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ABC Writers Workshop 23 April 1959

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Articles about TV drama The Age June 1959

Notes on Playwriting for TV by George F. Kerr

Article from Radio Active here https://web.archive.org/web/20200303170028/http://abctvgorehill.com.au/assets/publications/radio_active/pubs_ra1957.htm

Mr. Kerr, a former television script editor with the BBC and with two commercial TV companies, ATV and ABC in London, has spent the last eight years in writing and adapting plays. He is now writing several half-hour crime plays under the title "KILLER IN CLOSE-UP", the first of which was produced by the ABC on September 4.

Script Editors spend half their time explaining to writers the kind of play that has been found in the U.S. and U.K. peculiarly suitable for TV production, and in dissuading them from attempting the unsuitable. Their recommendations are based on a handful of elementary ‘rules’.

The average TV audience consists of three people, one of them making tea, another stroking the cat, and the third graciously giving about half his mind to the screen. The writers’ job is to kill the tea-making, put the cat out and get these three people sitting on the edge of their seats, riveted, receptive and silent. Difficult, certainly. But you won’t do it by costume drama. In fact –
A play about Cardinal Wolsey is unlikely to reach the TV screens at all. This goes for Joan of Arc, Bloody Mary, Henry VIII, most of his wives, Christopher Columbus and Guy Fawkes. If you must write the thing, don’t submit it. Show it to Aunt Connie instead. And if you’ve written a frolic about Income Tax remember that –
Farce needs an audience, a mass audience. The television playwright hasn’t got one.
TV fantasy flops. Your delicate piece about the mermaid who wants to join the Bondi Surfing Club has no television future. Television is a factual medium. The viewer has spent the afternoon watching five sets of Lew Hoad and Pancho Gonzales. In the evening he has accompanied Mr. Menzies on his tour of a new sewage works near Hobart. The viewer, a literal-minded character, believes in Hoad’s backhand cross-shot and in sewage; he doesn’t believe in the mermaid at Bondi. Who would?
Rule five requires the playwright not to attempt pale imitations of Christopher Fry, John Osborne, Dylan Thomas, Ray Lawler; not to re-love Lucy, re-marry Joan; not to prolong life with Elizabeth or Riley or Lassie.

What then is ‘suitable’ for television? What are the special conditions of television production? What is television?

Television is not a new art-form, a new medium. It is simply a new technical means of transmission. The thing transmitted – as far as drama is concerned – is still a play, and the ancient dramatic rules remain unchanged. The dramatic essence is still telling a story, through dialogue and action, of characters in conflict with each other or with circumstance. Television is contemporary, realistic, factual, literal, ephemeral. This tends to dictate the choice of subject. The audience that is waiting to view the play is not a mob gathered together for that purpose; it is a sullen domestic group of two, perhaps three people, their listless eyes a mere five feet away from the lips of the actor. But they are curiously alert, far smarter than a theatre or cinema audience. The old stage precept ‘Tell ‘em what you’re going to do, do it, then tell’ em you’ve done it’ is splendid advice for stage writing; it’s murder on TV. If, in a stage play, the grandfather clock is a significant prop because hidden in it is a loaded revolver, the Author throughout Act I will have been busy planting that clock five or six times. It will strike. It will be fast. Mother will think of selling it…At the Act I interval the audience will know that something, perhaps the crazy nephew, is likely to emerge from that clock in Act II. On television the clock can be established by a quick cut to it on the line ‘Are we going to be late?’ – and by this cut established, solidly, for the rest of the play. It is not that the TV audience is really brighter than other audiences. But it is given its information more directly, more vividly, and all the time the camera is selecting what it is to be permitted to see.

So much for generalities. Let us now consider the practical aspects of television scripting. Although it is a relatively young industry, television has had a progeny, some of them little monsters. A producer finding himself with an unexpected success, rather than attribute this to the story and the way it has been told by the playwright, is more likely to remember what he did with his cameras – shooting through mirrors from the feet up, ‘mixing’ instead of ‘cutting’, or superimposing the credits in chi-chi lettering. The observant student of television drama in this country and in England and America will be familiar with some of the experiments that have failed, others that have succeeded.

Writers and producers through the post-war years of television have certainly had their failures, but these should have taught the writers of today some invaluable lessons. Let us try to recall some of these. Let us start, heretically, by suggesting that sound is as important on television as vision, very often more important. The words matter most of course, for they tell the story, but effects and music can give a play roots in ‘place’, in a way that grainy telecine inserts or film shots cannot.

If five people are on the screen at once, two of them are likely to be getting in the way. If twenty-0five people are in the cast of a TV play, it’s probably a sound radio script. It follows that if a play subject is talked about by a cast of seven and dramatically illustrated by three main characters, it is right for size at least.

