Author: piersb

Posted on

A Fairy Tale Christmas

After taking The Just So Stories to the Edinburgh Festival this year, where we made a profit…

(I’ll just let you take a moment to let that sink in. We made a profit. At Edinburgh. Yes, our shows really are that good.)

…I’m pleased to be able to say that tickets are now on sale for the Red Table Christmas show.

We’re working once more with our friends at Pleasance Theatre, and this Christmas we’re bringing the magical fairy tales of Hans Christian Andersen to the theatre.

The show runs from 6 December 2011 to 31 December 2011, and tickets cost £9 for adults and £7 for children.

You can book your tickets online or by calling the Pleasance Box Office on 020 7609 1800.

Posted on

A hundred little things

I’m typing this on a MacBook Pro. It used to belong to my housemate, and now it’s mine.

It makes my life better.

My previous desktop computer was my first Mac – one of the early Mac minis – and is so old that it can’t play video from YouTube any more, and hasn’t been able to for some time. Occasionally over the years I’ve had enough money to replace it with a PC, but held out for a new Mac instead.

I’ve had a few conversations now with PC-using friends who’ve asked: Why a Mac? It’s just a computer. It does exactly the same things as a PC, but it’s twice the price.

Up till now, I’ve never been able to answer that, other than with “Well, it’s just better.” Which is no answer at all when you come to think about it.

Until I realised that it’s not just one thing.

The power cord on the computer has a tiny little magnet in it. When I need to plug the computer in, it guides the power cord into the slot. A tiny, insignificant detail, that adds to the cost, makes it more expensive.

But every time I plug in my computer, it’s just a little bit easier for me. A little bit nicer. Saves me a second or two hunting for the plug.

Every day that I use this machine, my life is improved.

It’s not by much. But it doesn’t have to be much.

Another example.

I work at a window, looking out across the city. Except, traditionally, when there’s been bright sunlight outside, at which point I’ve had to close the curtains and work in the dark because of all the reflections on my screen.

Not with the new computer. It automatically changes the brightness of the screen so I can always see what I’m doing. I didn’t need to ask it to do this. It just does. Making my life a little bit better on a sunny day.

Or there’s the accent keys. If I need to type an é on the MacBook, I just hold down the e key, and it gives me all the accent options. In Windows, that’s ALT-130. Not much, unless you have to remember or look it up every time you need to type an accent.

Or the migration. When I switched it on for the very first time, it asked me if I had a Mac already, told me to plug the two together, and copied everything across for me. All my settings, all my programs, all my shortcuts. The lot. An hour later, I could start working again, with everything set up the way I like it and where I expected it to be.

Or the trackpad. When I was using it, I swiped with two fingers instead of one, and found that it scrolled the page. Within minutes, I was able to move through documents more quickly and easily.

And, sure, all of these things are small individually. But they add up.

A few years ago I got my first iPhone. I opened the box and looked for the operator’s manual.

There wasn’t one.

And the amazing thing was, I never needed one. A couple of minutes with the iPhone and you can tell what to do. It just works.

(My brother is currently berating himself for not being able to work his new HTC phone, which does come with a manual. Claiming that it must be his fault for not understanding it properly. A telephone should not make you feel stupid. A telephone should make you feel smart.)

One more story.

Previous to the iPhone I had used Nokias for many many years. I bought a new Nokia to replace one which had broken. Shiny, touchscreen. I also got the insurance that came with it.

Within a month the screen cracked. In my pocket.

I hadn’t dropped it, or done anything unusual to the poor thing. And all of my phones before and since have been able to travel in a pocket without shattering.

So I got in contact with Nokia who said that they could replace everything except the screen. Wasn’t covered by the guarantee. Couldn’t do anything.

So I called the insurance. Who said that because this had happened more than a month ago and I hadn’t told them immediately, they wouldn’t replace it. (And, no, talking to Nokia rather than them didn’t count.) Should’ve read the terms and conditions.

I changed networks and bought an iPhone.

More than a year later, some pixels had gone on the display. I booked an appointment in the Apple store on Regent street and took it in to see someone at the Genius Bar to see what was up, pay to get it fixed. They took a look at it, consulted with their computer, and told me that the guarantee had expired last week.

And then they turned to me with a big smile and said: Tell you what, I’ll just replace the screen anyway.

It’s not just one thing. It takes a hundred little things to make something beautiful.

Steve Jobs RIP
1955-2011

Posted on

Translation Difficulties

So Joseph Mallozzi and Paul Mullie are no longer involved with the Transporter TV series.

I think that’s a shame. I’m a fan of all of the Stargate series, and their scripts have always been among my favourites.

