The Galton and Simpson Bursary and the BBC

The BBC recently announced plans for ‘The Galton and Simpson Bursary for Comedy Writing’. The winning applicant(s) will have a sample script ‘developed for broadcast consideration, with advice and input from leading industry practitioners, and receive a bursary of £5,500’. This is good news. It remains to be seen, however, if it is also a

A change of address…

So – that really is an irritating habit, isn’t it, starting sentences with ‘So’? Anyway: So…this is what happened. After I posted the first piece for this blog, the British Comedy Guide got in touch and asked if they could take the blog ‘in-house’. That was very nice of them, and, seeing as they have

1. CHARLIE DRAKE

Few people these days remember Charlie Drake. He was one of the biggest stars of British comedy from the fifties through to the seventies, feted and fawned over by the great and the good, but he faded into obscurity long before his death in 2006, and, if he is recalled at all these days, it

‘It’s very interesting but not commercial enough…’

That’s what people in publishing told me about what follows. And that’s why what follows, follows. Most publishers – I’m tempted to say ‘all publishers’ but do please prove me wrong – are only interested in books about comedy if they’re about recent shows or stars (after all, it’s not as if this is an