How Sitcom Success Breeds Success

In the last post, I argued that the lack of mainstream rating-grabbing sitcoms is not because of lack of talent. There are dozens of writers capable of writing a successful mainstream sitcom. But they are currently working in Hollywood, writing literary fiction, whodunnits, children’s books, TV dramas or script editing.

There are, of course, a few shows by British writers that are available to watch in the UK, like the delightful and poignant Trying by Andy Wolton, a half-hour comedy on Apple TV that looks a lot like a sitcom. It's a show that could easily sit on BBC1 at 9pm. Why isn’t it?

One pragmatic reason: Scheduling.

Schedulers have an awful lot of power. Listen to Ep 144 of Sitcom Geeks in which Anil Gupte explains how ‘The Office’ came to be on BBC2. You will hear that the reaction of a scheduler was crucial to proceedings.

But you don’t need to be a scheduler to understand this: If you’ve got a half hour sitcom, you’re going to need another one half an hour later. Or least a TV show that lasts half an hour.

TV, these days, last an hour. A while back, I posed the question about the difference between a sitcom and a comedy-drama. One answer could be ‘about half an hour’.

So - and you might need to sit down for this - why not have two sitcoms back-to-back?

From where we are, this is crazy talk. But we could get there. In fact, we need to get there because success breeds success.

But there’s no need to have two sitcoms when you have panel games. Would I Lie To You? – a real funny treat of a show –  or a rerun of Have I Got News For You? can plug any half hour gap created by an incredibly rare pre-watershed sitcom like Ghosts.

Safety First

A new show might stink. So launching a show involves some pre-emptive damage limitation. When it came to launching a show like Ghosts, a scheduler had to think about what the British public would make of a mainstream sitcom by the original actors for the right-lauded Horrible Histories CBBC series? You put something tried and tested before and after. That’s basic common sense.

There is another tried and tested way of launching a new sitcom that the US networks have done for decades. You launch it right after a tried and tested sitcom that everyone loves. Long-running shows like Cheers were used to introduce a new show straight afterwards. Of course, to do that you need a show like Cheers. This is easier said than done.

So how do you get a long-running mainstream sitcom like Cheers? With other sitcoms. Like Cheers. I realise how this sounds. But stick with me.

New writers and bright young things join the staff of an existing show like Cheers, learn the ropes and get experience. (Like introducing new players into a winning sports team). Look at the credits of these big shows and see how the names move around. Even in the UK, look at the writers for The Thick of It when it started out on BBC4, and how they have moved to other shows like Veep and now Succession.

(Except, of course, those shows aren’t on BBC4 – which is no longer making original programmes, despite having the best track record in sitcoms of any TV channel in British history. And those shows aren’t on BBC2 or BBC1.)

Apprenticeships

I was very fortunate to receive some sort of sitcom apprenticeship. I wrote a sitcom for BBC Radio 4 called Think The Unthinkable, where I met Paul Mayhew-Archer, who put me forward to write episodes of mainstream studio sitcoms My Hero and My Family.

Then after another show on BBC Radio 4 called Hut 33, I was able to help write Miranda for to BBC Radio 2, and then BBC2, and then BBC1, for which I also co-wrote a couple of episodes of Citizen Khan a few years ago.

In 2021, for someone still up for pitching mainstream sitcoms, my CV and experience is relatively unusual, mostly because there just aren’t many mainstreams shows on which to find your feet, cut your teeth or write a script.

The mainstream shows which do tend to make it on air run for six episodes rather than eight, ten or twelve. Most of the work will be done by the show creator who, let’s be honest, needs to make the most of that rare opportunity. And those with experienced garnered over the previous ten or twenty years will look elsewhere for work, and we see that’s been the case.

My point is this. Success breeds success.

Mainstream sitcoms led to further mainstream sitcoms, not just in terms of giving experience to newer writers, but also creating confidence for controllers to commission new shows to be launched by established writers. And for schedulers to find a home for them. That's how you get a Cheers from which to launch another Cheers.

Getting on a Roll

So Esmonde and Larbey could write The Good Life, and go on to give us Ever Decreasing Circles and Brushstrokes – and Larbey could write A Fine Romance and As Time Goes By.

Likewise, Carla Lane, who wrote The Liver Birds and Butterflies, could be given a primetime slot on May 1st 1986, for her new show Bread which peaked two years later with an audience of 21 million viewers.

