Tour Shenanigans…

I’m having such a brilliant time on tour with MJ Hibbett, I thought I’d best write about it. Maybe the fact that he’s done a blog about every gig so far (actually nothing’s appeared about last night in Leicester yet but I’m sure it will and it was, to probably quote his forthcoming post… GRATE!) has spurred me on. Read his blog here.

I don’t think either of us were expecting much apart from a bunch of nice gigs playing to a few people in pubs and bars, but so far it’s been.. well it has sort of been that, but we’ve had more people than we expected and it’s been a huge amount of fun. Croydon was the first stop and we had a fine attentive crowd and it was brilliant to hear MJ’s songs again. In fact, he’s got so many, he’s been switching it up a lot and playing totally different sets which I am thoroughly appreciating. Not because I don’t want to hear any of the songs again but because it’s wonderful to hear different ones. They’re bloody good. I’m sticking to similar, though certainly not identical, sets as I have new songs I am keen to bust out at any cost. Last night in Leicester I chucked in a few different tunes which was fun, although I did forget the end to Ed Sheeran’s Number One. I think I got away with it, essentially by descending into a flurry of swearing which seemed to go down well.

I think this must have been particularly appreciated by Jan of PASALB (Plymouth Argyle Supporters Association London Branch) who has been to all three shows so far. That’s commitment. It’s been a joy to have a regular gig attendee although I am worried we may need to stage an intervention.

The Leicester audience was a gathering of delightful people. A couple said they’d decided to go for us over some better known names in the sense that they had actually heard of them. Maybe the lower price point was an incentive, but they said they were glad they chose to see us. And thus, we won the Leicester Comedy Festival. Also, Sue was a French teacher – something that was revealed in the middle of her impressive Henri Le Chauffeur de Camion Amoureux translation efforts.

Camberwell at The Joiners last Sunday was a total joy. I’ve been playing the open mic there a lot recently and it’s a lovely room run by lovely people, so I’m glad we managed to fill it as a load of MJ fans turned out and the gentle pressure I applied on all my SE5 friends and acquaintances seemed to work. We had a blast. As MJ mentions in his blog we have different styles but they do compliment each other which is definitely making for great shows.

Next up it’s Sheffield, then Manchester followed by Bristol (at my friends’ Maria and Noel’s brewery which will be extra fun because they do incredible beer) and finally back to the home of MJ’s Totally Acoustic gigs which I’ve enjoyed playing at and attending on many occasions, The King & Queen in Fitzrovia where excellent beer is also available (but not as good as Maria and Noel’s unless we can persuade them to get some New Bristol beers on tap there…)

Come along to one of the shows. Now we are nearly half way through, I can absolutely 100% guarantee fun. All the details are here.

What Happens On Tour…

 

… won’t be interesting enough to stay on tour, thankfully. Except the gigs, which will be 100% guaranteed mayhem.

In the new year of 2019 I am playing a few shows around the country with the brilliant MJ Hibbett with whom I have gigged many times and who is delightful company on and off stage. We’re calling the tour ‘No Headliner’ to make it clear we are absolutely equal as humans and also so we can finish early, have a drink and a chat after the gig before going to bed at a sensible hour. Let’s Rock.

We shall be adding a couple of London dates to the tour and I’ll update details for tickets etc. as they come in, but for now here’s the dates…

Sunday 17th February 2019: The Joiners Arms, Camberwell, London

Wednesday 20 February: The Globe, Leicester  (part of the Comedy Festival and tickets are already on sale here)

Thursday 28 February: The Green Room, Sheffield 

Thursday 7 March: Gullivers, Manchester 

Thursday 14 March: New Bristol Brewery, Bristol 

Here’s the pic we put together hastily for the Leicester Comedy Festival programme which illustrates how serious we both are about creating absolute mayhem on stage…

 

Look forward to seeing each and every one of you at one of these places.