Klaus Zimmermann, one of the producers on Transporter, credits Mallozzi and Mullie as having been showrunners and says in the article “In America, the rule is ‘One show, one showrunner.’ But that wasn’t the case for Transporter – it was a collective effort.”

Now, think about that for a moment, and you’ll see that it has to be incorrect. Unless somewhere along the line there’s a True Democracy involved in making the final decisions about productions, then someone, somewhere, has the power to say yes or no.

(Even if no-one’s officially in charge, at the end of the day there’s going to be a person on set or in the office, somewhere at the sharp end of production, who actually makes the final decision on what or what not to do.)

Which makes me think that the problem here may be one of translation. As mentioned in a previous blog post, the US definition of a showrunner is the person who makes all of the creative decisions.

But in the US, that person is almost always a writer, and specifically the lead writer on the show in question. Which can sometimes lead to people outside the US thinking that if you’re a lead writer you’re a showrunner, and vice versa.

So it seems to me entirely possible that Messrs Mallozzi and Mullie were told that they’d been hired to be showrunners – and then only later found out that they were actually lead writers.

Which does, then, beg the question: who’s actually running the show?

Posted on

Curtain Up

Due to the magic of computers, this post will be published at exactly the same time as the audience are seated and the lights come up for The Just So Stories in Edinburgh.

The show runs twice a day from today until the 29th August, with two days off on the 10th and 22nd.

We’ve got a great cast, four great stories, and a great venue.

Now all we need is a great audience.

Book tickets here.

Posted on

When come back, do not bring pie.

So m’learned colleague Natt has blogged about the recent fracas in the Commons Select Committee.

For those who missed it, here’s what happened:

Rupert and James Murdoch were answering to a Commons Select Committee about what was known by them about phone hacking at the News of the World, and the possibility of a cover up within that organisation. Several fascinating things came out.

Towards the end of that questioning, some fucknut attempted to put a shaving foam pie in Rupert Murdoch’s face. Not only did he fail, he was roundly slapped by Wendi Deng, Mr Murdoch’s wife.

Good.

Natt’s opinion, given in full here is, as far as I understand it, as follows:

1. Oh go on. It was just a little bit funny.
2. There are other problems with that select committee which you should get more angry about.

Taking them in order:

1. No, it wasn’t.

Hitting an 80-year-old man in the face with a custard pie isn’t funny. Missing an 80-year-old man in the face with a custard pie isn’t funny. Even disregarding the 80-year-old thing, custard pies aren’t funny at the best of time, and in the middle of a select committee, interrupting that select committee isn’t funny because it’s not the time or place.

It wouldn’t have been funny if he’d gone up to him and farted, it wouldn’t have been funny if he’d mimed, it wouldn’t have been funny if he’d stood up in the middle of that meeting and just that moment come up with the greatest Wildean aphorism ever about the corruption of the police and politicians and their terrible co-dependence on tabloid journalists.

It wouldn’t have been funny if he was Bill Hicks himself come down from heaven with a new routine that was better than all his others put together.

Because there’s a time and a place for everything. And a Select Committee interrogating Rupert and James Murdoch about the possible criminality of their company and how endemic it may have been is not the time or place for an interruption of that manner.

2. The interruption really and truly is the thing to get angry about.

Now, it’s entirely correct that the committee (with the notable exception of Tom Watson) weren’t the greatest interrogators ever.

But that does not excuse interrupting an event in which the Murdochs, let us not forget, were being held to account.

Now, you could certainly claim that they weren’t being held to account well. That’s your right.

It is not your right to interrupt that event because you don’t like someone there.
It is not your right to interrupt that event because you hate or despise someone there.
It is not your right to interrupt that event because you wish to show that they, too, are only human.
It is not your right to commit an act of surrealism to expose a surreal process.

None of these excuses matter.

They were being held to account, and you stopped that.

It gave Murdoch the chance to read his prepared statement. It gave people sympathy for Murdoch. For fuck’s sake, it gave me sympathy for Murdoch.

Maybe it wasn’t going as well as you liked, maybe Murdoch really is the evil man that you see in your head every waking hour, but that doesn’t matter.

Because we have a fucking process. It’s what separates us from the fucking animals.

Due process was being followed. Justice was being done, and being seen to be done.

And then, at the end of it, some fucknut comes up with a shaving-cream pie and proves his disrespect, not just for Rupert Murdoch, but for every single person who thinks that, yes, maybe justice can be done. Not instantaneously, but eventually, and correctly, and following due process of law.

So what justice should be meted out to someone with no respect for due process and the rule of law at all?

I’m not usually a believer in eye-for-an-eye justice. It leaves us all blind in the end.

