The Now Show

Radio 4's comedy, Beauty of Britain, is about a woman called Beauty Olonga, who works as a carer and sees herself as an inspiration to other young African women in Britain. Here she tells us more about her show.

"One of the people in charge at Radio 4 asked me to tell you about my new series. She said she would do it herself only she's not very good at 'writing-ey type stuff' and she's got a wedding to go to.

"I could tell she was important because she had a little fold-up bicycle and she only goes into the office two days a week. Since coming to this country to work as a carer, I have learnt to recognise how much power someone has by how small their bike is, how long their holidays are and how much extra work they ask you to do for nothing.

"The British also expect you to compliment them on their sense of humour - like when those elderly gentlemen sang about 'My generation' on TV the other night. But I've noticed that although they like to laugh they don't want to make eye contact. I think that's why Radio 4 is such an important part of their culture.

"A lot of the elderly people I look after have a machine on the bedside table that suddenly starts playing Radio 4 at 6.15 in the morning while, at the same time, squirting them with steam and boiling tea - that fantastic sense of humour again!

"Radio 4 normally starts the day with three hours of high-status men shouting at each other. Sometimes you can hear the velcro tearing on their cycling anklets when they get really worked up. Most of my clients like to shout back at the radio, especially when a man called Gary Richardson is on. The elderly women I look after tend to get very annoyed when Kirsty Young starts talking. Personally I can't see anything to complain about with Kirsty - okay, she lost her professionalism when Morrissey was her guest but I've seen a photo of her in Asda Shopper magazine and she is the only Radio 4 presenter who takes the trouble to do her highlights properly.

"If you are an African girl working as a carer you will pick up plenty of top tips from my new series; from how to upstyle your tabard to slow-cooking carrots overnight to getting your clients seen by NHS professionals who are so young they can't write out a prescription without sticking their tongues out and moving their lips. I'd been living here for nearly two years before I learned the key to dealing with registrars is patience and understanding. Young doctors are very overworked so it doesn't help to criticise them for not knowing how to dress for their shape and for only visiting the barbers once every six months.

"But I hope there will be something useful for everyone who listens to my show. And let's face it that means all of you because how many Radio 4 listeners actually go in to work on a Friday? Exactly."

Beauty of Britain goes out on Radio 4 Friday mornings at 11.30am.

Dictated from the vintage section of the PDSA shop to Christopher Douglas and Nicola Sanderson

Up in Edinburgh, the BBC's College of Production (COP) has been talking to comedians about online shennanigans. The COP's Catherine Scott writes...

Yesterday saw four of comedy's bright new stars share their thoughts on how to be 'funny and multiplatform', during BBC College of Production's live podcast from the BBC Edinburgh Festival base in Potterow. The panel consisted of Daniel Berg, the comedy writer and developer who specialises in viral video, Bec Hill, named one of the "Top 10 Funniest Comedians on Twitter", Arron Ferguson of alternative comedy duo Not The Adventures of Moleman and Iván González, one half of Foster's Edinburgh Comedy Award 2011-winning duo Max and Ivan.

Prolific Tweeter Bec Hill told us how she started using online platforms simply to share her comedy sketches and cartoons with her friends, and was pleasantly surprised when it snowballed into a 3000+ Twitter following. Bec also noted that her online audience has grown much faster than her live audience – "I've reached 100,000 views on YouTube, I certainly haven’t got that in Edinburgh yet!".

Daniel Berg's passion for viral videos was evident when a strong gust of Scottish wind blasted through the pink tent and he remarked "Film that, that'll go viral!". Daniel spoke of how social media and online platforms give new acts the chance for exposure without the need to be commissioned. When wrangling with the shorter attention span of the internet audience, Daniel’s advice to comedians was "Keep your content topical, and keep it short."