Yes. 21 million viewers.

The UK population was 55million. So 21 million  is quite a lot isn’t it?

It’s proportionally a lot more than the 9.5m watching Line of Duty live, and on catch-up and on binge-watching a few years later. Look at the figures. Outside of live sport, the biggest mainstream TV audiences are for comedy.

Right now, there isn't much success to breed more success in terms of mainstream sitcoms. But as I argued in the last post, the experience and success is there. One of the men who wrote two of our truly great sitcoms, Blackadder and The Vicar of Dibley, is now writing romantic comedies for the big screen. Others like him are developing new shows for HBO or streaming services. Or Apple TV.

Have we asked them to write some shows for BBC1? Do we make it worth their while trying? Do they feel they have a reasonable chance of success, or at least not wasting their time if they do try?

Sitcoms can deliver huge numbers when you get them right. And the only way to do that is to try. Can we try trying?

Times change, but some things remain the same. People like watching TV. They like a good story. And they like laughing. Sitcoms have consistently delivered delight for decades and will go on doing so.

If you want to write a sitcom, you might struggle to get it on BBC1, but you are fundamentally not wasting yout time. But it’s a long road ahead. It’s hard work. And you need to write a pilot script. There’s no way around that but I can help you there.

I’ve broken down the process into twelve steps and put it into a video course called Writing Your Sitcom, which takes you through twelve steps to writing your sitcom script, plus a monthly Zoom chat with me. There's 25% discount code MAYDAY21 valid until end of Bank Holiday Monday 3rd May 2021.

You can find out more info on the course here:

Where Do Mainstream Sitcoms Come From?

At the sad passing of the Duke of Edinburgh, TV stations began wall-to-wall obituaries and tributes. But soon the question began to be asked in all seriousness: “They’re not going to bump Line of Duty, are they?” 

The nation is gripped by Line of Duty, Jed Mercurio’s compelling and unfolding drama about police corruption. In today’s ever-fragmenting media, 9 million viewers are turning up and tuning in to watch it live. Not streaming. Not catching up. Not binging. Watching it. Live. They can’t wait to see it, they don’t want to risk spoilers and they want to be part of the cultural moment.

I’m part of that 9 million. It’s always a scramble to put the kids to bed and get the lights out, so we’re not watching it on delay. I want to be able to watch along with everyone else and watch Twitter react and join in with the chat. It’s an event. Episode four was so vivid, it felt like it should have been the lead story on the BBC Ten O’Clock News bulletin that started straight afterwards. The thrills and blood spills continue.

This shared experience is, I think, an important part of a culture and social cohesion. It’s hard to say if the fragmentation of our media the cause or a symptom of our growing tribalism but that’s a discussion for a different blog. But it’s worth noting that this isn’t just about TV, and genres. It’s who we are.

So What About Sitcoms?

It was during episode three of Line of Duty that I felt a tinge of regret. Why couldn’t there be this level of engagement with a mainstream sitcom? Right now. It feels like their time has passed. But in this post, and some following ones, I'd like to argue that sitcom could easily make a return, that there's nothing to be afraid of and that sitcoms aren't just for Christmas.

Historically some of the biggest TV audiences have been sitcoms. The same year that millions watched Prince Charles marry Diana, a similar number watched the big season finale wedding in To the Manor Born: a record-breaking audience of 24 million. This record was beaten by the nation’s favourite Only Fools And Horses Christmas trilogy in 1996.

Are those days over? Not quite.

We get a few glimmers at Christmas, or at least some glowing embers. Christmas is the time when a mainstream sitcom might still be given a prime-time slot and the front cover of the seasonal bumper Radio Times. Those sitcom specials are expected to pull in big numbers.

If I may blow my own trumpet briefly, I was at least partially responsible for Miranda’s Christmas Special in 2012. It was watched by Line-of-Duty-numbers: 9.47 million people. It beating Christmas Day EastEnders, Doctor Who (7.58m) and Strictly Come Dancing (7.76m), Call The Midwife (7.27m) and the Downton Abbey special (6.83m). 

Three years later, Mrs Brown’s Boys took over as the ratings winner. But six years on, it’s hard to see where the next Christmas special is going to come from.

