The Friday Interview: The Channel 4 Scriptwriter

In the first of an occasional series, Graham Bandage talks to Justin Turnbull, the man who writes the narrator's scripts for Channel 4's reality lifestyle shows.

Graham Bandage: How do you approach writing a script for, say, The Home Show, or Supernanny?

Justin Turnbull: Well, Graham, later I'll be telling you how I use a script-writing program ... how I drink a cup of coffee ... and where I work.

GB: Great. But how do you approach writing a script for, say, The Home Show, or Supernanny?

JT: I get a rough edit of the programme and then I work my way through it. Phew, I need a wee-wee. After my break I'll tell you how I use a script writing program ... how I drink a cup of coffee ... and where I work.

INTERVIEW SUSPENDED FOR THREE MINUTES.

GB: OK?

JT: Yep. Before my break, I said this. "I get a rough edit of the programme." Later, I'll tell you how I use a script writing program ... how I drink a cup of coffee ... and where I work.

GB: How do you use a script writing program?

JT: I've got one on my computer. I just tap in the words on my keyboard and they appear on my screen.

GB: Yes, but...

JT: Sorry, time for another break. I'm parched, so I'll be needing a cup of coffee. Later I'll tell you how I drink a cup of coffee... and where I work.

INTERVIEW SUSPENDED FOR TWO MINUTES.

GB: Look, this is getting...

JT: So before my wee-wee break I said this, "I get a rough edit." Then before my coffee making break I said, "I just tap in the words on my keyboard."

GB: Can we get to the coffee?

JT: Of course. I don't actually drink cups of coffee. I prefer mugs.

GB: Oh, you'd led me to believe you drink cups of coffee.

JT: Yes, the mug thing is a bit of a twist.

GB: Very good.

JT: Yes. I need the toilet again now. When I come back I'll tell you ... where I work.

INTERVIEW SUSPENDED FOR TWO MINUTES.

GB: Please. Just please move on. Don't tell me what you've already...

JT: Before my first wee-wee break, I said this: "Rough edit." Then before my coffee break, I said: "I just tap..." Then before my second wee-wee break, I said: "I prefer mugs."

GB: Where do you work? Just tell me, for the love of thingy, where the f**king hell do you work?

JT: Here.

GB: So, what now?

JT: Now you go away. And then you come back to see me in 12 months to see if things have changed for me for the cheapo repeat.

GB: And will they have done?

JT: No. Not in the slightest. Next week you'll be interviewing conceptual artist Ted Cramp, when he'll be saying "The Northern Line," "three sheets to the wind" and "Mum, please don't."

GB: Justin Turnbull, thank you.

Frugal

I'm delighted by the Love Food Hate Waste campaign which is being foisted on various people around the country.

Now, I'm as environmentally-friendly as the next man, assuming the next man isn't made out of uranium, petrol-fumes and lead, but I was amused by the smashing recipe for Use Up Soup, "a nutritious, cheap and filling soup that takes only minutes to make and serve."

Here it is...

• 570ml chicken stock (made from leftover chicken bones)
• 1 garlic clove, finely sliced
• 4 overripe tomatoes
• 50g green vegetables, such as runner beans, French beans, mangetout, sugar snap peas, broccoli
• 1 tbsp tomato ketchup or 1/2 tbsp tomato puree
• 1 can 400g mixed beans
• 125g leftover cooked chicken or ham
• Salt and ground black pepper
• 50g leftover soft cheese such as Brie or goat's
• 1 spring onion, finely chopped
• Virgin olive oil
• leftover bread slices, lightly toasted

Mmm. Lovely. But I'm concerned by how often the specific circumstances required to make the soup come around. It must be a bit like a transit of Venus.

INT. KITCHEN - TEATIME

CHARLES AND EDDIE ARE IN THEIR KITCHEN. THEY ARE HOMOSEXUALS, BUT THIS IS NOT RELEVANT TO THE IMAGINING, OTHER THAN TO EXPLAIN WHY THEY ARE IN THE KITCHEN TOGETHER. AND ALSO BECAUSE I RARELY USE HOMOSEXUALIST EXAMPLES. (IF YOU LIKE, CHARLES COULD BE A BLACK GENTLEMAN.)

CHARLES
Crikey, Eddie, I'm awfully peckish.

EDDIE
Me too. Shall we see what to have for tea?

CHARLES
Yes. But let's not be wasteful. Let's make that lovely Use Up Soup.

EDDIE
Do we have the ingredients?