The single domestic viewer (and his tired neighbour) will be interested in a story within his or his neighbour’s experience. His television set is not there to recapture phoney history nor to lead him tip-toeing down the garden path of fantasy. ‘Costume’ in a TV play is acceptable if it is worn by a bus-conductor, a judge, a soldier, or a cop. ‘Period’, for TV purposes, is anything before last night. ‘Plot’, on TV, doesn’t mean Guy Fawkes; it means ‘who knocked the old lady down at the crossing and drove on?’

These are dogmatic statements, and every writer is free to challenge them if he wishes. But the young writer should go cautiously. He should first establish in his own mind and for his private satisfaction what the theme of his play is to be. He should then pick a subject that is contemporary and immediately recognisable to the majority of his viewers. Let it be shop-lifting or hit-and-run or the non-union man cut dead by his mates or the Melbourne doctor’s refusal to have his own child vaccinated against polio. This situation-story will run throughout the play, but running alongside it, inter-threaded, there might well be an emotional sub-story, so that (as we subsequently find) the wife who knocked down a pedestrian and drove on, happened to be on her way to meet a man friend. But for the accident, the husband wouldn’t have known, but now…(You may recognise Waiting for Gillian. It is not difficult to make a similar story skeleton for Deep Blue Sea or Journey’s End or Asmodee or Black Chiffon).

The story counts. The way it is written will dictate the way it is shot. Writers and producers have learned this by trail and error. The good producers can be trusted to do good and faithful work on a new play. And let us make no mistake about it, the producers, however foolish some of their earlier fumblings may have seemed, are now, as a body, far more highly skilled in their own craft than are the television writers in theirs.

Writers, for some obscure reason, have been curiously contemptuous of TV. A mere handful – perhaps twenty in England, fifty in the States – have persevered, studying their own and their colleagues’ work, striving to improve. But, in fairness to Australian writers, let it be added that a TV playwright in England can live comfortably by writing plays. U.K. prices are five times the current Australian rates. In fact, the professional writer in this country can only think of Australian TV as a secondary market. When writers are offered a living wage here, from that date Australian TV can begin to look ahead. But not until then.

In what form should the apprentice-writer submit his script? Certainly not in the form of a shooting script. Don’t clutter up a good story with pseudo-technical directions. Don’s add stage directions for the actor’s benefit. If the line is ‘You filthy swine, Marmaduke!’, don’t bother to add to that in brackets (ANGRILY) or (HISSING THE WORDS THROUGH BLANCHED LIPS). Leave such decorations to the producer or actor.

There is a simple punctuation of TV which should be known to the writer. This leaves the commas to the discretion of the producer, but makes it clear to him where to put the full stop and when to start a new paragraph. A ‘cut’ is the equivalent of a full stop at the end of a sentence. A ‘dissolve’ or ‘mix’ indicates the beginning of a new paragraph. A ‘fade out’ generally suggests the end of one chapter and the start of the next. A ‘breakdown’ is a fair cow!

When the play is written, submit it. Trust the actors and the producer. Keep away from all rehearsals except the first read-through, and watch the play’s first TV production in solitude, your fingers crossed against technical break-down or actors’ camera-hogging. And think about your next play.

A word of advice about that next play; the only worthwhile advice there is: Tell a good story, and tell it well dramatically.

Planning a telecast from a Sydney wool store. From L. - Bridgland Brown's Store Manager; Producer Fred Widdows (Rural Officer); Script Asst. Prue Bavin; Commentator Bryan todd (Rural Officer); Jack Christopher, O.B. Tech. Producer; Ronay. O.B. Planning Officer.

RADIO-ACTIVE, September 16, 1957 – Pages 4 and 5

Quotes from Ruth Page on early drama

https://web.archive.org/web/20200303170025/http://abctvgorehill.com.au/assets/contributions/ruth_harris_2E.htm

When working on Drama, the set was drawn up on the floor, and the Producer walked around the actors, looking for camera positions through what was known as a black box with different size holes, representing different angle lenses, and I had to follow him making notes and comments to tell the actors later. The Producer was also the Director in those days, not separate positions as now. Everything for the show had to go on requisition forms, props, sets, costumes, makeup, graphics - Bill Kennard was the Graphics Sup. It was interesting to sit in while the Producer and Designer mapped out a set and between the Designer and Wardrobe, costumes were designed and made. Zilla Weatherby was Wardrobe Mistress, and we usually had a look when fittings for the actors were made. Then suddenly today was Production day and it became very exciting sitting in the control room above the studio (when we moved eventually to a proper studio), and the actors or dancers and singers were in costume...