Rummaging Around for Old Favourites

2020 was an odd year because of Covid, filming disruption and maybe even TV fatigue. Ratings were a disaster all round. But the normal Christmas trick is to invoke the ghosts of sitcoms past, and persuade writers and actors to show us what our much loved sitcoms of yesteryear could look like now. We’re often a little disappointed. But we’ll watch anyway, because we love the characters and the world and the genre. At the moment, it’s hard to see what BBC1’s options are for another seasonal ratings smashing sitcom special in 2021 that you can watch with your sister, your son and your gran.

When we’re not disappointed and 11 million of us are delighted all over again by Gavin and Stacey, audiences are left asking the big question: why can't we have this all year round?

Sitcoms aren’t just for Christmas. They’re for life. Or they should be. So where are the mainstream sitcoms going to come from?

Where Do Sitcoms Come From?

Let’s learn some lessons here from Line of Duty. Where did that come from? A focus group who demanded a gripping drama about police corruption? Nope. It came from an experienced writer called Jed Mercurio who had also created Cardiac Arrest and Bodies.

Where did Sherlock come from? A TV commissioner realising that the world needed an updated Victorian sleuth? Nope. An experienced (comedy) writer called Steven Moffatt who had also created Press Gang and Coupling.

Where did Last Tango in Halifax, Downton Abbey and other ratings sensations come from? Experienced writers who could be trusted to come up with an idea people would enjoy and execute it well.

Compare and Contrast

Contrast that with two truly great sitcom writers with track records going back decades: Andy Hamilton and Guy Jenkin (Drop the Dead Donkey, Outnumbered). When Dave and I spoke to them for Episode 150 of the Sitcom Geeks podcast, we discovered how many scripts they had written since Outnumbered that were rejected, passed over and ignored. It was quite a lot. They were also given the impression that people thought that Outnumbered had only been a hit because they’d got lucky with some funny kids. Seriously. Go and listen to the episode. This is how mainstream sitcom writers are treated. I’ve not spoken to Marks and Gran since we recorded episode 50 we recorded back in 2017, but I suspect their experience is the same.

My point is this: there is a lot of mainstream sitcom writing talent out there. It's not even waiting to be discovered. It's hiding in plain sight. 

Some great sitcom writing talent is no longer with us. Victoria Wood (dinnerladies) almost certainly had another truly great mainstream nation-grabbing comedy in her. Likewise, Carla Lane was sadly unable to replicate Roy Clarke’s prolific longevity and give us more Bread, Butterflies or Liver Birds.

But Roy Clarke (Open All Hours, Last of the Summer Wine) is still going at 91.  Eric Chappell (Rising Damp, Only When I Laugh, Duty Free) is only a few years behind and still going. He got the impression he was no longer wanted as far back as the early nineties. Let’s let that one sink in. The man who wrote Rising Damp couldn’t get another show in TV and effectively retired. (I spoke to him for the Sitcom Geeks podcast here).

Others have stayed the course in the UK, like Naylor half of Grant/Naylor who is still writing Red Dwarf for Dave, but others have switched genre. Who can blame them? Given the experiences of those above, is it any wonder that Steven Moffat, writer of the brilliant series Coupling, would rather write hour-long highly acclaimed series like Dr Who, Sherlock and Dracula? Which also have bigger budgets than comedies?

Why on earth would Simon Nye go back to the genre that gave us Men Behaving Badly – the finale of which was watched by 13.9 million in 1998 – when he could make a good living writing hours of adaptations like The Durrells? Why would Richard Curtis go back to Dibley or Blackadder when he could write and produce another Notting Hill?

Bless Ben Elton (Blackadder, Thin Blue Line) for getting back on the horse with Upstart Crow which, let’s be honest, only exists because the original episode was celebrating a Shakespeare Anniversary, and it comes with Blackadder style and pedigree.

Brain Drain

Others have left the country too. Jonathan Lynn, who co-wrote my favourite show of all time, Yes, Prime Minister, went off to Hollywood, only to return to UKTV for a short revival of the show for stage and screen in 2013.

The sitcom writing talent is there. And they are writing comedy. Just not in the UK. Who wrote Veep, a show created by our own Armando Iannucci? The shows credits include Simon Blackwell, Tony Roche, Georgia Pritchett, Will Smith, Andy Riley, Kevin Cecil, David Quantick, Roger Drew, some of whom have gone on to work with Jesse Armstrong on his highly acclaimed HBO show, Succession.

