Sykes
It's a cliché to say that life is wasted on the young but, looking back I wasted some opportunities and, of theses this is the one I regret the most.
When I was 18 I was working the pantomime season that the Palace Theatre Manchester which featured a great cast and a particular comedy hero, Eric Sykes who played Alderman Fitzwarren in his inimitable surreal style. Although a great comedy writer, I always thought of him as a wonderful physical comedian in the Buster Keaton / Stan Laurel style.
Supported by now sadly missed Roy Kinnear, Andrew Sachs who was at that time best known for his role as Manuel in Fawlty Towers playing Sarah the ship's cook and The Great Soprendo, the show was packed with comedy set pieces. It also featured my favourite corny gag ever when the hero's are all captured in Morocco and herded into the throne-room of the Sultan. The characters fall to the feet of a grandly dressed courtier and the dame bows proclaiming "Salam, Salam!". The Vizier pulls the dame to her feet and say's "That's not the Sultan, he's the one on the throne!" and the dame turns to the real Sultan and goes "False Salam!"
My great friend Johnathan and I used to write together. We'd sit around late into the night drinking wine and coming up with comedy ideas. To be fair, the wine drinking took precedence but somehow we had come up with the idea of a series of half hour television shows that we a homage to both silent comedies and gothic horror, so themes like Burke & Hare, the Tale of the Mummy's Tomb would be played out in half hour TV films and comedian's of the day taking the roles that would have been played by the Jim Finlayson's and Stan Laurels back in the day.
Somehow, given my innate laziness, we had managed to write six 30 minute episodes. Eric Sykes of course was famous for the best known modern silent comedy, The Plank' and Johnathan suggested that we ask him to look at one of the scripts. We spoke to Janet the show's Stage manager and also Eric's PA and she agreed to hand the script into him.
A few days went by and to be honest, I didn't really expect Eric to respond in any way. We came into work one evening and Janet asked us both to go into Eric's dressing room. We went into dressing room no 1, just through the pass-door in the prompt corner. Eric was sitting at the dressing table in his tatty dressing gown and puffing away on his trademark cigar. "Hello boy's. Take a seat" and motioned for us to sit on the sofa opposite. He took the script from the table and said. "I like it. I think it's good. It's hard to write silent comedy but you've managed to do it well".
Johnathan and I glanced at each other and couldn't quite believe what this great comedian was telling us. We had both noticed that the script had been well thumbed and we could see annotations in the margin. Eric had not only read the script, he had completely got it and proceeded to take us through scene by scene with observations and suggestions. He completely understood where we were coming from and said "I have given you a few suggestions that you can use or ignore but as it stands, it's a really good piece of work". We were both delighted and thanked Eric for taking the time to read the script and were making to leave when he handed us a piece of paper. "This is my producer Dennis Wilson at the BBC. Now I want you to send him this script and tell him that I have read it and it's me who sent you". We couldn't quite believe what we were hearing. This British comedy institution was complementing us on our writing and giving us a contact to use with his blessing. I'll never forget what a kind gesture this was.
We sent the script and an outline of the series to Dennis Wilson at the BBC in London and waited patiently for a response. We eventually got a reply from the man himself neatly typed on BBC headed paper.
He liked it at lot!...but it was expensive, had to be shot on film and required location work. At a time when the BBC's comedy output consisted of sitcom's filmed in front of a studio audience, there was no way this project, especially from two unknown writers could be considered.
And now to the arrogance of youth. Denis Wilson invited us to submit ideas for a comedy show that could be shot in a studio with a maximum of 3 sets. We had set our sights on a great homage to silent comedy and couldn't conceive of writing the next 'Good Life'. And there it was left. We went back too the wine and our great ideas for comedy writing stardom and ignored what could have been a life changing opportunity.
To any other budding comedy writer's out there. Don't fall foul of ego...and maybe take it easy on the wine.
When I was 18 I was working the pantomime season that the Palace Theatre Manchester which featured a great cast and a particular comedy hero, Eric Sykes who played Alderman Fitzwarren in his inimitable surreal style. Although a great comedy writer, I always thought of him as a wonderful physical comedian in the Buster Keaton / Stan Laurel style.
My great friend Johnathan and I used to write together. We'd sit around late into the night drinking wine and coming up with comedy ideas. To be fair, the wine drinking took precedence but somehow we had come up with the idea of a series of half hour television shows that we a homage to both silent comedies and gothic horror, so themes like Burke & Hare, the Tale of the Mummy's Tomb would be played out in half hour TV films and comedian's of the day taking the roles that would have been played by the Jim Finlayson's and Stan Laurels back in the day.
Somehow, given my innate laziness, we had managed to write six 30 minute episodes. Eric Sykes of course was famous for the best known modern silent comedy, The Plank' and Johnathan suggested that we ask him to look at one of the scripts. We spoke to Janet the show's Stage manager and also Eric's PA and she agreed to hand the script into him.
A few days went by and to be honest, I didn't really expect Eric to respond in any way. We came into work one evening and Janet asked us both to go into Eric's dressing room. We went into dressing room no 1, just through the pass-door in the prompt corner. Eric was sitting at the dressing table in his tatty dressing gown and puffing away on his trademark cigar. "Hello boy's. Take a seat" and motioned for us to sit on the sofa opposite. He took the script from the table and said. "I like it. I think it's good. It's hard to write silent comedy but you've managed to do it well".
Johnathan and I glanced at each other and couldn't quite believe what this great comedian was telling us. We had both noticed that the script had been well thumbed and we could see annotations in the margin. Eric had not only read the script, he had completely got it and proceeded to take us through scene by scene with observations and suggestions. He completely understood where we were coming from and said "I have given you a few suggestions that you can use or ignore but as it stands, it's a really good piece of work". We were both delighted and thanked Eric for taking the time to read the script and were making to leave when he handed us a piece of paper. "This is my producer Dennis Wilson at the BBC. Now I want you to send him this script and tell him that I have read it and it's me who sent you". We couldn't quite believe what we were hearing. This British comedy institution was complementing us on our writing and giving us a contact to use with his blessing. I'll never forget what a kind gesture this was.
We sent the script and an outline of the series to Dennis Wilson at the BBC in London and waited patiently for a response. We eventually got a reply from the man himself neatly typed on BBC headed paper.
He liked it at lot!...but it was expensive, had to be shot on film and required location work. At a time when the BBC's comedy output consisted of sitcom's filmed in front of a studio audience, there was no way this project, especially from two unknown writers could be considered.
And now to the arrogance of youth. Denis Wilson invited us to submit ideas for a comedy show that could be shot in a studio with a maximum of 3 sets. We had set our sights on a great homage to silent comedy and couldn't conceive of writing the next 'Good Life'. And there it was left. We went back too the wine and our great ideas for comedy writing stardom and ignored what could have been a life changing opportunity.
To any other budding comedy writer's out there. Don't fall foul of ego...and maybe take it easy on the wine.
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