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Has anyone tried making their own Brasseye-esque show?

Started by Ben Worsfield, August 21, 2008, 11:09:00 AM

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Ben Worsfield

I've always allowed Brasseye and The Day Today to rule my life, so much so that I wrote my own 'Brasseye-esque' (not quite a rip-off, not exactly orginal either) show called It's Your Problem. Has anyone else tired this I wonder?

http://video.google.co.uk/videoplay?docid=7518795186289109525

I also started it as a radio series (just like the big man himself), here's a link to those: http://benworsfield.tripod.com/its_your_problem.html

Forgive me if this seems like a shameless plug, I'm just interested to see if anyone else has done something similar! I know there are a couple of Morris-like mockumentaries floating around on Youtube...

gloria

It's very sweet.  The comedy equivalent of fan fiction.  But if you're interested in actually writing and producing comedy professionally, it's a very bad sign that you've spent all this time and effort copying someone else's style so slavishly.

Mind you....early on in his career, Morris seemed to be copying Victor Lewis-Smith...

Just out of interest, how old are you, Ben?

The Masked Unit

Ben, I didn't watch the whole thing but I'll say this: Use your talents for something original, because the only good that could ever come of this is learning about the production process. It strikes me as the work of somebody who knows that Chris Morris is funny, but doesn't actually know why, and as such the jokes just didn't make me laugh in the slightest. Why on earth would I bother watching it when I could watch the man himself? I cut to about half way through and it still seemed to be about house riding. Is it literally all about that? It's the kind of thing Morris would have focussed on for five seconds in Brasseye.

I'm being harsh not to discourage you from doing more stuff, just to discourage you from doing more stuff like this. You obviously know enough about the film making process to make something that looks decent as it does here, and the performances are good - but the material is bad and made worse by the fact that it's SUCH a blatent rip off.

I think that if you went away and did five or ten minutes of something completely original then you could definitely be on to something. I wish you well with that and apologise if I come across as harsh.

scarecrow

Quote from: Ben Worsfield on August 21, 2008, 11:09:00 AM
'Brasseye-esque' (not quite a rip-off, not exactly orginal either)

erm... in what way is it "not quite a rip-off"? is it in the same way that my first-person point-of-view sitcom following the lives of two characters, one of whom is a pessimistic, socially inept careerist, the other, an unemployable, work-shy musician, isn't a rip-off of Peep Show, just because i've put new words in and employed a cast of under 20s?

abbot lau

I made this a few years ago with some mates. It's sort of Ted Maul doing Arthur C Clarke.
Not sure how Brass Eye it really is, but we were quite proud of all the different storytelling devices.


[youtube=425,350]<object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/UPvhsgNZfGI&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/UPvhsgNZfGI&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>[/youtube]

The Mumbler

I lasted about a minute on Ben's item. Then again, I saw Jack Whitehall again on Tonightly last night, who appears to be taking what Iain Lee did (never mind Brass Eye) and extending it. And getting paid for it.

Can I ask you, Ben? Is your reason for doing this genuinely a howl of protest against current affairs and news broadcasting, or is it merely a homage to Morris? Even if it's the former, it's not enough, and you must develop your own comic voice. And work on the writing a lot more. Even in the minute I saw, there was far too much padding, too much unnecessarily fussy wordplay ("look at you like you've got five nostrils"). It just didn't have a point of view, and a point of view is what would make it funnier. Other things would too. Like developing proper characters - even a media parody has to have very careful characterisation.

Godzilla Bankrolls

Quote from: The Mumbler on August 21, 2008, 05:00:19 PMLike developing proper characters - even a media parody has to have very careful characterisation.

Yeah, the OTH/TDT/KMKY teams were breathtakingly good at making each character - no matter how briefly they were on screen - seem rounded out, with their own quirks and presentation/interview style.

drberbatov

Ultimately you are going to be judged on the first five minutes, there is nothing to pull me in, nothing to laugh at, or to make me scratch my balls and think what the fuck is this crazy shit. Even if this was part of a series of skits on youtube or a comedy video site like funnyordie.com there is nothing at all in the first five minutes that wants me to watch any further.

And for that reason I'm out.

Marv Orange

Quote from: drberbatov on August 21, 2008, 05:59:52 PM
Ultimately you are going to be judged on the first five minutes, there is nothing to pull me in, nothing to laugh at, or to make me scratch my balls and think what the fuck is this crazy shit. Even if this was part of a series of skits on youtube or a comedy video site like funnyordie.com there is nothing at all in the first five minutes that wants me to watch any further.

And for that reason I'm out.

Amateur dragon, you've got a lot to learn.


Ben you tried to give us Brass Eye but it left me brassed off and for that reason I'm out.

Backstage With Slowdive

I lasted a minute but nevertheless thought it was the best thing I'd seen all year.

I'm in.

Shoulders?-Stomach!

Well I hate to write anything off on the basis of 5 minutes so I watched the whole shebang.

You know the Brass Eye section on Science about Invisible Lead Soup that just drags its unfunny feet for about 5 minutes. Imagine if that lasted half an hour?

That's why I don't understand why this one topic was fixated on when the subject matter wasn't funny enough to last a whole episode. The interview section in the middle was incredibly dull and seemed to be asking students what they thought about houses when most students rent houses and dont give a shit about them, which was strange. They were hideously boring Im afraid.

There just wasn't enough comedy.

Which is a shame because the comedy there was, wasn't actually that bad. The links and segues occasionally lapsed into quite passable silliniess. Throwing the stones, dangling the feet, theft of a steel egg, using a strong irish accent from the start- all very good. I can even forgive the studentyness of it all.

The Nintendo Wii House Riding game was absolutely inspired and probably would have won wimblemong single-handly. I would criticize some of the posters for tearing you to shreds given this, but they've only watched 1/5/none minutes.