My point, by now, should be clear. There is an abundance of sitcom writing talent. In fact, there is a really weird amount of experienced, successful and acclaimed sitcom-writing talent. It’s just very few of them are writing mainstream sitcoms for BBC1. Why is that?

Talk to any of these writers (and we do on the Sitcom Geeks podcast) and you will hear nothing but fond affection for the great mainstream sitcoms of the past, watched in living rooms in the '70s and '80s. Given the chance, most of these folk would leap at the chance to ape their comedy heroes and write their own Fawlty Towers or Dad’s Army. Why aren’t they doing that?

Emmy-winning writer and producer of Veep, Will Smith, wrote a wonderful sitcom for BBC Radio 4 called Mr and Mrs Smith, starring Sarah Hadland (Miranda), Paterson Joseph (Peep Show) and Geoffrey Whitehead, about a couple in marriage counselling. It was really simple, well-written and funny. There were attempts to get it on TV that foundered until it was clear it was going nowhere. Since then, it doesn’t look like Will Smith has looked back professionally.

Greener Grass

Perhaps I have a rose-tinted view of the greener grass over on the drama side of things. And there is plenty of comedy around on other channels and streaming platforms where a critical factor (entirely reasonably) is new voices.

But it’s frustrating to see sitcoms mostly absent from the mainstream, as if they couldn't get huge ratings, when historically this isn't true, and when there is so much talent around, if only someone would back it.

To me, backing mainstream sitcom doesn’t even seem like “a courageous decision”, as Sir Humphrey would put it. I’d go with Del Boy. “You know it makes sense.”

In the next post, we'll look at how success breeds success.

In the meantime:
To get a foot in the door of sitcom writing, or if you have an idea for a sitcom that you’d like to write, the first thing you’ll need to do is write a pilot script.

In fact, the very first thing to do is plan the script.

In fact, before that you need to figure out what the show actually is.

In fact, it might just be simpler if you had a look at my video course, Writing Your Sitcom, which takes you through twelve steps to writing your sitcom script, plus a monthly Zoom chat with me.

A to A of Sitcom Characters

I’ve been writing, YouTubing and Webinaring about sitcom characters a fair amount, and I’d like to move on and talk about plotting. But before we start with the stories, here’s a quick round up of some headline thoughts on characters. Use this list to give your main characters a good going over. It'll do them - and you - the power of good.

#1. Attributes

Easy one to start with, or at least it should be. How would you describe your sitcom character? What are their attributes? You should be able to sum them up quickly and easy. They may be nuanced and complex underneath, but how to they present themselves?

Del Boy is an optimistic wheeler-dealer. Malcolm Tucker is a potty-mouthed bully. Edina is a fashion-obsessed permanent child.

Not all sitcom characters can be neatly summarised but thinking about them should give you a strong sense of who they are: Lesley Nope; Ron Swanson; Liz Lemon; Father Dougal; Jez and Mark (Peep Show); JD (Scrubs - remember Scrubs? Aaah, Scrubs); George Costanza. Can you describe your characters as easily as you could describe these existing characters?

#2. Activities

What do your characters do? Maybe they have a paid job, but what takes up most of their screen time? Is it parenting? Is it tree surgery? Is it treating sick people?

And can you think of twenty things to do within that? You need to know this because your character will need to have things to do in 20+ episodes.

This may seem dumb and basic but you would be surprised at the number of scripts I read where the hero doesn't really do anything. They just are. They react.

Don't have your characters react. Have them take action.

If your character is purely defined by their situation or circumstance you don't have a character. You have an extra.

A character who works in a dry cleaners and has to deal with all the different customers who come in isn't really a character. They are stuck behind the counter reacting.

A character who has to work in a dry cleaners because it belongs to their parents and they have no choice is more interesting. Which takes us to:

#3. Aspirations

What is your character aspiring to? What is their mission statement for life? How are they trying to make the world a better place, improve their own lot in life for themselves or someone they love?

If your character doesn't like working in a dry cleaners, why are they working there? Why do they do anything? What is their big goal in life?

It could be that they love working in a dry cleaners because they want the world to be clean. That's their aspiration. They're passionate about it. They hate mess. And stains. And dirt. And it must be removed. There's some interesting stuff going on there.

Maybe they think that they can build a business empire and hey, why not make it a drying cleaning empire? Clothes will always get dirty, right?

