Rhetoric on Euro vote should be familiar to Cameron

Some days it can be hard to be a geopolitical optimist.  It is even harder to be one in favour of change.
But I could not resist a feeling of schadenfreude (in itself a useful European import) watching David Cameron squirm as this week, his eurosceptic grandstanding finally faced the arguments of economic uncertainty.

The reason for the glee is simple.  If pushed, I would describe myself as a Scottish Nationalist, not because I want to paint myself in woad and mount the heads of the English on Spikes at Hadrien's wall.  (That last part would be terrible for my relationship)  Rather because I am a Scottish Optimist.  I believe we could do it.  I also suspect that without the Eurosceptic deadweight of our English cousins, we could happily become a Denmark or a Belgium.  

Quietly going about our business, improving the lives of our citizens within a strong Europe and barely bothering the international stage save for the occasional innovation in science and syndicating Rab C Nesbit in the Far East.  For as long as I can recall, I have watched UK politicians, the mainstream broadcast media and the press savage the idea of Independence.  Everybody remembers Douglas Alexander's 'Divorce' adverts.  The lists of terrible things that would happen if we tried it including, destitution, the sale of national assets, and the fear of businesses leaving Scotland in droves.  Fear, fear, fear.

Don't rock the boat.

Now, those same arguments are being used by our international friends.  'Britain is sleepwalking out of Europe'.  'Businesses will think twice before investing if a referendum is called.'

So Dave, maybe a call to Alex Salmond is in order.  He'd probably tell you that just when faced with similar from you and your cronies who can barely win a seat in Scotland, such arguments are nigh on impossible to counter with fact.  Fear sells papers where fact does not.

So now, we face the farcical idea of Dave leading the charge against leaving Europe.  Against the will of the electorate, Joe Public, they who did not put you in power in the first place.  This is a seventy ton chicken coming home to roost.  Why?  Because Joe public hates Europe and in part, it's Dave's fault.

His party has fanned the flames of a quarter of a century of bile against the EU.  Always the easy target, and yes at times they have made it easier with straight bananas, CAP and fishing regs but never in recent years has the case been made to the public of 'What Europe actually does'.  Far easier to wallow in the negative, faintly xenophobic bureaucratisation, alienation and venom where every regulation is received like someone kicking the Queen in the head.

I have often wondered why Britain is so afraid of the thing it helped to create.  A space alien coming down to earth would be forgiven for looking at the USA and China and Russia, not to mention the rise of India and Brazil and thinking, wow, those guys should really join together to take on these bigger boys.  The EU is the strongest and largest trading block in the world.

Yes, in theory, Britain could survive or even prosper outside Europe.  But we won't for this simple reason.  The 25 years of bile have not gone unnoticed across the channel.  Diplomatically, we are in a weaker state than I can ever remember.  Our failure to engage with Europeans to improve the EU and the constant belly-aching and sabre-rattling have left us isolated with no friends we can count on to grant us the reforms Cameron might want in his renegotiation, and for sure if political ineptitude brought about an exit at the hands of referendum by a public conditioned to know nothing about Europe other than that they hate it, Europe would ensure that our parting would be as painful, protracted and expensive as possible.  They would delight in reimposing tax hikes on British goods and with this week's intervention from across the channel, our friends in the USA would mock our political naivety and ignore our 51st state entreaties as they reorientate their political engagement toward the Pacific.

So why then does Britain fear Europe?  For me there are two answers.  The first answer I keep returning to is that the British establishment does not like politics.  It does not like the hard work of democracy.  Our first-past-the-post system and slavish reverence to the monarchy does not allow for much compromise in how we govern ourselves.  Britain is the only nation in Europe for whom coalition was deemed unthinkable to the point that an attempt was made to unify by rote two completely contrasting parties to avoid the political hard work of true multi-party politics.  As such, we fear and mistrust being a mere part of a democratic whole.