Ivan Gonzalez sang the praises of online platforms such as YouTube for giving comedians creative control, and also gave a shout-out to BBC's iPlayer and Feed My Funny for allowing viewers to access comedy outside the restrictions of viewing schedules. Like Bec Hill, Ivan also enjoys the immediacy of 140 character jokes on Twitter – and if the #EdFest feed this week is anything to go by, so do a lot of us (“Just been to a lecture on how to build a ship. Riveting!")

Arron Ferguson's two-man sketch troupe Not The Adventures of Moleman actually began as a solely online act, only venturing out onto the live circuit once they had built a large online following. Noting that "some people think you need to be live to be comedians", Arron pointed out that a lot of NTAOM's sketches actually work better online, because film can provide subtle shots that might be missed in onstage comedy. Arron also gave us possibly the most useful piece of advice on treating online platforms with respect – "Don’t use Twitter to invite all your fans to KFC!"

Although the public passion for live comedy gigs remains strong, any new comedian entering the industry should remember that there is a plethora of other options available to them for making their name and getting their work out there. It might take a while to build up 100,000 hits on YouTube or 1000 followers on Twitter, but as our guests concluded “As long as you’re having fun, that's what matters."

Listen to the full podcast.

Follow College of Production @BBCCop

BBC One has commissioned a pilot of Father Figure, a new sitcom created, written by and starring the stand-up comedian Jason Byrne, to go into production early next year.

Jason Byrne plays married father Tom. He tries to be the best dad he can to his two sons, but bad luck and his extended family are always upsetting his plans. Jason will be accompanied by Pauline McLynn (Father Ted), Michael Smiley (Luther) and Dermot Crowley (Bleak House).

Jason said "It's been a big dream of mine and I'd never have thought I would get the chance to join the ranks of the television sitcom world. The characters all come from real life and the outrageous situations Tom gets into have, more often than not, actually happened to me. The people in my life will never realise that it's them I'm writing about, unless my wife and two sons, mother, father and best mate ever watch it."

Armando Iannucci's award-winning political comedy series The Thick Of It returns to BBC Two this autumn.

Coalition rows take their place alongside Government embarrassment, ministerial cock-ups, backroom deals, policy U-turns, spin-doctoring, political back-stabbing and wild media speculation

Roger Allam returns as Peter Mannion MP, the new Secretary of State for The Department of Social Affairs and Citizenship (DOSAC), supported by his team of special advisors, commanded by Number 10's Director of Communications Stewart Pearson (Vincent Franklin) and thwarted by his new Coalition partner, DOSAC's Junior Minister Fergus Williams MP (Geoffrey Streatfeild).

BAFTA award winners Rebecca Front and Peter Capaldi reprise their roles as Nicola Murray MP and foul-mouthed spin doctor Malcolm Tucker, both now consigned to the Opposition. The ensemble cast is completed by Chris Addison, Joanna Scanlan, James Smith, Olivia Poulet, Will Smith, Ben Willbond, and Rebecca Gethings.

Armando Iannucci says that this series takes us into exciting and uncharted territory: "A new Coalition Government, and Malcolm and Nicola fretting in the wings. For the first time too a storyline takes us all the way through the series right to the bitter, bitter end, with Government and Opposition convulsed in an incident that questions every political convention imaginable, but in a funny way."

BBC Two Controller Janice Hadlow says she is delighted to welcome it back, "A new Coalition government, what better time for a new series of The Thick Of It?"

Head of Comedy Mark Freeland is excited to see The Thick Of It return too - "No other show could coin the term 'Omnishambles' and see it become part of the political lexicon."

Last month YouTube celebrated its 7th birthday. Hulu, the largest legal TV streaming service in the US, will be 5 in August (It's four months older than iPlayer). There's been much talk in the US recently about online video "growing up". Google's decision to foster partnerships with content producers, starting with its YouTube Partner Program, has now seen the launch of premium video channels. At a presentation to advertisers in May, US comedian Chris Hardwick, who runs YouTube's popular Nerdist channel, summed up Google's intentions best: "The web will be to cable TV what cable TV was to broadcast".

