MEDIAPEEL 0.2

I realised recently that I will never be a successful writer of anything in particular because I don’t really understand people. That, and I sometimes take things too literally. I’ve been watching “Wilfred” on BBC3 which is an interesting enough idea, although I find the concept and the topics rather too disturbing for my aging mind to process. If you’ve not seen the show, basically, a young man contemplates suicide and when he wakes up, his neighbours dog appears to him to be a man in a dog suit, and much hilarity ensues.

Sadly, I keep being taken outside the story by various little things about the structure that bother me, so, instead of being carried along by the journey, instead I find myself worrying about the details and generally getting bogged down in things that obviously don’t concern the excited Tweeters whose unique observations upon the “coolness” of the show are read out by the continuity announcer over the end credits. Such a blatant attempt to persuade or manipulate the viewers into thinking that what they are watching is somehow essential I haven’t seen in a long time, but I digress.

My problem comes with what the other people in the show are supposed to be seeing. In theory they act like they can just see an ordinary dog, but my mind can’t make the leap between storylines that involve that dog being seen playing a guitar, smoking dope and wearing a backpack in those scenes. Like I said, it is my problem, in the same way I couldn’t detach myself during an episode of “Hustle” which talked about Albert Stroller’s wartime love affair whilst serving as an American serviceman even though I know that Robert Vaughn wasn’t even old enough to be in the army when the war ended. I know that people can play “older” of course, but the sad thing is that in many of the surrounding episodes he plays “younger” and this kind of inconsistency bothers me, and, once again, removes me from the story, and, sadly, it is this inability to think “outside the box” that has finally convinced me that success as a “creative” writer will always escape me because I’m basically far too literal.

I did once start a novel, of course, way back in the day when I still had creative juices to tap. I think it still sits becalmed in an ancient hard-drive at somewhere around the 40,000 words mark. I believe it was an existentialist detective story from the days when existentialism was my current interest du jour, but it wasn’t ever likely to go anywhere. My team leader at the time once told me I’d never finish it and it turns out he was right, so... well done him for his foresight. I did once, in the dark days after I stopped writing my plays, once consider adapting one of them into novel form but then I never actually bothered to do it, so I suspect that my one novel that everyone is supposed to have in them has evaporated into nothingness and instead been transformed into daily random witterings about nothing much in particular. I did pass on details recently to keener, sharper minds about self-publishing their works, but I suspect that that is a joy that I will never personally manage to achieve, although I’m always interested in being involved with some kind of collaboration with someone. I always feel that somewhere along the line I missed out on having a good mentor.

Other things in the media have passed before my nose lately, too. I was rather impressed to see a television advert for something as quintessentially lo-tech as an “Oxford Notebook” (“For those who write on both sides of the page”) and which wasn’t referring to some kind of electronic device. I suppose it must be the time of year with the schools and universities starting up again, but it made me happy.

I tried very hard to stay awake during the opening part of Mark Cousin’s 15 part “love letter” to cinema “The Story of Film” which was on very late on Saturday night. A lovingly crafted documentary series about a fascinating subject only really marred by his soporific manner of delivering his commentary which really did cause the eyelids to flicker. One rather interesting issue that came out of his observations was of how, much like the traveling circuses and other sideshow amusements of old, the early days of cinema was a refuge for the outcasts and rebels of society. This meant, however, that during an era when there were otherwise fairly few opportunities for certain groups in society to rise to prominence, the early days of cinema provided great opportunities for women and those within otherwise badly put upon ethnic groups to shine. This open and tolerant way of working was only really shut down when the “suits” and marketing me became involved once cinema became a successful commodity to be exploited and should give us all something to think about.

Finally, I was listening to the audio commentaries on my DVDs of “The Thick of It” over the weekend. What can I say? This was a house of disease. Again. It was interesting to me that one of the writers seems to have been specifically employed to make the (bad) language being used more “colourful” for comic effect. A “swearing consultant” if you will. Nice work if you can get it, but it reminded me of a tale one of my former colleagues once told me about his previous life on a building site, when a cement mixer was allowed to set overnight and the foreman bellowed: “What f***ing f***er f***ed the f***ing f***er up?” A perfectly descriptive and understandable sentence that would make no sense if you removed the swearing (“What the up?”), and I hand it freely to Mr Iannucci, should he wish to use it.

Total Tucker!