All to Play For (35 page)

Then she thought of her ever-increasing overdraft, and her ambition to move into a house with a garden, if she could ever make enough money. She thought of Sam and the Nike Air trainers which she suspected were stolen.

Jill gritted her teeth and decided to give it a try, for purely commercial reasons. She would write exactly what Sally wanted. If Sally could get it going then it would be worth it. She wasn’t compromising her artistic integrity, she was writing for the market.

She returned purposefully to her computer, and re-wrote the proposal again, incorporating all Sally’s suggestions. She worked and honed it over the next day to the most economical, appealing pitch she could.

The Harder They Fall

A Thriller by Jill Watkins

Hainault Country Park, East London: a killer stalks an anonymous woman on her way home in the dark. She is assaulted, raped and left for dead.

JOHN MORRISSON (David Jason) reads the report in the local paper, which he runs. His wife SHARON (Anita Dobson?) shivers as she hears about it on her way to the local comprehensive, where she teaches. LUKE WOODWARD (Gary Barlow?) thinks only of his favourite teacher, Sharon.

Sharon and Luke fall in love. He is sixteen, she thirty-five, but this doesn’t seem to matter. She stands to lose her job as well as her family, but in spite of this she can’t help embarking on the affair. They meet secretly in the wooded areas of the park.

Luke wants Sharon to leave John and their two daughters. She adores Luke but can’t bring herself to abandon them.

John realises something is wrong. One day he is in the woods (we don’t know why) and he sees her with Luke. After that he stalks them secretly. He’s nice as pie to Sharon at home. Too nice. Our sympathies tend to make us wish Sharon would leave him for Luke.

Another body is found in the woods. The police hunt intensifies. The audience’s suspicions fall on John.

John follows Sharon into the woods for an assignation with Luke. He watches them make love and then argue. Luke wants her to run away with him, but she’s torn apart by loyalty to John and the kids. We see John peering at her from a bush, he steps on a twig and the sound scares them. Sharon sends Luke away, says she’ll follow when the coast’s clear. She sits alone, worrying. Suddenly someone jumps her from behind, there’s a struggle and a knife flashes. Then someone else joins the fray, we see that it’s John, wrestling with Luke to make him drop the knife. Finally he succeeds and punches Luke. He lies on the ground unconscious.

John speaks into a mobile phone, and hugs the weeping Sharon as police with dogs arrive and take Luke away. They thank John for his assistance. John takes Sharon home, and we know they’ll be happy together after all.

Sally was pleased with Jill’s work and sounded very confident about it. Jill tried to put it out of her mind over the weekend, although she was haunted by the fear of actually being commissioned to write it.

*

Neil arrived to pick Sam up on Saturday morning in ebullient mood. He informed them that they were looking at the new Labour candidate for Birmingham South East, and offered to take them both out for a slap-up breakfast. They went to Banner’s, a favourite haunt of Jill’s and Neil’s: a relaxed café-bar which served great food accompanied by world music. Sam was sniffy about it, dismissing it as seriously uncool and full of old hippies, but he was outnumbered and silenced with a plate of pancakes.

Halfway through the meal Neil said casually, “Sam. You know I’ll have to spend a lot of time in Birmingham in the runup to the election, whenever it happens.”

“Yeah?” answered Sam suspiciously.

“There’ll be an awful lot of campaigning work.”

“Don’t tell me. You’ll be too busy to see me every fortnight.” Sam looked sullen.

“I wanted to ask you a huge favour.”

“What?”

“I wondered if you’d be my youth advisor. Join the committee. Come to Birmingham with me every weekend.”

Sam’s eyes popped. Jill was just as surprised but bit her tongue. Eventually Sam said casually, “Yeah, okay.”

Neil grinned. “That’s brilliant. Thanks. It’ll help me no end.”

“S’alright” said Sam, finishing his pancakes. He sat up, suddenly interested in the conversation. “That’s the trouble with politicians today,” he announced. “They don’t know what’s going down on the street. They don’t know shit about real life.”

Jill and Neil exchanged a wordless glance which confirmed a depth of shared understanding.

Sam turned to his mother. “Will you be alright on your own, mum?”

“I’ll cope,” she smiled.

“You can always get Gran to come and keep you company.”

“Thanks, Sam!”

*

Sally’s call came a week later. Jill picked up and greeted Sally in trepidation.