However, if every time Jonathan May-Bowles were to attempt to perform a comedy routine anywhere in the world, someone were to stick a cream pie in his face?

I wouldn’t be in the slightest bit sad.

Still wouldn’t be fucking funny.

Posted on

Open Book Theatre

M’brother Rafe and I will be talking at RADA next Saturday (9th July) about Open Book Theatre.

The event’s being held under the auspices of the Directors Guild of Great Britain, with support from the Mackintosh Foundation. I believe that DGGB members get first dibs on the tickets, but that any spare ones will be allocated to members of the public.

We’ll be talking about, among other things:

  • What is Open Book Theatre?

  • Contracts, Unions, and best practice

  • Involving cast and crew in the process

  • How we raise a production budget

  • How we pay investors back with interest

  • How profit share works in this system

  • The benefits of Open Book to production companies

  • Can the model be extended to other applications, like film?

  • Reality vs Theory – what we learned, what we plan to do, and expensive lessons we’d like to help you to avoid

So if you’d like to come along, book your free ticket here.

Posted on

The Just So Stories at the Edinburgh Festival

It’s my absolute pleasure to be able to tell you two things.

Firstly, that Red Table made a profit on our recent production of The Just So Stories at the Pleasance Theatre this Easter.

A Fringe Theatre show? Not losing money? Inconceivable!

As it turns out, when you’re involving actors and crew using the Open Book Theatre model, that word does not mean what you think it means.

Every investor has made their money back. Together with a 10% return on their investment.

Every actor and crew member involved in the production has been paid a share of the money that we made, in a clear and open manner.

To say we’re happy with this result is an understatement. It’s proof that this new model works. That people involved in fringe theatre don’t need to lose money.

Which leads us to announcement the second:

The production has been so successful that we’re taking it up to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival this year, once more with our friends at the Pleasance.

The Just So Stories will be showing twice a day at 12:30pm and 2:45pm in The Green, the giant igloo at the heart of the Pleasance Courtyard (that’s venue 33, fringe-fans), one of the largest venues in the Edinburgh Festival, with over 450,000 visitors expected across the course of the festival.

The auditorium only seats 60 parents and children, so if I were you I’d book early. Tickets are available now from the Pleasance Box Office or by calling 0131 556 6550.

Still not convinced that this is going to be one of the best shows at the festival? Take a few minutes to read the reviews of the Easter production.

And I hope to see you there.

Posted on

Tuppence a bag

If you look over to the right there (NB – this may not work if you are reading this in the future and the post has been piped telepathically into your brain), you’ll see there’s a link to a screenwriting forum.

It’s called Feed the Birds, and is designed to be a helpful resource for professional and emerging screenwriters.

As well as a good way to procrastinate. Cos we all need more of those, right?

There’s a lot of good info in there already, like whether or not to join the Writers’ Guild and what to look for in deferred payment contracts and the use and abuse of flashbacks, but it’s been a bit fallow recently.

So I thought it might be a good idea to mention it over on the left here, and remind everyone it’s still around. (NB – The left is what we used to have when humanity was still instantiated in the physical world instead of quantum decollapsing brain crystals.)

So, anyway, if you want to check out a forum for professional and emerging screen and theatre writers, why not pop over and say hi?

Posted on

The Permission Scream.

I’m finally surfacing again after doing a full-time job at the same time as producing The Just So Stories for the last couple of months.

There’ll be a full update about me-me-me shortly, but in the meantime, why not feast your eyes upon the new trailer for upcoming British horror flick Stormhouse:

Stormhouse is written by the lovely Jason Arnopp, directed by the lovely Dan Turner, and has music by the lovely Sam Watts.

It’s entirely probable that everyone else who worked on the film is lovely too, but I can’t speak to that.

I was lucky enough recently to attend the test screening of the film. You can read more about what happened that night over at Arnopp’s gaff, but there’s one moment I want to talk about in particular.

About five or ten minutes into the film, there’s a big scare. It’s the first of many, but this is the one I want to concentrate on.

It made me jump in my seat, and it made the woman sitting behind me let out a loud scream.

Now, if you’re ever doing standup comedy – and especially if you’re the first act on or you’re doing the whole thing yourself – one of the first things you need to do is to get a laugh out of the audience.

It’s called the Permission Laugh.

The first laugh tells everyone: it’s OK. You’re here to be entertained, and this person can do it. You don’t have to just sit there and smile wryly at the gags. It’s OK to laugh out loud. You’re in safe hands.

Once you’ve got the Permission Laugh, all of the others are easier.

So as I fell back onto my seat and heard the woman behind me let out a loud scream, I thought:

It’s OK.

I’m in safe hands.