Mrs Cohen's Boy Writes...
There's a film out this week, two more to come, and the TV show has sold 5 MILLION DVDs. Yes, MILLION. Here's a piece I wrote last year about Mr(s) Brown.When the first series of Mrs Brown’s Boys aired...
View ArticleYes You CAN Make A Living Writing Comedy
Today's blog is given over to Joel Soetendorp, a comedy writer you've probably never heard of but who is very successfully making a living at writing comedy. Joel's main source of income is writing...
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Self Obsessed? Self Employed.
Deadlines and strikes this week so instead of a new piece here's something I wrote last year about going freelance...I'm typing this a few feet from my kitchen, listening to the iPlayer. My commute...
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And Now For Something Vaguely Familiar
I watched Monty Python live the other night... okay I was in my local cinema, one of that audience of 60,000 who chose to view the swansong from the cheaper seats. I've seen exactly enough live comedy...
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What I Learned At The Big Comedy Conference
On Saturday the British Comedy Guide held their second Big Comedy Conference, which I helped organise. I love being involved with this, because it means I get to learn masses about comedy - the current...
View ArticleHappy New Year?
Now that I'm doing an (almost) regular blog, as it comes to the end of the year I feel like the Queen, ready to deliver the equivalent of those Round Robin letters that have been replaced by Facebook...
View ArticleHOW TO BE A PROPER CHARLIE
I've been writing about comedy on and off for about six years. The subject areas are quite niche and rarely relevant to the world beyond our tiny universe of writers, performers and others who seek to...
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A Gender Agenda
I was pleased to see an article recently by Robert Webb, in praise of the female characters created by Jesse Armstrong and Sam Bain in Peep Show. There was a panel at last year's comedy conference...
View ArticleWorking Class Hero Or Temporary Secretary?
In his entertaining memoir 'Conversations With My Agent', the 'Cheers’ writer Rob Long talks about Bugs Bunny and Mickey Mouse, and how they relate to the world of comedy writing in the US. Every...
View ArticleFour Days In The Life Of A Freelance Writer
I’ve been reading ‘Ulysses’ by James Joyce (which between chunks of impenetrability is really pretty funny) and am hugely impressed that the writer manages to stretch the events of one day across 600...
View ArticleSurrealism: There's Something Fishy About It
"He's fallen in the water... Spam! Spam! Spam! Spam!...What's on the end of the stick, Vic?"Up until about twenty years ago you rarely saw the word 'surrealism' used to define anything other than a...
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