Google though is not an isolated case, and other online platforms are taking it further. Both Hulu & Netflix have commissioned exclusive web series including political sitcom "Battleground", a new reality show from Morgan Spurlock, and a series of documentaries from the acclaimed director Richard Linklater. US online video services are for a wide variety of reasons evolving, but what's still unknown, and so exciting, is what effect the continual growth of this video market will have on Television.

This is contextually interesting, and relevant to the BBC, because today we published seven brand new comedy shows online. Of course that happens regularly on the iPlayer, but these shows have never been on television; they were commissioned for bbc.co.uk. Promoted by BBC Three as Feed My Funny Exclusives, and championed by controller Zai Bennett as a chance to find "the next Gavin and Stacey or Little Britain", they throw up exciting possibilities for comedy, a genre where traditionally you have to kiss a lot of frogs to find the next Prince or Princess, like Mrs Brown.

New talent, new formats and new scripts can be developed at relatively low cost in relation to TV production and put in front of an audience. Architecturally, the Feed My Funny Exclusives, use the same templates as TV shows, working within bbc.co.uk/programmes, utilising iBroadcast, and they can appear in IPlayer. But the differences are what makes this so exciting going forward. These shows don't need to be 28 minutes long, they cost less to make than most TV comedy and they are at that intersection between technology and storytelling Ralph Rivera described a few months ago.

How many of this year's Feed My Funny Exclusives will go to full TV series remains to be seen. What we do know is that when more are commissioned later this year, we can ask some interesting questions. For example, what would data driven comedy look like? After all, Yahoo, who now commission web series, make programming choices driven by data. After tracking the torrent of clicks that news stories about wedding engagements routinely get they commissioned a reality web show "The Ultimate Proposal".

Could we create a personalised comedy akin to the Tipp-Ex Bear on YouTube using bbc programme pages? Or create live comedy driven entirely from social media feeds? Technology is changing what we can do with comedy but all that really matters is how funny the end product is. So I will leave you to judge and comment on what's been produced for the first series of Feed My Funny exclusives, but I would like to point out that without this project we would never have been able to unveil the latest revolution in equine technology. It keeps you up to date with news for horses, surf websites for horses, and connect with friends, who are horses.

Feed My Funny Exclusives

• Dawson Bros. Funtime
• People Just Do Nothing
• Celebrity Bitchslap News
• Impractical Jokers
• For The Win
• The Tape Face Tapes
• The Imran Yusuf Show

Will Saunders is an executive producer within BBC Comedy.

If you were visitng the internet yesterday, you may have heard about our new show for 2013 It's Kevin, starring and written by comedian Kevin Eldon.

You may have heard that it's sketches, it's songs, it's characters, it's guests, and it's a man who's old enough to know better mucking about, with help from a number of his comedy friends.

What you have probably not heard until reading it just now is that you can watch a clip from the show as a taste of things to come right here, right now!

 It's Kevin: The Perspective Twins

We're going back to the Fringe!

This summer, we'll pick up from where we left off last year when all our Fringe action came together under one roof. Expect even more performances and shows from across our site on TV, on radio and online.

We're going extra mile at the Fringe this year, hosting an overnight Comedy Marathon. BBC Three will start an epic overnight journey with a specially billed, anarchic eight hour show which will go out live on the Red Button from 9pm till 5am and forms part of the London 2012 Festival.

Our tented festival village opens on Friday, 3rd August and doesn't come down until the early hours of Monday 27th August, with over a 100 shows under its belt.

Last year, our venue enjoyed hosting shows from across the BBC. Where else in Edinburgh could you have found Ricky Gervais, Mark Lawson, Sarah Millican and David Hasselhoff on the same stage? (OK, not necessarily at the same time) - in case this all passed you by, here's a video of last year's highlights:

There is so much going on across the month, make sure you don't miss anything by following @BBCEdFest on twitter and via www.facebook.com/BBCEdFest

Free tickets for all of the on-site events, performances and Masterclasses are available from BBC Tickets from Thursday, May 31. Apply now to make sure you don't miss out!