Matt

x

 

Top Ten Hits

I am in the charts, the Contemporary Musical Comedy chart. This means I am a fully-fledged, living, breathing person who is making musical comedy right now in contemporary times. It’s lovely to be included alongside a load of very good people who are on the radio and television…

Numbers Game

 

Something often crosses my mind. ‘How many things should I be working on right now?’. Am I diluting my unquestionable genius and creating a mushy sea of mediocrity? Or by loading up a blunderbuss with so many killer fragments and then pulling the trigger, might one of those fragments tear through the addled brain of a commissioning editor causing them to, possibly mistakenly, order a fifty-six part series? Or are my metaphors an indication of a descent into some kind of creative abyss? Only you, or the commissioning editors who are very much looking forward to my pitch meetings, can decide…

Here I am working on my slate at my ergonomic stand up desk system…… well, taking a selfie pretending to work, but you get the gist.

I often look in the mirror and shout, ‘am I developing too many projects?’ I don’t actually shout in the in the mirror, but I do look at my reflection in an attempt to find a soul. And when I’ve found it, it’ll be available, at a price, to the devil or Channel Five. 

What I can definitely tell you is that just focussing on one project alone for months and years on end is a pathway to frustration and despair. Of course you should focus on one project at a time to get it into the best shape possible to pitch, but then you should pitch it and move on to something new. Of course, it’s always worth going back to it once you have some time away. Sometimes that period of reflection can be very helpful… maybe Downton Abbey The Gameshow hosted but the CGI Paddington will be a major hit.

I’ve had a few instances where someone has been overly insistent on one particular project. Often it’s something they’ve had a bit of interest in, so it’s probably quite good. Maybe a producer said they really liked it. Maybe a commissioning editor or some other kind of highly important individual has said, ‘It’s great, but not for us right now.’ And maybe I’ve read it and thought, ‘Yeah, this is pretty good.’ But then, if no one at that moment has bought into it, it’s time to move on at least for a while until everyone has moved jobs and you can send it to someone new.1

Being passionate about something is great, but you also need to know when to move on and put that passion project to one side for a minute and slip out another one your passionate about. Do focus on things you care about, but make sure you have loads of ideas you think are ace. Or at least a handful. You want to go into a meeting with more than one, but not so many that it looks like you’re taking the blunderbuss approach. Which I think is probably a bit haphazard and likely to lead to you accidentally shooting yourself in both feet with a load of metallic fragments. Funny in a cartoon, not in real life and a frankly a stretched metaphor in both this paragraph and the entire post.

So, I thought it might be handy to let you know what I’m up to. Some of these have to be vague because I’m working on them with other people, but where I can I’ve set out the top line. Why not – are you going to nick them? I doubt it, I mean you’d be an idiot to really, just look at them…

  1. A low budget feature about a singer songwriter whose dreams have been trampled by his parents but is encouraged to break  them by a carefree spirit. But she goes and dies, which is a pretty shitty thing to do. Once meets Truly Madly Deeply is how someone described it – not me, I don’t do ‘thing meets thing descriptions.’ But it does kinda make sense.
  2. A feature that is really great that I can’t go into more detail about.
  3. A silent comedy drama which I have to be a bit more vague about.
  4. A sitcom with a rising stand up attached.
  5. A comedy drama about a girl who ends up running the family B&B in Plymouth when her dad goes missing only to find he and the guest house are embroiled in the local drug trade. Breaking Bad meets Fawlty Towers (but not really).
  6. Another sitcom.
  7. A comedy drama about some stuff.
  8. A silent series of digital shorts about an awkward relationship.
  9. A zombie thing – could be a feature or series, I’ve only written one page so far, but it’s a cool idea…. I would say that, wouldn’t I?
  10. 11,12,13,14….. Various other bits and bobs with other people.

Of course, I’m not working on all these at the same time. Some are in a position to be pitched, so I pitch them and continue looking at the others while waiting for a response, which could take months. And then if something gets some interest I focus energy on that.

