that flexes the writing muscles.

My copy of the magazine arrived today, and flicking through I was struck by the double-page spread on  the great David Warner, acknowledging his sad death just last month. That's quick work, I thought; his funeral was held on Monday this week. What a funny, kind fellow he was, as well as such a brilliant actor, and how sorely he'll be missed.