What's On?

BBC Radio 1's Scott Mills and Nick Grimshaw will be returning to present their spectacular Fun and Filth Cabaret, also part of the London 2012 Festival. And BBC Comedy Presents is back, showcasing the best of the Fringe with nightly shows.

Festival-goers can come together and marvel at our new big screen which will be showing the best of the Olympics live.

Radio 4 bring a host of listener favourites to the Fringe; David Mitchell will be dropping in to host The Unbelievable Truth, Nicholas Parsons and Paul Merton will rock up for Just a Minute, as will Clive Anderson for Loose Ends. Jim Naughtie is with us for a special Fringe edition of Today, and Rory Bremner's in town to host Tonight.

More Radio 4 recordings from the festival include Comic Fringes, with short stories created by popular comedians. Also, Front Row, The Horne Section, The Philosopher's Arms, Wondermentalist Cabaret, plus a new food panel show making its debut at the Fringe - The Kitchen Cabinet presented by Jay Rayner.

As well its regular stable of Edinburgh shows of MacAulay & Co and the Festival Café and in recent years Off the Ball - BBC Radio Scotland will be taking more stalwarts East including Vic Galloway and Jazz House, and as he did in 2011, to acclaim, Christopher Brookmyre will be combining comedy and books in a specially recorded series.

Radio 3 will broadcast In Tune live from Edinburgh with Sean Rafferty and Verity Sharp presenting two editions of Late Junction with live music and special features.

Radio 2's Steve Wright Show - with Patrick Kielty at the helm - will broadcast from the festival. Patrick's also hosting the Edinburgh heat of the Radio 2 New Comedy Award. And Penny Smith returns with The Radio 2 Arts Show.

There is also a chance for you to see Richard Bacon present his BBC 5live shows from the BBC venue at the Edinburgh Festival on August 22nd and 23rd with celebrity guests.

BBC coverage goes beyond the Fringe. The diversity of the Edinburgh festivals will be reflected across a range of output, including BBC Two's The Culture Show with Sue Perkins and The Review Show with Kirsty Wark. And as broadcast partner of the Edinburgh International Festival, Radio 3 will broadcast 18 live and pre-recorded concerts from the Festival.

There will be a host of other live music acts across the month, featuring special performances from world loop-station champion, Shlomo, as well as up-and-coming live music acts showcased by Vic Galloway and the BBC Introducing... team in Scotland. There will also be lots exciting things to do for families with young children.

Key events at the BBC@Potterrow are included in the Edinburgh Festival Fringe brochure, but further details of additional events including Masterclasses and Workshops will be announced in due course.

Ashley Blaker, series producer, co-creator & co-writer of The Matt Lucas Awards stopped by Comedy Towers to talk to us about making the final episode of series one.

Everyone was very excited about making this episode of The Matt Lucas Awards and there was a fun end-of-term feel around the studio. For starters it was the final recording of an incredibly intense period that should have carried a government health warning. We were also really looking forward to having Ruth Jones, David Baddiel and Griff Rhys Jones on since not only are they three really funny people, but they are also seldom seen on other comedy chat shows so we were thrilled they'd agreed to do this.

A few days before filming, the final Lucas was going to be Most Baffling Song and of course everyone would have to perform their nomination. However, locked in my office at Television Centre at around 2:30am - high on chocolate and processed food - Matt and I agreed we'd already had people singing and wanted to do something a bit different. So we changed the award to 'Most Baffling Campfire Song' and decided we'd like to build an actual campfire in the studio and get everyone to sit around it chatting and singing with the lights turned down. I'm sure the Health and Safety people were tearing their hair out, but credit to our amazing art department and in particular Production Designer Dennis De Groot who made it all happen.

A reason for personal excitement was also the fact that we managed to track down our former swimming teacher Mr Keith Talbot. The first award is the Lucas for School Subject Most Likely To Induce Severe Depression and David Baddiel - who went to the same school as both Matt and myself - nominated swimming. So it seemed only fair that the man who depressed David all those years ago should have the right to reply!

