Twisted Showcase is back! Series 2

In March we launched our no budget web show Twisted Showcase, our biggest honour from Series 1 has to be our placing in the Guardian Guide's top 25 web TV shows list alongside David Lynch, John Woo and Vic and Bob. And now, we're back for Series 2.
The fact we've been working on Series 2 is my first excuse for the lack of updates on my blog. The second excuse is that I accidentally deleted the note off my phone with all my blog ideas in it. Doh!
There is a trailer for series 2, and there will be more news in the next few weeks before episode 1 on the 25th September. So keep checking www.twistedshowcase.com 

BBC Writers Festival

I've left my blog about the BBC writers festival for a few days, just to allow myself to process the events. I arrived the night before the festival, on the Tuesday, and three days later was spat out the other side full of information and fizzing, like a shook up can of pop, with excitement. I've now had enough sleep that I have sorted through everything that happened and can hopefully put it into some semi coherent order.

Drinks on the Tuesday involved meeting lots of lovely writers and since this was the first time at the event for me, meeting other writers was an exciting highlight and to hear what they were working on and to share Twisted Showcase with them was quite brilliant. We might not have put the world to rights, but we put TV & Film to it.

The main event started midday on the Wednesday, but not after breakfast at a pub that claimed to have the 'best sausage in Leeds', they were good but if that's the best sausage Leeds has to offer I'll be surprised. The writers festival kicked off with an opening speech from Peter Bowker, which can be found on the Script Angel blog, thanks Hayley.

After that it was every writer for themselves, as there were choices as to what talk you wanted to go to. Choices which almost everyone i spoken to had forgotten which one they were in. Luckily boards were in the foyer letting you know which talk you were in, I was in Creating Contemporary Coppers.

Chaired by Toby Whithouse, this session featured Ashley Pharoah and Stephen Butchard, and everyone was treated to a tense and brilliant clip from Stephen Butchard's upcoming TV Cop drama 'Good Cop'. Other advice I picked up from this session was to have something unique about your police drama pitch, but don't try to be too unique, which reminded me of what Steven Moffat had to say about Elementary the CBS adaptation of Sherlock Holmes. On the flip side of creating cop shows with a unique element, both writers admitted that a return to the traditional cop show could be the way to go.

The next session I went to was by Peter Bowker and Patrick Spence, entitled Hanging in There and was about really believing in your ideas, your script and doing as it says in the session title. For evidence of how tough it can be Peter Bowker offered up his experience writing Occupation with took four years, twelve drafts with eight of those drafts being from scratch. Ouch.

There was plenty of choice for each session and I won't go into detail on all the session i went to as what is equally important about the festival is meeting new people and chatting in between sessions and across the road in The Wardrobe, which is actually a pub not a wardrobe.

I won't list the people I chatted to, and went on to one of the best curries I've had, there are far too many. By the  end of the night i must have told the story of how we made Twisted Showcase for no money and then got named in the top 25 in the. Guardian at least a hundred times.

Day 2 of the festival started early. I count 9 am as early, after a cup of tea and some more good chat I was ready for another day which kicked off with a John Yorke masterclass. After which i went to The Reality of Film a session with Joe Oppenheimer, Executive Producer for BBC films. He revealed that BBC films have an annual budget of 11 million, are obsessed with cast, they have stopped doing romantic comedies, make 8-9 films per year, amongst other advice and statistics.

The last two session involved Meeting the commissioners of BBC, ITV, Channel 4 and Sky, and then an entertaining session with Toby Whithouse and Jack Thorne about setting up fantastical worlds where one of the main messages was that budget necessity can become a virtue.

So, all in all, a great festival with interesting sessions, but the highlight for me was probably meeting so many interesting people all with the same passion as me, writing. Also I got to introduce many people i admire to Twisted Showcase including Toby Whithouse and Jack Thorne and then to put the cherry on top since I wasn't sure of my way to the station a walk and a chat with Peter Bowker as my guide. Who inspired me just as much on that walk as he did in his introductory speech.

Bring on next year.