Maybe it's a failing family business but the daughter is determined to prove her dad that he's got it all wrong - and underestimated her - by making it the best gosh-darned dry cleaning business in the country.

What this means is that everything your character does in that dry cleaners is imbued with meaning. They have aspirations.

#4. Answers

How do your characters solve problems? Both their own, and other people's?

People aren't really rational. They tend to attempt to fix the problems the same way. Their own way. Not the best way. I hate talking to people on the phone so I try to fix problems with emails. Or second guessing. How I fix problems says everything about me, and very little about the problem.

People who like to talk out their problems assume that all problems can be solved by talking things out. In fact, they can't. But it doesn't stop them from trying. And infuriating the people around them. (Especially people like me who don't want to talk on the phone).

A silver-tongued fast-talker, like Del Boy, will assume they can talk their way out of a problem. So he'll always try that first. And when that doesn't work, he'll probably try it again. Only on the third or fourth failure, when the chips are really down and there's no alternative will he do the thing he always tries to avoid doing, which is normally even funnier than their usual schtick as they are now out of their depth.

In Bluestone 42, Captain Nick Medhurst, bomb disposal guy, normally assumes that being the devil-may-care but self-effacing hero will makes girls fall into his arms. And normally it does. But not this time. Not with Mary. He's going to have to think of something else. (Same applies to Sam Malone in Cheers. Obvs. (Bluestone 42 is basically Cheers-meets-M*A*S*H, only a thousand times less successful)

The extra factor here is that character usually assumes that everyone else is like them and wants to solve problems in the same way. Or feels and fears the same thing. An extrovert who craves the company of others and is always the life and soul of the party assumes that if someone is on their own, they must be sad and in need of company. So they'll try and fix that problem by being sociable, not realising that introverts actually prefer being on their own. You get the idea.

So, to summarise:

Attributes - Can you sum up your character quickly?

Activities - What are they trying to do?

Aspirations - Why are they trying to do?

Answers - How do they fix their problems and those of other people?

Got answers to those questions?

Probably not. It's a lot to take in, which is why I ran a live Webinar on exactly this. You can watch a recording of that 80min session including Q&A for FREE by signing up to the The Situation Room where you'll get links to a bunch of other things and find out about the next webinar on plotting when it's announced.

Sitcom Characters 101 What Do They Want?

Characters are not just the most important part of your sitcom. They are your sitcom. The word ‘sitcom’ is misleading. It is short for ‘situation comedy’ – and the situation might seem like the most obvious part of the show.

The situation is the most visually striking aspect. I’ve written a sitcom about soldiers in Afghanistan (Bluestone 42), about codebreakers in Bletchley Park (Hut 33) and about management consultants (Think The Unthinkable). But those shows are actually about Nick, Mary, Bird; Archie, Charles and Gordon; Ryan, Sophie, Daisy and Owen. These sitcoms are about the characters.

The setting of the show might initially be intriguing. But we’re not attracted to ideas and concepts half as much as we’re attracted to people. Any photographer will tell you that you have to get faces. You have to get the eyes. We want to connect.

We form a bond with the characters of the sitcom and we start to feel like we know them. When we watch Only Fools and Horses, we’re going on a journey with the eternal optimist, Del Boy who says ‘This time next year, we’ll be millionaires.’ It’s a show about survival and hope. It’s about a lot of things, but it’s embodied in the characters.

So that’s why I recommend taking a lot of time over your characters. They are fundamental.

And this may sound obvious but it really isn’t judging by the scripts that I read from writers who make some really big mistakes here. Let me just highlight a couple of main ones:

Mistake 1: 100% Banter

This is the mistake of a script which is just people talking and swapping jokes. It’s an easy mistake to make because we want to make the audience laugh – and this is why the first episode is the hardest to write. But you MUST show us who the characters are and why we’re going to enjoy spending time with them – otherwise it’s just going to be a string of jokes. And it’s going to wear a bit thin after a few pages.

We do want jokes. And when we’re starting a show, and we don’t know the characters, we have to work really hard to get laughs. A good example is the opening of Blackadder Goes Forth when we’re wondering what kind of Blackadder we’re going to get in this series. In the first scene we get some real gems like this:

Blackadder: That’s not the only thing around here that’s “very small indeed”.  Your brain for example, is so minute, Baldrick, that if a hungry cannibal cracked your head open there wouldn’t be enough inside to cover a small water-biscuit.