Maybe that is too many, but it’s definitely good to have ideas. I could do a whole other blog about whether or not someone will steal your idea by the way. They won’t. Or at least if you’re the sort of person who worries about that then you’re not approaching it in the right way. Concentrate on getting your stuff into great shape and then telling people about it. Otherwise it ain’t never going to happen anyway.

Good luck out there. And wish me luck with my ludicrous list. I’d appreciate that.

 

1 Make sure you check all the references though. There’s no clearer clue to a dated script than references to Craig out of Bros or President Reagan. Unless it’s an eighties period piece, obvs.

A Cheesy Tune…

Hello. You know when you’re living with someone, a significant husband/girlfriend or boyfriend/wife, you think something’s gone missing you often blame then when actually the story is somewhat different? Maybe you left the thing on the bus, maybe it’s in your coat pocket, or maybe you didn’t eat that last piece of your favourite cheese after all. Well, here’s a song about men being f**kwits with added cheese puns….

Having said that, yesterday I was, like, totally vexed as to the whereabouts of my headphones. And then my wife pulled a tangled web of wires from her coat pocket and put them on the table. There were four earpieces. Yes, she had taken my headphones. But then she did apologise directly using the power of speech rather than bang on about it in a song, so who’s the better person. You decide.*

Sign up to my mailing list for more nonsense….

*It’s her, obviously.

Interrogating Ideas

 

As I sit in my lounge pants pondering the creation of 2018’s, well, probably 2019’s1, comedy hit of the year, I thought it would be a good time to think about interrogating those sure fire hits you’re dreaming up. Tie that idea to a chair in front of your desk, shine a light in its eyes and threaten it with ways you can make it talk. When it comes to generating concepts for television shows I totally advocate the use of torture. As a member of Amnesty International, like the fully paid up member of the guilt laden middle-libtard classes I am, I do not advocate torture in real life.

 

But how do you do that other than make sure it’s the best script ever? Surely that’s enough? ‘Hello commissioning editor, here is a brilliant script, let’s rock.’ Sadly it doesn’t work like that even if you are the most well connected, talented person in the world ever. Okay, so sometimes it does because there are brilliant well connected people who have made their connections throughs being brilliant working their arses off and not being dicks. Yeah, I know there are exceptions but don’t start thinking like that, don’t get bitter. It’s not becoming and it’s the festive season so let a little love into your heart. Okay, so there’s that bloke who’s doing really well in the US and he’s really irritating but remember how he was great in that thing years ago, and that other thing, so maybe his talent got him there? Yes, I have heard that he’s a total dick a lot of the time, but forget about him, we’re talking about you here and thinking about what other people are doing while you’re trying to get your thing moving is not going to help. Stop it.

 

Back to the point. The fact is there are a massive number of scripts floating about. Most are quite good and a few are genuinely brilliant – well crafted, funny with great characters. Scripts that you could see making a really strong comedy show (before some producer or exec comes along and messes it right up, obvs). But with all those scripts chugging their way through the e-pipes, being read on devices and occasionally printed out and bound together in a loving, old-school manner, that is rarely enough these days. If you ask the question, why isn’t that enough?, just think about how many shows get made each year. It’s not that many, so why should your show be made alongside or above Detectorists, Motherland, The End of the F***ing World, Man Down, Quacks, Timewasters… it’d have to be pretty incredible.

 

Yes, there are slots for newer talent, but those are largely for people who have been spotted on the live circuit or for their creations online. So, if you’re not doing either of those things then you can’t expect to compete for those slots.

 

So, what can elevate your project? Here’s a few back of the ALDI own brand cereal packet (I don’t smoke, so I have to make do with what I can find) ideas…

 

1) Is your idea relevant to now? Does it have a reason to be made and is there a reason why you should be doing it? ‘You spent a year in a far right/left organisation and this is a comedy based on that time, interesting.’ Think about what’s going on in the world and what you can bring to that idea. It’s going to be more interesting to commissioners and, if it’s done well, more interesting to viewers.

