29th April

Ok, changed my mind. The scenes before the careers centre scene weren’t working so we’re back with that as the first scene but was thinking of flashbacks and that, employed during the scene to establish the characters pictorially whilst they tell the advisor about themselves. Also added more jokes, think the scene will be quite long but if it’s cutting about a bit it will feel quick.

Jim (yeh still haven’t thought of a better name, any ideas?) Jim now goes out with Isabelle not Ed, he’s the drifter character, the indifferent one, he can be pushed around more than Ed. It doesn’t work so well with Ed who’s becoming more negative and sarcastic (like a typical Wolves fan, the sort of person who is still pessimistic even if they have just won the league) .

Also and this is exciting Jim’s going to have an unseen, unheard of family, Isabelle is his surrogate mother figure but she’s suffocating him (not literally). Anyway at the end of the episode Jim says he’s not going with Isabelle to look at houses in Edinburgh for the post-grad course she wants to do there and at the end of the episode Simon convinces his parents to let Jim move into a spare room they have. Cue 6 episodes of hilarity as Jim has to negotiate Simon’s parents and pay them rent and stuff and maybe become a surrogate son. It adds more of a trap, more of a reason why the characters are forced together. It’s more sitcomy having 1 central family and will also involve less adult characters to film and gives heightened push/pull to the get a job/let’s make a film thing. All the time whilst Ed lives next door. Oh and if we ever make this into a dodgy sitcom we can call it ‘Simon says’, sounds like a good rubbish sitcom.

Also episode 4 is now 5 and is shaping up brilliantly. Basically the episode starts with Jim crying in-front of a computer, then the episode keeps cutting back with what I previously told you until then end where Simon and Isabelle kiss. This then cuts back to Jim and is shown to be the reason he is crying. And then episode 6 starts of brilliantly because Jim and Simon, living in the same house, having kissed the same girl, there’s going to be some drama.

16th April

Had 2nd meeting with Matt and Adam yesterday, went well. Think they were a little surprised that the Careers Advisor scene wasn’t first but at least they had both read it. The reason that it can’t be the first scene is that the story starts after the characters return from having graduated at university. Originally each of the protagonists was going to be seen at each stage of coming back. Jim at Grad Ball, Ed in car with Isabelle, Simon returning home but having talked to them last night about it, I realised it was rubbish. Thankfully last night I realised I can do it in two scenes, Simon leaving his university room and then returning to his room at home. It has a nice symmetry to it and I love the idea of starting with a goodbye. It also brings Simon into the centre, the main character and hopefully his goodbye scene with Julia will get the audience to emphasise with him immediately. It also means I get to the career scene quicker but the problem is it means I have 2 longish scenes with a lot of exposition and no jokes! Wrote the first scene out entirely which is good, bad news is that it is a bit dull, sweet but dull. Needs jokes, although I know the father figure will be funny in the 2nd scene but even then I want to set-up the scene, introduce Simon’s parents and Jim and Ed in 2 pages if possible, I mean it’s impossible but I can at least try. Just realised that this also means setting up Ed and Isabelle later on but that’s ok, makes her entrance better, more important. Try to keep thinking in images, I like the idea of the three protagonists sitting on the sofa with Isabelle perching on the arm, that’s scene 6 possibly and probably 10 pages in. Almost a third of the script! Near the end of the first act and still so much I want to put in, maybe we should make the first episode a two-parter but that means taking out the episode 3 school reunion thing that Matt and Adam like. I suppose after a lot of the character exposition the plot and the scenes will get a lot quicker. Exciting, today for the first time feel that I can get an episode written within time, I have two weeks after finishing my last exam to get a first draft in. If I keep thinking the way that I have been recently then that will be easy and then if I can get onto episode 4 quickly and write that… it won’t happen like that but it’s something to hope for. Anyway back up to Norwich tomorrow, will be interesting to see if a change of location will produce a change in thinking.