And:

George: (reading King and Country magazine) Come, come, sir, now. You can’t deny that this fine newspaper is good for the morale of the men.

Blackadder: Certainly not, I just think that more could be achieved by giving them some real toilet-paper. 

George: Not with you at all sir, what could any patriotic chap have against this magnificent mag?

Blackadder: Apart from his bottom?

And:

Blackadder: I smell something fishy, and I’m not talking about the contents of Baldrick’s apple crumble.

But the best sitcom jokes aren’t actually funny lines or wisecracks - even though those lines are memorable. They are this character saying these words to that character in that situation. Because we know the characters. That is the vast majority of sitcom jokes. Character jokes. So we need to know the characters. And so you, sitcom writer, need to know your characters.

Action Point: Get your characters to show us what they are like, where they are going and what they want.

Mistake #2 At The Mercy of Events

Quite often a script starts with characters talking, and joking. And then something happens. And the characters react. Then there might be more jokes. And then something else happens. There is more reaction. There are more jokes, if you're lucky. And then it ends.

That might initially sound fine. But it isn’t fine. Your character isn’t making any choices. They’re not active. They’re passive. And you can’t have a series of episodes of sitcoms where the protagonist isn’t doing anything, but having stuff done to them. It has to be compelling and dynamic.

Action point: Make Your Characters Active. Ask the question “What does your character want?”

I know that's basically the same point as the last action point. That's how important it is. It's the big question that will drive them through 100 episodes. What are they trying to achieve in any given day? What is their calling? We can nuance this with future posts, but for now, get them moving, active and doing stuff. What kind of stuff do they like to do?

What does Del Boy want? We hear the refrain throughout the show: "This time next year, we’ll be millionaires". It’s not in the first episode. But that spirit of optimism is there, and a whole lot else, like the integral relationship between two brothers. One is an optimist, the other a pessimist. But very quickly it gets nuanced.

In the first scene, during a disagreement between Rodney and Granddad about Sidney Poitiers, Del walks out and gets a laugh with the name ‘Harry Belfonte’.Then he goes and looks in the mirror and says to himself:

DEL

S’il vous plait, s’il vous plait, what an enigma. I get better looking every day.

He seems to mean it. He clearly believes in himself! Then he says:

DEL

I can’t wait for tomorrow.

Again, he means it. He’s not a down-trodden poor man. He’s a go-getter!

DEL

Oh, do you know, I think I’m suffering from something incurable.

Grandad and Rodney ignore him. Del is clearly a hypochondriac and his family ignore most of what he says. He goes on.

DEL

Still, never mind, eh! Oi, come on Rodney, shake leg, we’ve got a meeting at 12. [Great! Action! A quest!] What are you doing?

RODNEY

Our accounts.

DEL

You keeping accounts now? Well there you are Grandad, a lot of people told me I was a right dipstick to make my brother partner in the business, but this only goes to prove how bloody right they were. You dozy little twonk Rodney, this is prima-facie evidence ain’t it, eh? The tax man gets hold of that he’ll put us away for three years.

RODNEY

Don’t worry, if the tax man comes I’ll eat it. This is the only way I can keep a check on you, Del. I’m sure you’re cheating me in some way – I just can’t figure out how.

DEL

Cheating you! Cheating you! What’s that rumbling noise?

RODNEY

I didn’t hear anything.

DEL

No, it’s alright, it’s Mum turning in her grave.

Del knows how to play his little brother – and then we get a speech on how he essentially brought up his little brother himself. They’ve got a meeting at twelve to get us moving, there’s a chat about the business and Del’s philosophy about staying out of the governments way – both with tax and benefits – and we’re off! Great start.

In that first episode of Blackadder Goes Forth, the arrival of a service revolver means there’s going to be another ‘big push’, which means certain death. When Blackadder sees his chance to get our of the trenches by pretending to have talent as an artist, he grabs it. And when it turns out the George can paint extremely well, he makes the most of that. And then it all backfires.

Looking at Del and Blackadder, it’s not hard to see what they are trying to achieve: survival, in their own way and in their own contexts. We’ll think a bit more about that next time.

There’s a lot to think about so I ran a live Webinar on exactly this. You can watch a recording of that 80min session including Q&A for FREE by signing up to the The Situation Room.