2) Can you bring talent to the project? I know this is almost impossible for a new writer without connections. To be honest it is hard for anyone, even top producers, to attach the kind of massive name that will open doors. But if you seek out unique talent with their own voice and work with them then perhaps you can create an opportunity.

3) Is the format unique? A couple of the shows I referenced above have different, unique elements to them; Timewasters and The End of the F***ing World had an original vision that would have made them stand out at pitching stage.

4) Don’t know if there’s anything else, but if you find any other great ways to make your project stand out do let me know as I’m doing a new year review of my development slate.

 

So, good luck in 2018. Read, watch, write and pitch like the wind. And dig deep into your idea, so deep that you get to the other side, become enlightened and discover that it really is shit, but that other notion you scribbled down the other day could be the one. Yes, that one has something about it. That is the one. I’m excited about it for you. I hope your show gets commissioned at the same time as mine.

 

1 Pilot in 2018, series commission before the year is out, shoot Summer 2019 for an autumn TX followed by global acclaim.

New Year, New Stuff…

 

Hello and a very happy new year. I hope you are excited by the possibilities and opportunities that lie ahead. Even if you are currently sat in your dressing gown typing nonsense for your website attempting to stave off the fear. Just by the very act of typing, you are doing that. I think just did a bit of ironic self-congratulation. Not sure if that’s good or not – you decide.

 

For the last couple of years I was working for Comedy Central where I had a great time working on a bunch of stuff like Drunk History, which is a really great show and looks incredible, and the shorts I’ve posted about with Tom Rosenthal, Absolutely Fine, which are brilliant so do have a watch…

 

Now I’m back working independently,  developing and writing projects all of which will definitely hit your screens at some point1.

 

So, here’s the plan… I’ve decided to be more open about what I’m up to. I’ve always been wary of sharing things too early, not because I worry about people stealing ideas – if you stress about that, you’ll honestly get nowhere. I remember reading a quote from a writer or producer (I think it was in David Quantick’s How To Write Everything) that the size and frequency of copyright notices on a submission is almost always inversely proportional to the quality of the writing. That rang true to me.

 

I can’t always give all the information, if I’m working on something with another writer then it’s not really fair to divulge it without their permission. But where I can, I’ll write about what I’m doing. I hope it’ll be interesting and useful, but mainly it’s an entirely selfish action – I reckon that if I tell people what I’m up to then it’ll motivate me to get stuff done, because it’ll be embarrassing otherwise. Expect loads of blogs saying, ‘I sent (INSERT PROJECT HERE) to (INSERT BROADCASTER OR EXECUTIVE HERE) and, ‘I am waiting to hear back from (INSERT BROADCASTER HERE).

 

Today I’m back to work and looking at a treatment for a silent comedy I’ve co-created. I think it’s a strong idea but it’s a bit of a re-working of a previous project. This is something that is always worth trying but it can be difficult to let stuff go. All I have to do it let all the great scenes and jokes that won’t work in the new format go. Let it go.

 

Sorry if you now have that song from Frozen going round in your head.

 

Good luck in 2018.

 

1 Okay, maybe 5-10% have a realistic chance, but you have to start with the belief that all will be good enough otherwise you might as well go back to working in a luxury fruit goods packing factory in Devon. That was my worst job ever. Worse than working in Sergeant Pepper’s Fun Pub where, on my first shift aged eighteen, a drunk middle-age woman leant over the bar while my hands were occupied pouring a pint and started undoing my trousers.

Sleigh – A Merry Short Film

Merry Christmas! Here for your festive delectation is a short film I did a bit of my executive producing on. What does that mean? No idea, but I did whatever I could in an executive fashion. All the hard work on Sleigh was done by the brilliant John Panton who directed and co-wrote with David Quantick and producer Michael Knowles. It features a song specially composed by Elbow and has been released on the Dead Parrot comedy channel. Enjoy…