The second reason is much simpler.  In Europe, we are in a position of weakness and this story is why.
I am a freelance writer by trade.  I have had a variety of jobs and for the last three years, one of those has been based in Paris where I mentor Higher Education students and help them with content in English.  In Paris, therefore, I am one of the comparatively few dirty foreigners coming over from Britain and stealing French jobs.  This is possible because I am conversant in French, but although a long way from fluent, I speak better French than 97% of the UK population.  In France I probably sound like a ten year old child.

Contrast this then with Europe, where just about every continental European I've ever met in Britain speaks better English than I speak any other language.  This is the losing battle we fight.  Of course they're coming over and stealing our jobs, because they can, and most of us are powerless to go over and steal there's.  Surveys suggest that less than one in ten of us can count to twenty in any other language.  That is beyond uncompetitive.  That, in a global employment market is completely f**^&d and is also impossible to fix in less than a generation.  We have a populace geared to fear and mistrust Europe whilst everybody else is busy seeing the possibilities and taking advantage of them, and by dint of our uncompetitiveness, taking advantage of us.

So, as this conversation heats up, one thing becomes evident.  You don't have to be a Europhile to understand the value of this elephant trading block on our doorstep, an elephant that is actively seeking to strengthen itself as an entity.  We need to get in there and start battling in a meaningful way for our interests, not by way of vetos and exemptions but by building the alliances and moulding Europe in the creation of new policies that will benefit us as part of the greater whole.  We shouldn't leave Europe.  that is a geographical impossibility.  Instead we should look to address our weaknesses and do what we can for the next generation to truly lead it.

Getting paid for screenwriting (May I be brutal?)

As a screenwriter who has survived (and more recently, prospered) in the game, I'm often asked how to 'get into the business' or 'get paid for doing what I love'. (Retch)

Here's my answer. A lot of new screenwriters won't like it. 

This is because most screenwriters have a dream project, a story they want to tell, an idea that they just KNOW will be a hit film. I don't care about that. I don't particularly care about your ideas, your projects. What I care about boils down into a simple question.

How good are you at this thing you claim to want to do for a living? To answer this question, let me tell you a story of two screenwriters. Bob and... Mo (it being Ramadan)

Bob wants to be a screenwriter. 'Ok.' says Bob, 'I've read my Field, my Snyder and my McKee. Now I'm going to write my spec script, the one great idea that made me want to be a writer.' Bob goes off and lo and behold, he writes and writes and produces something that looks and smells vaguely like a 'screenplay'. 'Huzzah!' Says Bob. 'I'm going to send this to agents and producers and maybe, just maybe, one of them will option the script, make the movie and make my fortune!' Bob does his best to pull in his contacts, he cashes in favours and sells his body in the hope that someone important will read his opus.

Now at this point, we should maybe cover some truths about Bob. Whilst he is a likeable thoroughly optimistic sort of fellow the following is likely to be the case.
1. Bob is statistically almost certain to be rubbish at screenwriting. This is his first go at this.
2. Bob's 'one great idea' might actually be quite good, but he has more than likely just spunked it up the wall in a terrible screenplay.
3. Bob has no influence, no allies and the business being what it is, Bob's idea, if it gets read and if it's any good will likely be given to someone else to write professionally.
4. Bob has not experienced process. He has not learned to write with any boundaries beyond a form book that he more than likely doesn't fully understand.
5. And remember, this was Bob's 'one great idea' so more than likely, Bob will sit back and wait for some kind of response to his hard written work of genius. When none comes, Bob will lose heart and return to his day job.
We all know a Bob. We love his innocence, but Bob is not a screenwriter. Bob is a man with one idea who happens to have written a screenplay.

Now consider Bob's friend Mo. Mo read the same books as Bob. Mo has probably also written a spec screenplay, but Mo knows that his own recently excreted pearl might not stand up to scrutiny at the sharp end. 

So what does Mo do? He goes along to the low level networking events that will admit him. He talks to people, people like himself who are at the beginnings of their career. Mo does not have the patience for the slush pile. Mo is looking for something specific - a newish producer with an idea for a movie, but without the skills to turn it into a screenplay. 'Do such things exist?' I hear you say? The answer is simple. The producer with an idea is a lot more common than the producer who is sitting in her office, fanned by slaves, waiting for the perfect unsolicited screenplay to drop through the letterbox. 