“Jill, darling,” Sally began. “I’m terribly sorry, but David Jason passed on it after all.” Jill collapsed in relief. “He liked it ever so much, but he’s booked solid for the next three years.”

“What a shame,” Jill murmured. “Never mind.”

“I’ve got another idea, though,” said Sally, to Jill’s alarm. “There’s a rumour going round that Ross Kemp’s leaving
EastEnders
. It would be a super role for him, don’t you think?”

Jill didn’t see why not. She felt a little faint, and let Sally rabbit on while she wondered how to get out of it.

“… I can’t decide whether it would be better for Ross to be a goody or a baddy. What do you think? He’d be jolly good as either. I suppose if he’s the murderer it’s a bit close to Grant Mitchell. Maybe we should keep it as it is for now. What about Anita Dobson, though?
Two
actors off
EastEnders
would look a bit odd, don’t you think?”

“Yes, it might,” agreed Jill, wondering if there was a limit to Sally’s obsession with famous faces. A sudden light-headedness made her reckless, “What about Dawn French?”

“Hmm,” replied Sally, seriously. “I’ll have to think about that one, Jill.”

Jill felt it was time she took control.

“Actually, Sally,” she said firmly. “I’m not sure about the whole project. I’m afraid I’ve rather lost my enthusiasm for it.” To her surprise, Sally didn’t seem to mind too much.

“Really? Oh. Well that’s understandable. Without David it’s sort of lost its heart, hasn’t it?”

“Yes,” said Jill, grinding her teeth.

“Okay darling. To be honest I was sort of losing faith myself, but I didn’t want to let you down.”

“That’s very sweet of you.”

“Well, look.
Do
stay in touch, and bring me
any
ideas at all. I’m
sure
we can get something off the ground if we keep trying!”

Jill said she would, although she knew perfectly well that she wouldn’t, even if Sally was the last producer left in London. She hung up, and went into the kitchen for a cathartic Lion Bar.

She doubted whether she would ever approach the BBC directly again. She had found the whole experience traumatic, and was left with the feeling that getting a show on there was harder than pulling out your own teeth with a pair of nail clippers, and less entertaining. Instead, she would focus her efforts elsewhere.

She returned to her computer and continued with an idea she was writing up for
The Bill
; her agent had set her up with a meeting and it seemed positive so far. She also had some thoughts on a returning series set in a secondary school, which she planned to develop and take along to Anthea Onojaife, Carmen’s producer, at Sisters in Synch.

An hour later Sam came home, and offered to make her a cup of tea. Delighted by this novelty, she rewarded him with her company while he watched television. Leafing through the
Radio Times
she noticed
The Soap Ashes
, and a wave of self-reproach washed through her yet again for her loss of royalties. She contemplated her nice but inexperienced young agent Paul and compared him to Billy Trowell’s guardian dragon. Muriel would never have let her sell all her rights for a hundred pounds. Her thoughts drifted to the
Bus Stops Here
proposal she’d reworked for him recently, at least he had paid her well for that. Or… had he? Was he up to something? An intangible sense of dread began to develop in her belly. Could she have been finessed a second time? She racked her memory to find out just how significant her contribution to the show had been, and remembered Nik’s conversation with Geordie Boy on the roof garden. Poor lad, she sighed. At least I didn’t get shafted as comprehensively as you did.

Chapter Seventeen

I liked Jim’s scripts for
The Medical Miracle
very much. I’d never seen anything quite like them before. They had an immediacy and relevance to life as people really live it, with all its inconsistencies and absurdities. They were a bit messy, the spelling was idiosyncratic (to put it kindly), and the structure of the story was rather irregular, but the characters and scenes had real verve, and his dialogue had tremendous energy. The scripts had an improvised flavour to them that told me that Jim was one of those writers who don’t plan beforehand. This is a hit-and-miss approach which can produce top quality writing, but on other days it produces nothing worthwhile. Writers like him are usually unsuitable for a returning series, unless they happen to know it inside out – for instance you’ll find a few great cockney writers on
EastEnders
who won’t be much use on
Monarch of the Glen
. People like Jill Watkins can turn their hand to a range of shows, but Jim Johnson was definitely a one-off.