CHARLES
We're bound to, as it is "great for making sure any odds and ends are used up from the fridge." Open the fridge, Edward, and I shall recite the ingredients... First, chicken stock, made from leftover chicken bones.

EDDIE
Yes. Got that.

CHARLES
Garlic, overripe tomatoes.

EDDIE
Overripe? How ripe is overripe? These four are a bit squashy, but I'd just call them ripe. Do they need to have mould on?

CHARLES
They'll be fine. After all, Eddie, as my old gay dad used to say, "One man's ripe tomato is another man's overripe tomato."

MUCH LATER...

CHARLES
Leftover cooked chicken or ham.

EDDIE
Phew! We nearly ate all that cooked chicken when we cooked it with the aid of our cooker. Thank goodness for your prescience, Charles.

CHARLES
Leftover soft cheese, such as Brie or goat's.

EDDIE
Well, Charles, as you know, we are homosexuals so we always have Brie and goat's cheese in the fridge. Which would you prefer?

CHARLES
I've always liked goat's.

EDDIE
Goat's it is.

CHARLES
Spring onion. Virgin olive oil.

EDDIE
Ooo, shall we have extra virgin?

CHARLES
Why not? I'm very much in the mood for a treat vis-a-vis my tea, given the length of this list of ingredients. And finally... leftover bread slices.

EDDIE
Ha! I nearly looked in the fridge. I'd better close that, actually, lest any food go off. What a terrible irony that would be.

CHARLES
The bread, Eddie. Eddie? Eddie! What's wrong? Why do you weep so?

EDDIE
Oh, Charles, we've got no leftover bread. We've been too frugal and used it all. Shall I open a new loaf?

CHARLES
No leftover bread? Are you sure?

EDDIE
Would I lie to you?

CHARLES
No! It's all ruined, you bastard! I'm going home to my two gay fathers.

CHARLES KICKS EDDIE HARD IN THE HEAD.

ENDS.

That could very easily happen. Love Food Hate Waste? Love Food Hate Waste Hate People Want Them All To Be Frustrated, more like.

Ball Of Confusion

I've been watching the Wimbledon on the television. It's all very good and everything, but I'm a bit distracted by the ladies' knickers.

And not for any saucy reason. Frankly, I'd be disappointed if you thought that. It's more to do with the balls.

I reckon it must be very difficult for the lady serving if the other player returns the ball, because then she has to leg it across the court with a big tennis ball in her pants.

No wonder they make that massive grunt. I'd be browned off, too, if I were faced with a bit of a run with a ball in my pants.

It's not so bad for the chaps, of course, but it's still got to be a bit constricting having one in their pocket.

I think if I were a tennis player, I'd probably be tempted to put the first service into the net on purpose, just so I could free up my pocket for whatever knick-knacks I had in there. My mobile, or whatever. But that would be risky.

So I've come up with a smashing new idea. The Ball Thigh Bracelet. This is a heavy metal band which players wear on their thigh. How it would work is that tennis balls would now contain a powerful magnet. The spare ball would then adhere to the outer thigh until pressed into service.

And, as both players would wear the Ball Thigh Bracelet, neither would be at a disadvantage.

The only problem I could see would be if the ball in play veered a bit close to the opponent's thigh adhering inadvertantly. But that's not something I would be concerned about. These are highly-paid professionals, who should be able to move their thighs if required. Moving a thigh is probably the least one could expect of a tennis player.

I think it's the only practical solution until tennis players evolve little pouches like kangaroos, i.e. for ages.

Five Things People Think Work But In Fact Don't

1) Crossing fingers when lying
No defence in law. It turns out.

2) Dog whistles
They just lick them. They'd rather bark anyway, I suspect.

3) Anti-ageing cream
You might as well have anti-gravity cream.

4) The internet
Michael Jackson dies and Twitter follows suit.

5) Anything other than fools or horses.

Gnat's Entertainment

I wonder what simile gnats use when referring to something of notable tightness.

EXT. GNATS' CAR PARK - DAY

TWO GNATS ARE SITTING IN A CAR, TALKING.

MARTIN (gnat, early 30s):
Goodness, Terence, that parking space is a tight as, erm, my chuff.

TERENCE (gnat, late 30s):
I really wouldn't know, Martin.

MARTIN:
OK, Terence, it's as tight as your chuff.

TERENCE:
Martin...

MARTIN:
Argh! All right, Terence, fair enough. It's as tight as, I don't know, a chuff. Anyone's chuff.

TERENCE:
Martin, I'm beginning to feel a little uncomfortable. Can we stop talking about chuffs?