Mo eventually finds a producer with an idea - the idea is about gangsters. Although not particularly into gangsters, Mo tells the producer he can write this screenplay. Mo shows the producer his spec script. Mo's spec script is no better than Bob's but it doesn't have to be. Where Bob was trying to convince high end readers to make his movie, Mo is only trying to prove to a newish producer that he knows how to write a screenplay, any screenplay. 

If indeed he does, Mo's odds - combined with his personality and demonstrated drive (he's shown up at this event after all) are good. 'I can't pay you much, Mo.' The producer is likely to say. 'As you're new, Mo, I'll give you $800, 400 now, 400 when you're done. We'll sort a proper fee if/when the film goes into production.' Mo knows that these aren't the sort of numbers he's read about in books, but he reckons he can bash this out, and what the hell, this newbie producer might get the thing made. If not, some optimist has just given him money to get better at screenwriting. 

Mo writes the movie in the evenings and at weekends. It's a fraught challenging process. Mo has to take notes, learn genre, listen to the producer's mate who 'Almost had a short at Sundance once'. All of this makes him better at screenwriting and helps him to begin to assert himself as the 'expert in the room' on screenplay. Whilst Bob waits for the gods to respond to his script in the pile, Mo finishes the screenplay, hands it over and leaves the producer to get on with getting it made. Maybe the producer likes Mo, maybe he offers him another gig. Maybe not, but Mo has learned process and he is now the author of two different screenplays. 

Mo goes back to the networking events and does the same trick again. Occasionally, he meets douches. Sometimes it doesn't work out but Mo has scripts out there with inexperienced but motivated producers pushing them to get made. Mo doesn't have to do anything. He keeps writing to briefs - briefs he never thought he would work on. He suddenly finds himself saying things like 'Yeah, I wrote one of those a few months back. Let me send you a sample.' Word starts to get around that Mo is a guy with the skills to write anything. People begin to knock on his website. 

Mo writes five full length screenplays for peanuts in his first year for five different producers in four different genres. None of them are 'his idea'.  He does some process on all of them, including writing treatments and pitching. Bob meanwhile is still waiting for someone to buy into his dream. He's maybe started to tinker with another 'awesome idea' but he's had no process on his first screenplay. He hasn't worked it or learned to write to remit or deadlines. He won't have improved much.

By this point, with deadlines to motivate him, Mo is beginning to feel confident enough to start approaching agents, and maybe, using his skills to write that awesome spec project. He's also gained the confidence not to write screenplays for $800. He'll have the benefit of Five people who have good will and OWE HIM to help grease the wheels, who themselves are climbing steadily up the greasy pole of the industry.

Cards on the table. I'm a Mo. I back his method because it was mine and in the city of London circa 2009 - present, I know it works. When I lecture my University students or talk to newbie writers, I encounter the same fear of process. 'How do I stop them from changing my ideas?' 'Hollywood makes you write to a formula.' 'I'm not into commercial kind of films.'

These are walls you are meant to run into as a professional. The smashes and train wrecks, the arguments, the crying, the hair pulling... It all makes you better at what you do. Writing screenplays is where this job begins, not where it ends. You fight and learn and win the battles through your mastery and application of craft, not, as some books would have you believe, by following through on one good idea.
It is possible to get so good at this that the ideas and 'changes' people add to your script are exactly the ones you subliminally suggested in its writing.

For you writers out there, I'd love to know your thoughts and your methods. The US has a more vibrant spec market than the UK and maybe there are other ways to slice it but to summarise the above, I would distil this into the below.

Write for people whilst you are weak. Learn on their time and their dime (however small that dime may be) When you are stronger with your craft and more connected in the business, write for you.

The British Screenwriter's ode to Hollywood

The movies are doing my head in at present

Of all careers out there, this one seemed quite pleasant

But getting things made is like walking in treacle

It isn't my fault, No! I blame other people!

For this is a business where everyone smiles

Make sure that you're up on the Hollywood styles

'How bankable is he and what did he say?'

'Is she right for it?' 'Maybe? How much does she weigh?'