All programs in early days went 'live' to air, and we had some anxious moments. If the cameraman wasn't careful and knocked into one of the flats, the viewers saw the wobble of the set, heard the noises, but everyone just carried on. Or an actor had to be prompted, which fortunately didn't happen very often. Now, of course, if the slightest thing happens, the whole scene can be videotaped again - we didn't have such luxuries, and I think the fact that it was 'live' gave a certain excitement about it.

Also at https://web.archive.org/web/20200303170028/http://abctvgorehill.com.au/assets/publications/radio_active/pubs_ra1957.htm below

THE WHIRL OF A SCRIPT GIRL

By RUTH PAGE (Script Asst., H.O.)

When Grandmother began her campaign for equality, I’m sure she thought she was doing the right thing. When she stormed the ramparts of Commerce, Law and Medicine, I’m sure she thought she had won a great victory for her daughters and grand-daughters.

From a tiny world of her home she had visions of being independent, of working in an office. To her this was an exciting prospect. So, as we all know, she set about making her dream a reality. And she won.

You and I had no trouble at all in becoming typists and secretaries. It was almost expected of us. We took our lot for granted – but we were not content.

As we sat at our typewriters we dreamed (in this modern age) of being script girls in television. We saw monitors and cameras, lights and talent and stopwatches and producers and shooting scripts, and studios and galleries. We saw ourselves as vital cogs in the fascinating wheel of production; and like grandmother – in a relative way – we stormed the ramparts.

But perhaps my natural romanticism is creeping through. There is really nothing romantic about this business. I t only in those vague thoughts of a typist that any romance exists. This you learn the first day.

That first day starts with, "These are the forms we have to issue". And there staring you in the face are white forms, blue forms, yellow forms, all neatly numbered, and all of which don’t mean a thing. That exciting world of the studio and the gallery seems suddenly far, far away. But there is no time for dreaming. The nemisis (you come to know it as nemisis) rings, and a voice – usually male – says something vague about not having TV 8 or TV 11 or 5, or some number, and could he have it? So it starts.

You tell your producer, who tells you in no uncertain terms to tell him (that is, the voice) that he’s waiting on a writer or an artist or news, or any one (you come to learn) of a thousand things which exists for the producer, but don’t seem to for the voice. But you ring the voice, who tells you to tell the producer - - -. At the end of the first day you’re not quite certain what the difference between a typist and a script girl really is. But don’t worry; this goes on for weeks.

By the time TV 8 or 11 or 5 or blue or pink forms mean something, all thought of that exciting studio and gallery, and being a vital cog in the crazy wheel of production has completely and finally disappeared. Now all thought, all will is brought to bear on such things as – "I hope he doesn’t change his mind again". "I hope that man-invented thing doesn’t jangle again". "I hope he doesn’t call another night rehearsal!" – While there’s life there’s hope.

And then, suddenly, to-day is production day. You find yourself in the studio. And somehow, in those first few minutes all the forms and the telephones and the changes and the voices and the rehearsals have been worth it. But, wait for it. The man to whom you have been for the most part sweetness itself, and who in return has been approximately human, if a little eratic, has turned suddenly into a not-so-far-from-erupting volcano. He is full of such questions as – "Why didn’t we do so and so?" And somehow the "we" doesn’t include him. It is now that you hope you’ve done everything, and that the volcano doesn’t erupt at you. The chances are that it won’t, but, girls, that’s a chance you take.

Then it’s all over, and the big day to-day is yesterday, and a voice is saying something about TV 8 or 11 or 5, or pink or green forms not being in, and you’re back where you started. Not quite, because your producer who was yesterday a volcano is a benign breeze who breezed in early, and breezed out again to relax after yesterday’s show.

You sit for a minute to think about that studio and gallery which you’ve seen, and you realise that you didn’t feel quite what you thought you’d feel – anyway you’re not quite sure what you did feel – ah well – TV 8 and 11 and 5 and yellow and white, and voices and nemesis – such is the price of progress.

RADIO-ACTIVE, October 15, 1957 – Page 4

ABC report 1958

ABC report year ended 30 June 1958

"In all, 24 "live" plays were presented, most of them an hour or more in length. No other television organisation in Australia has, so far, attempted anything on this scale. Critical and public reaction has been excellent. Seven of the plays were locally written, and the television adaptations of all productions were done in this country"

I checked this. It was 24... I wasn't sure of the seven that were locally written.

1. A Fourth for Bridge

2. Fair Passenger

3. A Phoenix Too Frequent

4. The Right Person

5. Rope

6. The Robert Wood Trial*

7. The Passionate Pianist*

8. The Duke in Darkness

9. The Sound of Thunder

10. The Wallace Case*

11. The Importance of Being Earnest