10 tips for creating a top 25 web series

We were very surprised when the Guardian named us one of the top 25 web TV shows you must see. I think we’re one of only two British entries, the other being the legends that are Vic & Bob (I haven’t checked this so if you’re a British web series that we’ve missed that was included please let me know). We never dreamed of being included on such a high profile list, but we were so I guess we must be doing something right; here are some things we tried to do or learnt from making the first batch of Twisted Showcase films that might help with your endeavours. I hope they do.

·         Script – It all starts with the script. It really is the most important aspect. If the script is bad there is no way the film is going to work. Each script we used got extensively drafted. At first we were nervous about asking for rewrites. Who were we to ask people to change their scripts?  Well, we were the people making the series who had a vision of what they wanted, what we thought worked, and didn’t. We know there are better looking web series’ all over the internet than ours, we were only a small team working with no budget, and hence why we put so much emphasis on the script. If there is interest we will put the drafts for Eyeball up on the website as that script went through the most drastic changes as me and Rhys Jones sent drafts back and forth between us.

·         Aim high – We made Twisted Showcase with what we had, which was literally nothing. We borrowed cameras and begged favours. Sometimes we were turned down, a cameo appearance on Casualty scuppering us on one occasion.  Then Gareth David Lloyd said he would be in an episode, something we never felt possible and which elevated the series.  As well as casting we also felt we aimed high whilst promoting the series, getting far more coverage than we anticipated. Much thanks to SFX, Cult Box, Dread Central, Gores Truly, Blogtor Who, Doctor Who magazine, Guardian Guide, Blazing Minds and anyone else who covered us, it was all unexpected.

·         Involve people – Another early decision was to make Twisted Showcase inclusive. We could have gone and wrote every episode ourselves, once you start getting weird and strange ideas it’s quite addictive and they just seem to flow. But we wanted to work with other writers, we also wanted to let as many people who want to work in the crew come along and help. And people who watched the series and enjoyed it, we wanted them to feel a part of the Twisted Showcase world too, and twitter was a great way to do this. Just another reminder, we’re open for scripts at the moment, have a look at our episodes and get submitting.

·         Look good - We are very lucky to have a brilliant logo by Jonathan Edwards. We asked for something that mixed the domestic with the weird. And he delivered. I still like looking at it, and you can get it on a T shirt here. We’ve kept our website pretty basic at the moment, but it’s something we keep looking at expanding and making better.

·         Hard work- The most obvious one I guess. March (was it that long ago), was an intense month, which we probably didn’t prepare for as well as we could. We were still editing some of the films, putting together the title sequence, the trailer was a last minute thought, and we were putting together lists of where to send the press release as we were doing it. Every day was a day to come up with ideas of how to get the name Twisted Showcase out there. That’s only half the story; setting up these films can be difficult. Getting everyone to be available on the same day can be a nightmare, but it’s so rewarding when people see your hard work.

·         One day shoots– This is a difficult one, and one that you could most easily disagree with. It works for us, and make you really work and honing that script down into a an easy to film short film, because it’s so easy to write a script and not think about budget or anything, and it is the strangest things sometimes which are difficult to film. If something has multiple locations it can become a nightmare to get done in a day. Being clever about this was pretty tough, Fear of Living for example all takes place within one house but uses nearly every room of that house. We decided early on to have that juxtaposition of the domestic and mundane to frame the eerie and weird and this helped make shoots a little easier, and hopefully scarier to as the everyday being infiltrated with something to fear is often worse than your most flamboyant imaginings.

·         Catchy title – Twisted Showcase say all you need to know about our show really, and it’s really catchy. Short and to the point. We think so anyway.

·         Have other stuff to put up– Someone might be interested in any aspect of the production. We’ve had commentaries, which usually result in giggling, behind the scenes (also giggling),Outtakes (giggling),  alternate takes,  podcasts, (giggling), interviews, preview pictures, behind the scenes shots. Anything else you’d like to see let us know. All this should keep people checking on the site, although nothing beats the thrill of a new episode.

·         Coherent world, theme, tone – We don’t have an ongoing storyline. We don’t even have a set genre, and hopefully Bob Dracula surprised a few people after the psychological horror of Fear of Living the week before. But we felt something held these episodes together, they could all happen within the same world or something about the tone of the series made them Twisted Showcase. They were all weird tales, they fitted. However disparate your web series is/will be make sure something binds it and makes it coherent something that the audience relate to your name.