We asked fans of the show to send in their questions about The Matt Lucas Awards for Ashley to answer:

Who was Ashley's favourite guest/anecdote?
Favourite guest is a tough one. We really were blessed with having great guests who got into the spirit of the show and were happy to sing, perform magic tricks, eat cakes, perform gangster raps, wear silly wigs and anything else we asked them to do. So forgive me if I don't annoy 17 guests by picking one favourite.

One of my favourite anecdotes was one we didn't have time to hear in the end. In the recording of episode four we had a Lucas for Most Embarrassing Item of Clothing Ever Seen In A Guest's Wardrobe and Johnny Vegas told a story about how he wasted his first ever student grant cheque on a poncho in Camden Market. We brought out models wearing all the nominations but in Johnny's case it was a very large woman and when she appeared it was a very funny moment. Sadly there just wasn't time to have it in the final show.

What are the possible pitfalls of transferring a comedy from radio to TV? How have you avoided them?
That's a good question. On the one hand you run the risk of pointing a camera at the exact same show and having people criticise you for just making a radio show on TV. On the other hand, if you change too much you run the risk of ruining the show and losing what was good about it in the first place.

I'm sure there will be people who say they preferred the show on radio just as I know others who have told me they prefer the TV version. I think one needs to view them as quite distinct entities because there are things that we can do in one medium that we can't do in the other.

Where do you get all the sofas from?
Why? Do you want to buy one? Our Art Department did a great job on the set and in the weeks before filming they would constantly show us photos of sofas they had seen to find out if we liked them. They seem to be able to find anything although I genuinely have no idea where they get all this stuff. If we ask them for twenty 1970s annuals for a shelf they seem to magically appear.

Would you ever consider making it more spontaneous where for example the audience could shout out categories and the panel would then have to come up with things on the spot?
Absolutely, why not? Hang on, if we do that now you're going to say it was your idea!

Make sure you tune into the final episode of series one of The Matt Lucas Awards on Tuesday 15th May at 10.35pm on BBC One. There will also be a compilation episode on Tuesday 22nd May.

Check out Ashley's post on the TV Blog: Making the Matt Lucas Awards with my childhood friend Matt

With the official announcement this week that the Olympic site is coming along nicely, the Twenty Twelve Deliverance team have been working around the clock to ensure that the games go off without a hitch.

Unfortunately, Graham must have left his computer unlocked, as we've been forwarded some e-mails that Ian might not want to world to see...

 
As you are no doubt aware, the International Olympic Committee are in London this week and will be visiting our offices on Friday. Following the PM's lead, our official line on the London games is that (despite what I may have said in Wednesday’s meeting) they will be "the greatest show on earth".

Pramface writer, Chris Reddy, stopped by to give us some top tips and insight into the world of sitcom writing:

Hello. I've been asked to do a blog about my writing experiences on Pramface, so here goes...

In brief, an average day would consist of me sitting in a room, staring at a white board covered with illegible scribbles, grinding out pages of scripts late into the night to ever diminishing deadlines while stuffing my face with sugar rich-foods, trying to stay awake.

The next day I would typically wake up to notes from my producer telling me it was 'not good enough' and to 'go back and rewrite... and hurry up'. This went on for months.

So, no, there was not a lot of hanging out in the British Library having lattes, or Soho lunches with glamorous actors talking about how much they love my work. It was basically just one very long slog of writing, rewriting and rewriting again.

Have I put you off yet? If you're still reading, my guess is you're a writer because, let's face it, no normal viewer would be reading this.

So rather than ramble on I thought I'd try to share some of the stuff I've learnt and a few things I'd like to have been told when I was starting out. I'd also add that none of what follows is original, it's just stuff that has struck me as useful along the way. It's all in the many screenwriting books and courses out there already, which brings me to my first point.

1. Read the books
I am always amazed by how many scriptwriters haven't familiarised themselves with the basics of screenwriting technique. In no other profession (like dentistry for example) would you expect to just walk in and have a crack at it without any schooling.

