Writing for Children
Simon Nelson
Development Executive, ±«Óãtv Writersroom
Simon Nelson is settling into his role as the ±«Óãtv Writersroom’s new Development Producer.
Well, hello to all regular (and irregular) readers of the ±«Óãtv Writersroom blog. As some of you will have read in , has left us for a time to take her maternity leave. Abigail has been a bold and indefatigable champion of New Writing and will be much missed by her friends and colleagues here at the ±«Óãtv. I, for one, will miss her enormously and I know that I have very big boots to fill! I want to thank Abigail for all her support during our handover period and I am sure you will all join me in wishing the very best to her and her new baby son.
So who am I? Well I have worked in theatre and television for over 20 years, in both drama development and production – my most recent job being as a producer for ±«Óãtv Children’s Drama based at the in Salford Quays. And – as luck would have it – my last job at ±«Óãtv Children’s Drama was also my first job at the ±«Óãtv Writersroom: helping to deliver a jam-packed 2-day course on Writing for Children.
Late in 2014, C±«Óãtv Drama announced its intention to run an initiative for new and early writers. Through a network of theatres and writing groups we asked for sample scripts (radio, TV, Film or Theatre) from any writer who had less than 120 minutes broadcast TV experience. More than 400 people sent their work, which was read and assessed by the C±«Óãtv Drama development team; from these samples, 40 potential candidates were selected for interview; and of these interviewees, 25 writers were invited to come and spend some time with in Salford.
Strange Hill High on C±«Óãtv
The course looked at the more general areas of television writing, covering familiar subjects like structure and character; but it also focused in on the more specialised skills that are required when writing for children. At the same time, the delegates got the chance to exchange ideas and find out about the practical process of taking a children’s drama or comedy from first pitch right through to production. And, in addition, the writers got to meet and question an array of Salford-based experts from TV Drama, Radio Drama, Comedy and , as well as from C±«Óãtv itself. The writers got the rare opportunity to speak directly to people like C±«Óãtv’s channel controller, , and the newly appointed Director of ±«Óãtv Children’s, .
However, for me, the highlight of the course was hearing from our guest writers. The course delegates got to work with two of C±«Óãtv’s key writers – who spoke passionately about her work as lead writer on ; and who gave a fantastically entertaining presentation on writing comedy, with reference to his work on , , and – very excitingly – the remake of .
The Dumping Ground on C±«Óãtv
Although vastly different in their approaches to the scripting process, they were both adamant on two things:
1. You MUST watch what the ±«Óãtv is producing for today’s children – NOT what you remember from the past.
2. You MUST know your audience and how they are today – NOT how you remember them from your own childhood;
Indeed, when you visit C±«Óãtv, something that quickly becomes clear is how passionate the department is about its relationship with its audience. Several of the course delegates noted how often the C±«Óãtv staff mentioned their audience and the frequency with which they met and interacted with them. And just to reinforce how importantly C±«Óãtv regards its audience, the writers were just a little bit shocked when they discovered that as part of their course they would actually have to work with some of their young audience – yes, they had to meet a class full of Year 7s who left them in no doubt that if they wanted to write for this demanding bunch they had better dust off their best programme ideas and get thinking about how to entertain this challenging audience who can happily watch 3 different screens at once whilst simultaneously tweeting about something they’ve seen on the web!
The writers went off exhausted but – we hope – inspired, enthused and armed with the right tools to create and pitch some fabulous ideas for this very challenging audience.
The C±«Óãtv Drama development team has produced an invaluable set of for the