'I'll read it tomorrow!' 'God damn I forgot!'

'Next time you're in Cannes you should come on my Yacht'

'Do you have a nice Indie? I want the next Juno!'

'I quite liked the start but the rest's a bit... you know?'

'Wow you're a screenwriter?' 'What have you made?'

'I'm not signing anything till I get paid/laid'

'Is that actual blood on page ninety six?' 

(Where I gouged my eyes out and impaled them on sticks)

'You're from England? 'I love that!' 'Hi! How have you bin?'

(That means that he's poor and has terrible skin!)

I'll just quit so I don't have to moan like a bitch...

Yeah, who am I kidding... They might make me rich...

Doing film business in Nigeria - An understated near death experience

I must preface this article with a couple of things.

1.  Anything I refer to is purely based on my own experience

2.  I was only in Nigeria a week, a short sharp shock for an Africa newbie.

The first experience of a work trip to Nigeria is of wondering around with vaguely symmetrical aches in your upper arms.  Yellow Fever, Typhoid, anti malarials rattled around my confused biology, as administered by a Northern Irish nurse who still felt the need to distract me with holiday based conversation as she repeatedly stabbed me.  Be still my Celtic sister, turn my arm into a colander but don't insult my intelligence.  I'm freelance so after this I can go and have a lie down...

That lady and a fair few others had a not dissimilar response when I revealed my plan to visit Nigeria for work.  'Don't get kidnapped' a friend of mine chirped helpfully, ruining my fun.  Others simply wrinkled their noses and ask 'Why?'  The short answer was as follows.  'I am going on a research trip for a feature film I've written about a Western writer who is kidnapped by pirates whilst visiting Nigeria on a research trip.'

Those with a moderately developed sense of irony politely suppressed a snigger at this.  Those who know me and my travel habits a little better do not make the Indiana Jones esq connection I'm trying to cultivate in my university teaching.  I'm generally more of a cafe culture Europhile making trips to places famed for their museums, train links and boulevards.

Fortunately those visiting Nigeria must undertake a mandatory training programme known in most circles as obtaining a travel visa from the Nigerian High Commission.  Here, I must make a distinction. If your bank offers a Visa credit card, you will be welcomed in with open arms, obtaining the travel visa through a relatively simple online process accompanied by an hour's early morning wait.

If not then you must attempt to 'pay at the commission' and your training begins in earnest.  After being searched and checked over by external security, asked to turn off your phone, you will be sent downstairs through a waiting room into a small room where the magic truly starts to happen.  After about forty minutes, commission staff will appear and say 'good morning' before reappearing close to a half hour later to open a small office for which you are encouraged to informally queue.

Nigerian queuing as far as I can work out, seems to be the same way that people might queue at a broken ATM continuously dispensing cash.  Once you force your way to the front, a terrifying young woman, physique straining under a sprayed on silk blouse will grumpily ascertain your 'status'.  Mine was, 'Have form, have supporting documents, just need to pay.'  She grunted, then handed me a pink slip.

Then you discover that 'pay at the commission' loses something in the translation.  What you have to do is leave the commission, head round to the post office.  Opposite the post office is a Newsagent with a Cadbury's chocolate logo on the outside.  You must go in there, ask for Mr Patel, perform the secret handshake, give him a piece of pink paper to prove your identity and £100 in unmarked notes.  He will then pay the consulate and give you a receipt.  After picking up a £50 postal order (£80 if your turnaround is less than a week) you then return to the commission and rejoin the queue with no beginning or end.

After fighting your way to the front, you then hand your slip back to the scary silk blouse woman who tells you to sit down, which by this point you feel like doing anyway.  You then sit in the airless subterranean chamber for another hour until they process your payment slip.  Once you have the payment slip, you may then join the official queue, which is at least governed by the Argos numerical waiting system.  (Average waiting time from this point- 2 hours)

After your number is called, you must then attempt to outwit a desk clerk who does not want you to visit his country and with undisguised glee, winds down the clock until the end of the processing window at 1pm, demanding a signed letter of invitation from whoever you are going to meet with in the country.