Six episodes of a mid-priced sitcom is going to cost over a million pounds to produce. So when you pitch a script to a broadcaster, you are essentially asking them to spend a million quid on your idea. Whilst they're making this decision, it's probably in your interests for them to feel you have some idea of what you're talking about.

If you are a genius, then spending a couple of weeks reading won't stop you being a genius. You can then happily reject everything the experts say as formulaic nonsense and move on to collecting your armfuls of Oscars, Baftas and Emmys relatively untroubled. If, on the other hand, you're just a regular hack like me, you might find something useful in there.

2. Structure
Everyone bangs on about the importance of structure, and who am I to question them. Half hour narrative comedy is in some ways the most demanding dramatic form (that's right, I'm saying Keeping up Appearances was a tougher gig than Hamlet).

If you're making an art-house film, you've got time to go wandering off on a twenty minute philosophical tangent. The Everyman matinee crowd will love you and your rambling, ambiguous, anti-structure masterpiece.

TV audiences, however, are less tolerant. In television comedy you have to tell funny, coherent, integrated stories in a very compressed time frame. This requires discipline and practice, but you've chosen to write in a populist medium so, no pouting - get used to doing it.

And the truth is, learning to write structurally is actually one of the most rewarding bits of the job. And, when it comes to the dreaded rewrites, I've found having a strong grasp of my story allows me to work more efficiently and approach the task with more confidence.

So how do you structure your comedy script? Well first, don't start with the script...

3. Premise

Classical narrative sitcoms are made up of two acts, but they are acts ii and iii. What? All this means is that the de facto first act of a sitcom is the premise of the show itself. And I don't mean just the backstory; I mean the cast design, the character relationships, and the arena of the show. This is the real root of the comedy.

Make sure you spend time designing your premise rather than just churning out thirty-odd pages of script, hoping your natural gifts will carry you through. Been there, done that, my natural gifts carried me through to a forty page confusing mess that still hasn't been shot. No surprises there.

Writers' tendency to skimp on the design of their premise is the reason script development and script editing in half hour comedy is such a difficult job. By the time a new project makes it into development with a production company, it's often already broken.

And since TV production companies typically develop scripts rather than premises, the structural elements causing the problems will always be out of their reach. This is why, despite the best efforts of talented people, TV shows can still arrive on screen hobbled by the inherent weaknesses of the initial design.

4. Funny stories.

So now you've designed a robust narrative machine, you're going to need a funny story to feed into it.

It's important that the events of the story themselves are funny (or at least dramatically interesting) prior to the inclusion of any dialogue or action. The individual scenes should be amusing just by dint of their position and context in the overall narrative.

I go to my big whiteboard and start by plotting out the events I know I want in my story, putting them in approximately the right position, then I try to connect them up in an interesting way. It's somewhere between doing a jigsaw and drawing a picture. You try to see how the pieces you already have slot together, and then fill in the gaps.

Do this for your A plot and any subplots until you have an interesting, escalating story with promising comic scenes, and a strong payoff, then fill in the dialogue and action.

The benefit of this approach is that when you write your actual script, the dialogue magically improves because it's been released from the burden of carrying the plot.

Conversely, a properly positioned scene becomes much funnier because it has the full weight of narrative behind it. The comic tension is generated by the entire story rather than disconnected bits of business in-scene, or superficially 'comic' dialogue.

You should aim for about 35 pages in standard feature screenplay format. It'll be around six thousand words give or take a couple of hundred depending on how verbose you are with your stage directions.

5. Why won't they call?
So you've written your spec and sent it out, and now everyone is ignoring it. When you first start out, the industry can seem to take an age to respond. Sometimes it never calls back at all. It's easy to feel isolated and get frustrated when everyone seems to be ignoring you or, worse, deliberately excluding you. However, your fears are unfounded. Conspiracy implies a degree of organisation that is absent from most of the organisations you currently believe to be maliciously ignoring you.