·         Luck- We know that getting in the top 25 web TV shows in the Guardian guide must have involved a lot of luck. We’ve made the series with no budget and not spent on advertising it, we relied on our press release getting us out there. Every bit of coverage we received was down to luck, and getting the shoots done on time each time was all down to good luck and some great talent in front and behind the camera. So many things can and do go wrong, sometimes you need a bit of luck.

Finally, something I think is second nature to any creative person, be it film maker, writer, or whatever, everyone always tries to get better, and not to get complacent. This is what we tried to do with Twisted Showcase, to push ourselves in every aspect, make films, learn from mistakes, get better, try different things, try and surprise people, which hopefully we’ll do even more when we return. This isn’t a comprehensive list but stuff that occurred to me and may help you and your web series, or any project you may have on the go. Get out there, do it is the best advice anyone can ever give. Then let me know about what you’re working on in the comments.

Twisted Showcase Part 3

This is my final part of my blog series on Twisted Showcase. You can all breathe a sigh of relief.
This will be the only time I'll get to do a look back at a conventional series of Twisted Showcase I guess, don't worry there is more coming later in the year, but with a bit of a format change. Keep an eye on the site for news on that. Go here to do that check now  Twisted Showcase

So, Part 3 focuses on the last two episodes of Series 1. Probably the two I had least to do with, even though I wrote one of them.
Bob Dracula came through our first ever script call out. An idea which we felt wouldn't get much coverage or lead to many submissions. we were wrong .It's where Twisted showcase started for us really, with that call out we realised that writers at least want to eb writing this kind of thing. We accepted the script Bob Dracula from the writer Leslie Cummins, who went away and expanded the idea a little bit, and Rhys who loves the black comedy side of the series jumped on making this film, and like that it was done.

The last film came from the other end of the spectrum when the deadline for films was approaching and one film we were trying to develop from writer Stephen Marsh fell through, again and again. It fell on me, well it didn't I guess but someone had to write something to film quick and simply. Hence the idea for The Devil Inside Her, which although has a stunning central performance is the most flawed thing I've ever written, in my opinion anyway, and I'm probably my biggest critic, so you may like it, but I wouldn't like to put together such a flat film again.  With Twisted Showcase taking me more into directing and thinking more visually about the script, I'm quite keen to have something more visual than a static webcam shot as the entire film. Still, a lot of people said they find that episode really creepy, so must work in some way.

Let's not forget the Guardian Guide named Twisted Showcase in it's Top 25 web TV shows, so it's all looking good and getting exciting for our upcoming films. It won't be long now.  Brace yourself!

25 web TV shows you need to see

WOW!

Still can't believe it. Twisted Showcase has made the guardian guide Top 25 list of Web TV shows you need to see.

Jaw - dropping.

The list includes Vic and Bob, David Lynch; how Twisted Showcase got on there I don't know. but I'm not complaining.

We began Twisted Showcase for one just to make films and have a base where they can be seen. We also knew we wanted it to be weird, different and open to be anything it could each episode, not restricted by genre, tone etc

We never expected this sort of recognition!

So happy we are getting it though. It's nice to be recognised, and get more people to come and watch the hard work that has been put in. Which will be covered in the next blog which will discuss the last two episodes of Twisted showcase forming the third and final part of my blogs on making Series One. The hard work continues, we are currently making Series 2, with loads of plans for what comes next also flying around.

We hope there's nothing else like it on the internet, and we hope we blow your minds with Series 2.

In the meantime , I'm gonna stare at the top 25 list in proud disbelief. And you can too by clicking on the following link.

Top 25 web TV shows you need to see

Twisted Showcase: Part 2

I've already mentioned on Twitter that the 3rd episode of our first series is very personal to me, even calling it a Horcrux, to say it has a part of my soul in it. I'm only part joking.