Creating Even Better Sitcom Characters

Recently, I wrote about how a sitcom character isn’t a random bag of attributes and attitudes, rolled up with dice like a characters in Dungeons and Dragons.

It’s easy to think you’ve got a sitcom character when you haven’t really. You only know what they like to do and want they to do. Initially that might sound like enough. But it isn’t.

You need to be creating characters that will run for multiple seasons so the way you set them up is crucial. And that's what producers and readers are looking for in scripts. Not jokes. They're not actually that hard. It's characters who can run and run.

Our Friend Jessica

Last time, we looked at a lady called Jessica. She likes cooking. She’s forever foraging for ingredients and testing recipes on her husband who is a bit dubious them.

Initially it feels like there are a lot of plots and stories around cooking. She offers to cook for her neighbour who is sick. There’s a village fete and she wants to win the baking competition. A particular berry is in season and she needs to be out into the muddy fields to get the pick of the crop.

But why? Why is Jessica doing these things?

We need to know why Jessica is really doing these things because it needs to matter when she fails. And she is going to fail. It needs to hurt.

Wanting to cook isn’t quest. Wanting to be a cook or a chef isn't either. What Jessica needs is a sacred quest or calling that is going to be at heart of everything she does for dozens of episodes.

So how about this for our Jessica?

Jessica actually loves nature. She wants to be in tune with it, and the seasons. And the way she expresses that isn’t through political activism, biological research or pets – but seasonal wholesome home cooking. And she wants that food to taste really good, because she wants them to love nature too, in the same way that she does. Essentially, she doesn’t love cooking. She loves nature.

That’s better than what we had. But it still doesn’t quite feel right yet. We’ll come back to her in a moment.

Self-Awareness

Sitcom characters lack self-awareness. They think they want one thing, but actually they want or need another. They are fools. They think happiness or contentment can be found one way, but quite often that’s the thing that makes them miserable, or frustrated. They end up trying to please the implacable, or achieve the impossible.

The audience and the other characters have different perspectives on that character although the other characters in the sitcom will often misinterpret each other’s actions and motivations, but we’ll get to that in the webinar. (see below)

Such Is Life

This way of approaching sitcom characters sounds like a trick. But it isn’t. Comedy is based on truth. (I talk about that The Sacred Art of Joking) But this lack of self-awareness and state of delusion is life. We convince ourselves of all kinds of lies to get through the day. We run around in ever decreasing circles trying to solve problems that won’t actually help, trying to please people we don’t like or achieve goals that, if we stopped to think about for a while, we have no real desire to achieve.

It often takes people therapy, counselling or a traumatic event to really figure out what they want in life and how they’ve been going about it completely the wrong way. You’re characters probably aren’t in therapy. They're in denial. Like most of us. They’re living their lives, trying and failing and driving each other crazy.

Jessica 2.0

With this in mind, let's get back to Jessica. How about this?

Jessica cooks. But she doesn’t understand why. She thinks it’s because she’s good at it and that it brings her pleasure. She is quite good at it. Actually finds cooking frustrating because she has high standards. But why does she put herself through this?

Jessica does love nature, as we've said. And she loves living in the countryside. But she feels like a fraud. Because she’s a townie. Or thinks she is. She lived in the city for years but moved to the countryside a few years. She’s not the cliched city slicker who’s moved to a farm and found all the locals backward or hostile. (I am so bored of that trope)

In fact, everyone’s been very nice and welcoming to Jessica and she’s part of the community. But she still feels like an outsider. To prove that she fits in, she tries to show that she understands nature, and the ways of the countryside. And so to do that – in her head – is by cooking seasonal recipes, making jam and pickle and giving out jars it and winning the occasional rosette that the village fete. (But not too often or that looks bad).

Jessica is a nature lover, but that’s a passion. But she, like most people, wants to be liked, respected and accepted. We can all relate to that, even if we don't feel it. And cooking is how she expresses that need to be accepted.

So that’s Jessica.

But what about her husband? Her mother? And her brother-in-law? What are they like and how do that relate?

We don’t just need to do apply this process to one character but to a family of characters – but we don’t do that in isolation.

There’s a lot to think about so I ran a live Webinar on exactly this. You can watch a recording of that 80min session including Q&A for FREE by signing up the The Situation Room.