There was certainly a role for me, he’d re-invented Wales to save himself the trouble of research, as far as I could see. I could put that right easily enough. He’d used a lot of names that needed negative checks to make sure they were fictitious, and the plot needed attention. The characters and dialogue were terrific, I didn’t want to interfere with those in any way except to tweak a few lines to give them an authentic Welsh feel. I timed the scripts as running ten and twelve minutes short, so we needed some new scenes.

I talked through my thoughts with Jonathan and he was very happy as we saw eye to eye on all the important points. I was relieved to find that he was quite easy to work with, after all; he didn’t stand on ceremony, he was simply professional and pleasant. I did my best to be the same. His office was just like him, somehow: extremely tidy, with matching furniture, which was fully functioning, even the blind. I wondered how he’d achieved this and put it down to administrative talent – until I realised that the girls in the admin block would be a lot more susceptible to Jonathan’s charms than they were to mine.

Jonathan called Jim in for a script meeting, and we met in his office one Friday morning. Jim knew me already from the writers’ party so the formalities were brief, and Jonathan even went out to fetch the coffees himself instead of asking me to get them. I appreciated the gesture. While we waited Jim pottered nosily round the office, and lit upon a framed photo of Selina.

“Who’s the tart?” he asked cheerfully, picking it up. I responded with a reproving smile which I hoped would warn him to be more careful in front of Jonathan, and told him she was his fiancée. Jim responded with an expression of appalled disgust which made me laugh out loud.

“She’s very beautiful,” I said, loyally. I’d never spoken to Selina and knew little about her.

Jim waggled his head as if to say he disagreed. “Debutante. They’re all over the city like cockroaches.” I was on tenterhooks in case Jon came back and heard him, but Jim didn’t seem to care. Seconds later Jon did appear, so the cheeky sod smirked admiringly as he replaced the photo. “What a lovely girl!”

Jonathan smiled modestly, “Thanks, that’s my fiancée Selina.”

“She’s PA to Chris Briggs,” I added.

“Actually she’s just been promoted. She’s going to be part of the new Department for Policy and Planning.”

“Not just Miss Kensington and Chelsea, then,” said Jim. He grimaced at me while Jon’s back was turned, and it was all I could do to keep a straight face. He was so outrageous, he didn’t seem to have any sense of decorum. I kept chatting to cover for him.

“I don’t know much about Policy and Planning, do you Jonathan?”

“Not a lot. They’re going to have an overview of all programme making, make sure it’s in line with policy, keep the staff informed with new directions, that sort of thing.”

“Sounds a bit of a yawn,” I said, and Jon shrugged.

“That’s a bit cheeky,” said Jim.

“Why?” I asked, starting to blush.

“Fancy describing the future Mrs Proulx’s work as a
yawn
, how rude!”

I fixed Jim with a warning look of exasperation: he was clearly trying to wind me up like a clockwork toy.

“Take no notice, Rhiannon,” advised Jonathan. “He’s incorrigible.” I realised that he already had the measure of Jim, and I needn’t worry.

We settled down to go through the scripts, giving Jim notes to take away and work into the second draft. It was very enjoyable, as Jim observed afterwards naming us the toff, the chav and the sheep-shagger. I told him he’d regret saying that.

Jonathan then announced that he’d booked a table for lunch in a Notting Hill restaurant, which he’d cover the cost of somehow, so we were duly appreciative. We set off with a sense of excitement and pleasure, feeling we were going to make a great team, and the show would be something very special.

One One Three was busy as usual, and hummed with media folk networking. We sat in a panelled booth which allowed a measure of privacy, and ordered spritzers. The restaurant had a good balance of comfy relaxation and delicious-but-not-too-fancy food and service. It was both friendly and discreet, and at the same time it was a fashionable place to see and be seen. I was easily impressed, places like this made me feel very provincial.

Over lunch we got know each other better, and our working relationship really began to gel. You might think it extravagant to spend even a fraction of a production budget on restaurant bills, but that underestimates the significance of the creative spark and how it travels round a team. The difference between a standard drama and an exceptional one can be down to these small but vital events, where interaction goes deeper than it does in normal working patterns. Creative leadership is about nurturing the right assemblage of people in the right atmosphere, so that they feed one another and enter a new place together; in this way the individuals act like ingredients in a cake, and combine to produce a magnificent confection. I saw that Jonathan already understood this and knew how to achieve it. I was impressed. I asked Jim if he’d always wanted to write.