So, last week could very easily have turned into one of those weeks. Those weeks are the weeks in the year where sunny optimism is drained away and replaced by hail-battered gloom, when projects new and old are cut down before, during and after their prime, when the keyboard feels like broken glass and 17 pints in the boozer seem like a really, really good idea.
Come to think, I’m not quite sure how last week didn’t manage to turn into one of those weeks. I finally managed a meeting with type-3 producer, who was sweet and kind and told me she liked and laughed at my sitcom script (why I couldn’t have been told this by email/over the phone still escapes me) only to discover 10 minutes later that – even before my script was commissioned – a sitcom with a not-altogether-unconnected premise already had a series scheduled. This makes several months worth of writing, corner-fighting and tactical strop-throwing utterly pointless.
Then the next day I discovered that another producer has decided that the book she had originally agreed was “perfect for adaptation” was actually far less than perfect, again negating a lot of work involved in roughing it out.
So, not a good week. The question is, why didn’t I end up drowning my sorrows? And the answer is, because drowning my sorrows wouldn’t have got anything commissioned ( the fact that it’s taken me a decade to realise this suggests that I’m really nowhere near as bright as I like to think myself). Instead of the pub I found myself back at the keyboard, making a frantic set of emergency changes to the script and treatment for the sitcom and drafting out the best argument I can muster to save the adaptation. Will they work? Probably not. Nonetheless I feel much, much better for having at least made these rescue attempts. Maybe Robert the Bruce and his spider had the right idea after all.