If you have talent, then you will get through eventually. In the meantime, don't waste your time and energy getting angry and despondent. Get better at your job. The truth is that writing talent is relatively commonplace, craft is rare. If you develop your technical abilities, you will instantly distinguish yourself from 90% of the writers in the marketplace.

Very few people can write at a professional level, very few do. Most of the television being produced today is written by a small group of people. This group has three subsets made up of the supremely talented, the moderately talented who have learned some craft, and a bunch of people who you could supplant if you write a decent script.

Now stop browsing the Internet and go and do some writing.

Yep, that's right. Twenty Twelve is returning to our screens at 10pm on Friday 30th March on BBC Two.

This series the pressure mounts as the Olympic Deliverance team try to navigate their way through such delicate issues as how to handle the Algerian team's demand for a mosque in the Olympic village, and how to carry out a Legacy Audit on the rival bids for the Stadium when no one knows what a Legacy Audit is.

Here's a clip of Ian, Siobhan and the ever dedicated Sally, drafting a press release about the Deliverance teams commitment to 'multicuturality':

More from Twenty Twelve:

• Twenty Twelve on Twitter: They're in charge of the biggest show on earth - so how difficult can Twitter be?
• Watch interviews with Hugh Bonneville and Jessica Hynes.
• Find out more about the characters from Twenty Twelve.

Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle has been commissioned for another two series. The show is set be broadcast on BBC Two in 2014/15.

Since the first series aired in 2009, the programme has built up a fiercely loyal audience, and Stewart will once again be taking the opportunity to ruffle a few feathers. Produced by Richard Webb and directed by Tim Kirkby, Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle is a mixture of stand-up and sketches, performed by Stewart and special guest.

BBC Comedy is thrilled with the commission, with the Head of In-house Comedy, Mark Freeland commenting: "How brilliant that BBC Two has given Stewart Lee two more series. It's reward for a unique, perfectionist, hardworking, bit scary comedy master and the wonderful team behind him. I'm standing by with my compliance forms".

Stewart Lee is also excited at the prospect of two more series: "It will be amazing to be able to move forward and experiment in this unprecedentedly secure position. Thanks to everyone out there who watched the series, wrote about them, or lobbied for their return. I will make you proud. Peace! I'm outta here! You shoulda killed me last year!".

"Mr Stink stank. He also stunk. And if it was correct English to say he stinked,
then he stinked as well…"

David Walliams' best-selling children's novel Mr Stink is set to come alive as a comedy drama for all the family on BBC One later this year.

The touching, twisted and hilarious tale tells of Mr Stink, who is befriended by a local girl Chloe. Chloe sees Mr Stink every day, but she's never spoken to him, which isn't surprising, because he's a tramp, and he stinks.

 

When it looks like Mr Stink might be driven out of town, Chloe hides her unusual friend in her garden shed. As she struggles to make sure no one sniffs out Mr Stink, her dad tries to hide a secret of his own, and the stage is set for an epic family confrontation. There is also one other person with an extraordinary secret: it turns out that there is more to Mr Stink than meets the eye… or nose.

David Walliams, who will play the role of the Prime Minister in the show, says: "I am beyond thrilled that BBC One is adapting my children's book 'Mr Stink' into a family film. I have written the script, and can't wait to see actors bring it to life." BBC One Controller Danny Cohen added: "Mr Stink is a heart-warming, nose-clenching and funny tale which will appeal to viewers of all ages. It's brilliant to be working with David to bring his magical tale to BBC One." Mark Freeland, Head of Comedy, finishes the stinky love-in by saying: "I am delighted that the BBC is continuing its relationship with the multi-talented David Walliams. Mr Stink has become an instant classic and it's so exciting to see it come to life on TV. Both my children would echo that. But then they both want parts, so…"

Roger and Val Have Just Got In returned to our screens on Wednesday 8th February. Beth Kilcoyne co-wrote the show with her sister Emma, and stopped by to talk to us series two:

Beginning to write a second series of Roger & Val was like trying to get a swing-boat started: hard, which is why the man on the swing-boats gives you a push and you catch the rhythm with the rope. But there was no one outside: just me & Emma, not swinging, with 2 ropes. We began. It's a series about distraction: what do you do to get through? We decided to look at Roger being at home all day and focus his neurosis on the washing: "Val? I've got that stain out of your purple blouse" one unmemorable line I remember, as the Tribunal was pointedly ignored. We wrote and wrote, hour after hour, and got to the end, where the stain had come out of the blouse, but, hanging up to dry like a headless person, it gave Val a shock.

It was awful. Dreary. Dull. The characters didn't even sound like Roger & Val; they sounded like people doing an imitation of Roger & Val. I tried to be hopeful it had "just come out wrong", excusing myself with the fact that you can't CUT in R&V, and I'd forgotten the difficulty. But the next draft was even worse; they were now sounding labored, eg. Roger droning on that mozzarella cheese in a packet feels like a ganglion. Over-thought, turgid, flat-footed drivel, leading up to Val's decision to actually apply for the Deputy Headship and Roger opening his Tribunal mail. I couldn't understand why all of a sudden the show said nothing, apart from Roger thought the dirty clothes is an ideal environment for growing mushrooms.

At about this time my house got infested with mice; I saw one in the bathroom, which next day got caught in a trap, so I was hopeful it had been acting alone. No one would believe this if you put it in a script, but the day we handed in the first draft about the washing, I opened my own washer. There was a... thing on the rubber rim. All its fur had been hideously washed off but the tail was still on, grey, shiny, dead but for once clean, tufts of black fur skidded round it and no doubt in among my clothes, which I couldn't throw out because they were all my best ones. Aaaurrgh - visceral - on me. I didn't dare look for its eyes. I retched, and started hopping from foot to foot, stating the obvious but in a weird chant: "There is a mouse in the washer, mouse in the washer, a MOUSE!" to which my partner unwisely replied, "What's the matter? It's dead."

We really now had taken far too much time on this now-laboured Episode 1. On its final night I went to get fish & chips, in panic. When I sat down to eat, there was an alive mouse at the bottom of the stairs. It didn't even bother to run away and I didn't bother to react, because I knew what it had come to tell me: the script was awful. I just sat there, fish and chips slopping out of my exhausted, not-screaming mouth: rock bottom.

We started Episode 2 the next day, when Dave the fantastic Mouseman called to say he had solved the problem. This script wrote like a dream - zinging out from all over the place, free and alive, both characters wholly themselves, ideas toppling over each other to get in, and Val got shortlisted for the interview. Plus we introduced the over-arching story. "What a pity this can't be Episode 1 instead of that boring one about the washing" said my Mum. Of course, it was Episode 1; we had been writing Episode 0 - the characters before we got them going again. So I am grateful to that awful script now, dreadful as it was, because it was the push outside the swing-boat for Series 2. And I never saw a mouse again.

BBC Comedy Commissioning and BBC Writersroom have joined forces for a second nationwide talent search to find new comedy gold. If you have a big studio sitcom brewing in your mind and can tell original stories, invent characters and catchphrases that can make a live audience laugh, then send in your script.

This is an opportunity not to be missed - you may get the chance of your work performed at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival and at our Sitcom Showcase at the Studio in MediaCity, Salford. You could also be in line for a comedy masterclass on how to write studio sitcoms, plus an intensive week away developing your idea hand-in-hand with BBC comedy producers and established comedy writing talent.

The amazing Dawn French will be on the panel of judges. Cheryl Taylor (Controller, Comedy Commissioning), who judged last year's BBC writersroom comedy talent search says: "I was thrilled last year by the number of very funny and original scripts that we were asked to judge. It was a pleasure to read all of the short listed projects as was having the opportunity to meet some of their very talented authors."

The deadling for entries is Wednesday, 21 March 2012. For information on how to enter, visit the Writersroom website.