Day two, assuming you can get the letter, you return to the Commission before it opens, queue to get in, wait another hour and a half.  (You are now on first name terms with many of the others in the queue having spent five hours with them the previous day. Negotiate with the same desk clerk who might grudgingly grant your papers, or in actuality, take your documents and passport and hold them, encouraging you to return a few days later to pick up your prize.

If you still want to visit, the experience does indeed prepare you for what is to come.

2013 and I

Me:  So 2013, we meet at last.

(2013 twirls moustache, strokes white persian cat and presses button to activate shark pool)

2013:  I've been expecting you.

Me:  Um... Ok.  So, how is this thing going to play out?

2013:  Well, I have some rather delightful things in store.  This year you are going to turn 30, plan a wedding and cancel your gym membership at the earliest opportunity.

Me:  That doesn't sound so bad.  When I saw the sharks I naturally assumed things would be more dire...

(2013 looks somewhat disappointed but carries on regardless)

2013:  Ha!  You know nothing!  For this will also be the year of your final confrontation with the film industry, the year that dictates whether you will make the leap to dreamt of success or hide yourself amongst the tall grass and reassurance of a job with hours and pensions and the the cat vomit-like stench of failure.

(2013 laughs smugly, Persian cat looks moderately offended)

Me:  Actually, a lot of people I know do real work.  Some of them I even like.

2013:  Did I mention you will no longer be cool anymore?

Me:  You really should have talked to 1990 - 2012.  Cool has never really been an issue for me for the same reason that crashing my Boeing 767 was never an issue.

(2013 looks impressed)

2013:  You have a Boeing 767?

Me:  Yes, and it is full of champagne, pork pies and ho's.

2013:  I don't believe you.  You don't dress well enough to own a private plane and nobody eats pork pies with Champagne.

Me:  My hypothetical plane, my rules, besides, the ho's haven't complained and that's all I feed them.

2013:  I knew it!  There is no plane, no ho's and no pies.  You are no longer cool.

Me:  (sighs) So what if most of my friends are over thirty and married?  So what if I own a cat and have a mortgage.  So what if my idea of a great Friday night is watching back-to-back 15 year old episodes of Cold Feet on Lovefilm and commenting on how 90s everything looks whilst debating how it was that Helen Baxendale ever 'happened', watching Arsenal lose to mediocre opposition on Match of the Day and trying to remain witty enough to dupe my fiancé into accidentally sleeping with me.  Is this not the middle class utopia I was promised?

2013:  Face it, you are boring.  You are boring and two stone heavier than in 2010, I asked him.

Me:  You take that back!

2013:  Your hips don't lie, in fact they have a distinctly middle aged waddle these days.

Me:  Fuck you, I worked in theatre in 2010 and was unable to feed myself properly.  My metabolism has slowed but I'm told I look healthier with the weight on so you can fuck right off and misquote Shakira at someone who deserves it.  Besides I still play tennis once per week and relish the two days after it where I can't walk after losing to the nice man in his mid fifties who humours me so patiently.  That waddle is tendonitis.

2013:  Whatever you say.  So, any resolutions to break or is an inevitable slide into middle age the best you can do?

Me:  Yes, I've decided to win at everything, except for arguments with my other half because victory is an impossibility there.  I will make a Hollywood film, train a brace of kick ass screenwriters at university and so help me, I will have that loft conversion so I don't have to sleep with my head and my feet touching opposite walls of my bedroom.  I will complain about the X Factor and about those friends who post baby posset on Facebook.  I will call for the execution of politicians who begin sentences with 'Look' and those who play youtube clips at parties.  I will ignore the sycophantic lobotomised drooling of the mainstream media over the monarchy...

And I may even put up some shelves.

(2013 looks a little perturbed.  It attempts to distract me by throwing its white persian cat into the shark pool and backs away slowly with the half smile one uses to humour a crazy person.)

2013:  Ok, you just do that.

(2013 disappears through a secret door, tripping over its own feet in its haste to escape.)

Me:  Don't go!  I haven't even told you how I plan to spend my Christmas iKea vouchers...

(I Sigh, watching as cat is consumed by sharks.)