The good bits are all inbetween the meat and potatoes of the thing which unfortunately are really fucking boring.

What this could have been is one really quite good 5 minute sketch for Brass Eye.

Plus I was waiting for the lines to come, and the presenter (you?) was quite wordy but the jokes were quite thin on the ground.

You could make it into an entertaining Youtube sketch if you savagely edited it.




Gradual Decline


Ben Worsfield

#12
Well thanks for all the comments, negative and not - the truth is this is quite a weak script, I wrote it when I was quite young. However, I'd always written it for Television and had spent the last year or so doing episodes for radio, and before I left uni I decided I wanted to get the original episode made into a video. This was more to get a handle on the cameras and sound equipment than anything else, and as the other IYP scripts are for radio, this was the only one I had readily available in such a short period of time.

I wonder how many of you had a listen to any of the radio episodes? These evolved quite a lot, and although it's still very much in the vein of Brasseye, the characters ended up a lot more fleshed out, and there are many more laughs per minute than in Houseriding. The final episode also steps out of the documentary format.

If you've got the time, I'd ask you to have a listen to the final ep here:

http://benworsfield.tripod.com/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderfiles/its_your_problem_12_1_the_finale.mp3

and if it helps to change your mind, then the second half is here:

http://benworsfield.tripod.com/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderfiles/its_your_problem_12_the_finale_2.mp3

You may be interested to know that the first series of the radio version won Silver in the Best Scripted Programming category at last year's National Student Radio Awards.

Oh yeah, and to everyone who has urged me to concentrate on making more original things, there are a few here:

http://benworsfield.tripod.com/watchings.html

You all seem to know what you're talking about, so I'll welcome any more comments.

Mumbler: It's more just a homage to Brasseye than a proper satire. The only scene which is genuinely poking fun at the news/documentaries is where Brian tries to make the victim cry.

Shoulders?-Stomach!: It's interesting you should pick up on the Wii game segment - I added that in this year when I recorded it. I'd urge you to have a listen to the radio finale and see what you think of that - IMO it's a hundred times better than Houseriding.


Danger Man

Quote from: Ben Worsfield on August 23, 2008, 12:04:51 PM
If you've got the time, I'd ask you to have a listen to the final ep here:
http://benworsfield.tripod.com/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderfiles/its_your_problem_12_1_the_finale.mp3

Ok, I've downloaded it and will give my opinions in real time, typing as I listen....

Sounds exactly like The Day Today......a public schoolboy impersonating Ted Maul?......wordy.....classic rock.....speaking so fast there's no time to take any of it in.....Chris Morris voice.......silly voice....Christ, everyone is talking at top speed.......(just listening in grim silence now)......stop saying 'darling'.........rainbox................angry Chris Morris............'twots'??...........more Chris Morris voice........'Bombed to Fuck' was almost funny......slowing down now, which improves things.....by making it sound like Radioactive.......hmmmm........



Right, I listened to the whole 13 minutes and whilst it seemed to pick up near the end (either because everyone was talking slower or I had succumbed to Stockholm Syndrome) I have to be honest and say that I never laughed once.

There's a lot of enthusiasm in what you do but I think taking the mannerisms of Chris Morris without any of the purpose is a road to nowhere. I don't think, as the story unfolded, that the 'Brasseye' style actually served your story at all and you seemed to be heading off more towards the 'League of Gentlemen' at the end, and that improved things a little.

I'd say you should keep plugging away, slow things down, let the dialogue breathe and try and make your influences less obvious.

vrailaine

I've seen quite a lot of brass eye imitations on myspace and such.

Then there's the Onion, the daily show and thousands of blogs doing the novelty current affairs thing.

Seems like an angle where there's too many other things to bother competing with.

Mr. Etiquette

I made this a few months back. Junior Poon: Episode one

Rather Morris-esque you could say...

<object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/ugepYSYw9v4&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/ugepYSYw9v4&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>

Le Tourbillon

I think that the clip's too much in awe of Brass Eye, but, on the plus side, the production values are higher than 99% of the stuff that came out of WTV when I was there.

The Masked Unit

Despite suffering the same affliction of being Brasseye fan fiction, that was actually pretty funny and well performed enough for me to check out episodes two and three. I didn't care too much for the third, but the book-as-drug concept in one and the performance in the second showed a lot of promise. I'd be really interested see what you come up with in the future but as with Ben's stuff, it would have to be an original concept to make it worthwhile.

If I could offer some specific advice (and I should add that I'm in no way qualified to do so), it would be to hone and stick to the script, as it appeared to me that there were a few unnessesary ad-libs, and just generally be a bit more ruthless with cutting from the script stuff that doesn't add anything or isn't funny. I reckon you could cut a good minute or so from each episode and it'd be better for it. Just my casual opinion, like.

Mr. Etiquette

Yeah I completely agree with the fact they drag on a bit too long, especially the second. Infact they were all completely ad-libbed, as I find it really difficult to write comedy scripts. I think the ad-libbing adds slightly towards making the characters appear natural and real, but at times the lack of script really grates for me.

I wouldn't say they were Morris fan fiction as such, just slightly inspired by the man himself.
I'm working on other stuff at the moment.

The Masked Unit

Well kudos on the fact that it was improvised, because there were some funny and well delivered lines in there. Wouldn't a happy medium be to ad-lib it, then write a focussed script based on what happens?

Mr. Etiquette

Cheers!

Yup, I think that would certainly be the right way to go. I just find it extremely difficult to sit down and flesh out a whole comedy script, as I tend to think up so much stuff on the spot, when under pressure.
Writing for me is a painful business.
Having said that, I find serious writing a whole lot easier.