MARTIN:
I'm sorry, Terence, I'm just trying to think of something that's quite tight, so that I can adequately express the area in which I am expected to park.

TERENCE:
I appreciate that, Martin. But I'm just disturbed that you would immediately think of a chuff, that's all.

MARTIN:
What would you have thought of?

TERENCE:
I don't know... an earhole. I'd have probably just said it was a bit tight and left it at that.

MARTIN:
You know your problem, Terence, you've no poetry in your soul.

TERENCE:
Yes, well, if by that you mean I'm not constantly thinking about chuffs, then I'm happy to be prosaic.

MARTIN:
Bugger. Somebody's taken our parking space.

END

If These Walls Could Talk, They'd Say, 'Put Something On Me, I'm Freezing'

I've been doing a bit of wallpapering in the bedroom. It's not the most fun I've ever had. But it has confirmed the decision I took some time ago not to become a professional painter and decorator.

That said, I've come up with some smashing ideas which might make the whole sordid business a bit easier.

1. Perforated rolls of wallpaper. It's tremendously hard to cut wallpaper in a straight line, especially when it's a bit soggy owing to the wallpaper paste the manufacturers insist that one splaps on liberally and then leave on for eight minutes.

So perforated wallpaper, just like toilet rolls, would be ace. Sploink it on the wall, give it a bit of a brush and then tear it off at the top and bottom. Of course, this would mean that walls would have to be standard sizes, but that's not my problem.

2. Velcro wallpaper. Stripping walls is a tremendous mither. So, my idea is a backing paper flocked with Velcro which one would glue to the wall. And then one would buy wallpaper flocked with the corresponding Velcro. Goes up easy, comes down in one. I'm not sure how you recycle Velcro, though. Are there Velcro bins in the car park at Tesco? It must be tricky to empty them.

3. Abolish windows, light switches and corners. I admit this might be one of the trickier things to pull off but I don't see why we can't think big.

All these ideas will definitely work.

Fool-proof Search Engine Optimisation

I've been guilty of a bit of hyperbole. Last year, when this blog was in its salad days, I drew a lovely little cartoon. This one, in fact.

I must admit, it made me chuckle at the time. I might even have hooted. But after I'd patiently filled in all the colours and that I became a bit bored with it.

Then I realised, "No, Bandage! There's an unspecified number of people out there who might chuckle upon first exposure to this cartoon. It might even enhance your reputation as a tremendous chap."

So I posted the cartoon. But in a moment of hubris, I suggested "I think this might be the funniest cartoon ever."

Let's have another look at it.


See. It's all right, isn't it? I doubt you've been troubled by rib crackage. You're probably bored by it already. And I don't think it would travel particularly well.

But every day there's a trickle of visitors to this blog who have come, drawn by Google's promise of "the funniest cartoon ever" and they're mostly from America. I can only imagine their disappointment. And here I am, imagining it...

EXT. PRAIRIE FARM - DAY

SUN SCORCHES THE VAST FIELD OF CORN. JOE, A LEATHERY-SKINNED FARMER, TENDS THE LAND. IT'S BACK-BREAKING, UNRELENTING WORK.
HE'S SINGING "THE OLD RUGGED CROSS."

JUNIOR (O.O.V.):
Pa! Pa! Come quick!

JOE:
Land o' goshen! What is it, son?

JUNIOR:
Pa! I've found it! Come quick!

JOE DROPS HIS TOOLS AND RUNS TO HIS SON.

JOE:
What is it?

JUNIOR:
It's back at the house.

THEY BEGIN TO RUN. WE SEE THEM FROM ABOVE, ANTS IN A SEA OF GOLD.

INT. FARMHOUSE - DAY
PANTING, JOE AND JUNIOR BURST INTO THE LIVING ROOM. A COMPUTER SITS IN THE CORNER, ITS SCREEN SWITCHED OFF.

JOE:
Is it true, son? Have you found it? Have you found the funniest cartoon ever?

JUNIOR:
Yup, pa.

JOE:
And have you seen it?

JUNIOR:
No, pa. I wanted to see it with you.

JOE AND JUNIOR EMBRACE.

JOE:
You're the best, son. Now, let's take a look-see.

THEY WALK TO THE COMPUTER. JUNIOR SWITCHES THE SCREEN ON.

GRAHAM BANDAGE'S LOVELY WORLD APPEARS. IN THE CENTRE OF THE SCREEN IS THE SHEEP CARTOON.

JOE:
You utter tit.

ENDS

I blame myself. And Google. But mostly Google.