  FEAR OF LIVING

 I've talked before about this film being written in order to film easily, one cast member, one location. And I've already discussed how the idea came about after a coffee binge. The original inspiration being what if you feared absolutely everything, even the prospect of being alive. Let's not hide this, Fear of Living definitely comes from a place of depression. There is nothing good in Ian Marksman's world, he is alone, scared and has nothing to live for. A comment on the Twisted Showcase website links the character to paranoid schizophrenia, I'll admit some of this probably seeps in to adhere to the horror conventions, but I was also writing from something far more personal which hopefully comes across in the second half of the film as it shifts from the horror genre to something far more heartbreaking and real.

 The shoot was very helpful for my writing, realising how much dialogue I could cut. Ziad El-Hady's performance made it instantly clear that I'd over written. He was saying sentences, paragraphs of dialogue I'd written with one facial expression. As we were shooting I'd sit next to the camera crossing out loads of dialogue and asking Ziad to try it without certain lines. In most cases they were the takes we used. When it came around to releasing the film was when it dawned on me, what the film was about to me personally, maybe  I was too close to it beforehand. But it has proved a helpful experience all around.

 Unfortunately, this episode has been seen a little less than some of the others. Maybe because we were promoting a new episode every week and people were still trying to find time to watch Episode 1 and 2, shooting starts on series 2 tomorrow and we're already discussing how we'll release the next episodes. But in the meantime, the great thing about films on the net is that they will always be there. Fear of Living will continue to be seen. So, go and watch it.

Twisted Showcase Part 1

In this blog post I'm going to discuss what it felt like unleashing the web series Twisted Showcase onto the world through the internets.
It's not a blog about how to make a web series, which by the way is lots of hard work but quite straight forward: script, cast, film, upload, promote. This blog, which will be in two or three parts, is about the month of March from my perspective.
Twisted Showcase launched on March 1st, St Davids Day, and it's last episode of Series 1 was launched 29th March. It was a hectic month, and theres more to come before the end of the year!
But I'm getting way ahead of myself because this all kicked off a week before the launch as we inflicted the trailer onto our website and all over the internet including
Ok I'll admit I didn't expect any of that to happen, I knew the involvement of Gareth David Lloyd would bring us some attention but was still blown away by it all. There seemed to be anticipation for Episode 1.

Peter & Paul
Nerves. Bloody fear. Most of all excitement. These were all buzzing around as we launched episode 1. We knew we had a great central performance from Gareth David Lloyd (for more on how Gareth came to star in our web series check out the Peter & Paul commentary on the Twisted Showcase website, it's not as interesting as you hope though) but feared how we'd be judged, this was a no budget series and maybe the promotion we recieved made us look bigger than we were. The episode launched as the clock turned midnight to take us into the new month. Here's where we discovered one of my favourite things about the series, the instant feedback we recieved over Twitter. Mostly positive. I still want to thank everyone who watched and commented, still can't believe it really. But, I also came across negative feedback. which do you think I focused on most? Hours and hours stweing over it, analysing what they said, watching the episode again to see if i could see it from their point of view. I couldn't. I learnt that week to let people have their opinions and not to let them affect me. not everyone is going to like what you're doing. Can't please everyone and all that.

Eyeball
Episode 2 was even more stress. this week we didn't have a star name to hide behind. This week was a more experimental film, our star was someone's Eyeball for fucks sake, oh and an egg we'd painted a face onto. It was a three minute film rather than a more conventional ten minute that our first episode was. There's plenty more reasons we were worried, we thought there may be a backlash from people expecting a continuation of the first story not realising it was an anthology show, how would this one go down? Bloody well as it turned out. People even stcuk with us and reviewed us, thanks Gores Truly and Blazing Minds. We felt this episode summed up Twisted showcase, it was a truly weird tale. So were glad it went down well, but we ralso realised the downside of the anthology series, it's really hard to keep an audience who have no reason to return. They've seen a complete story so why come back. We thought Gareth would bring some people back, but why, he's only in our first episode. Oh shit! Maybe TV executives are right not to go for anthology shows, it's a whole new sell every week. No they're wrong. Fuck them, it's a challenge but the anthology show needs to come back. Our thinking is once people get a feel for what Twisted Showcase is they'll come back for that Twisted feeling, which is happening and will hopefully build.

NEXT TIME: We launch episode 3, Fear of Living, I may go into some depth here as it's a film I have a lot to say about. Bob Dracula and Devil Inside Her may be part of Part 3, we'll see