Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
Playwright best known for creating the television drama 'Cracker' and writing the films 'Priest' and 'Hearts and Minds'.
On the island
Eight records
When I Fall in LoveFavourite
I've picked this for my mum and it's just a song my mum used to sing going around about the house. You know, this little two up, two down with loads of kids and not very much money at all, and this woman singing When I Fall in Love, it stayed with me ever since.
The reason I picked this is because I can remember the f the very first record player, my father bringing us into the house, one of those red plastic things. And uh we didn't have a record. We we we now had a record player, but we didn't have a record. Now, my mum used to spend an awful lot of time in the pawn shop'cause it was a pawn shop economy and she was to talk at the Streetford, the pawn shop. So we sent next door and asked them for a loan of a record, and the record they sent was this one, and my mum went deserved.
I haven't picked this for the fact that I I used to stand on the cop, which I did do, you know, it's it's just meant a lot to me all my life, this song. And it it was played at my father's funeral.
At that age I used to play football on the weekend and over night time we'd all go out. I we were all fifteen, sixteen and uh we we used to have a few pounds beforehand and there was a a place called Martins and we were all sixteen, seventeen year old kids and we all used to dance away. I couldn't dance. And there was a a young girl there and she was the epitome of the sixties, long blonde hair, eyes of blue, and she terrified us.
When I was a school teacher I did this wonderful school play about a school and it was called A Brick in the Wall. At the end of that play I remember this kid who was a lovely lad marching all down the aisle. It ended in a custard pie fight and it saved one custard pie and I just saw this kid marching right down the aisle and giving it to me right in the face. You know, but it was a wonderful night.
This is the old Brookside tune because I loved Brookside in those days and I think it's l it's lost its edge a bit now, it's lost its way a bit now. But uh the the old Brookside and the old Brookside tune because Brookside means so much to me.
I've picked this because it reminds me of the time I started work after Brookside for the BBC and I can remember a screening of Needle w which was a film of mine up in Edinburgh. And we all went out afterwards afterwards for quite a few drinks. And I can remember George Faber, who who's now i in charge of single drama at the BBC, he but at the time he was executive producer of Needle, I think. And uh he'd had a few drinks, George. Everything had gone well. And he started to sing Chattanooga Choo Choo.
Well, I have to pick this one because this has always played a family night out and I can't dance at all. And w when this record comes on, I simply jump up and down. So every time this comes on, everybody goes Zebedee and and that's my cue to to dance because it's uh come on out.
In conversation
Presenter asks
0:29How much was Fitz [in Cracker] your creation and how much that of the producer?
It was an awful lot of me and him, you know. At my worst I was Fitz at his worst. At his best he was the kind of person I aspired to be.
Presenter asks
2:21When you were told you were getting Robbie Coltrane to play this role, you must have thought they were mad?
I was suicidal. I thought it was the biggest mistake ever made.'Cause I had this guy, this thin, wiry guy, in mind. ... And then uh the first few rushes came out, and he was absolutely astounding.
Presenter asks
6:27Does that kind of experience [of sudden success] make you feel sort of angry or are you just resigned to the fact?
I'm quite blasé about it now, you know, and it happened to me at the right time, but I'd hate to have gone through this when I was 35. Also, a further thought is you spend all your life and you write all your best stuff trying to get to a position whereby you can write what you want to write, but once you reach that position, you've already written it and you haven't got any more ideas and your energy levels down.
The keepsakes
The book
James Joyce
I've made an awful lot of attempts to read James Joyce's Ulysses and never really succeeded.
The luxury
I had to pick a thing that I always take along with me no matter where I go, and the thing I always take along with me is hemorrhoid ointment.
Presenter asks
9:04You knew a lot about being poor. How poor? What was it like?
Uh we were quite poor, you know. ... We were well fed, well cared for, but we were poor. It was okay to be poor then in the primary school, but as soon as I passed the eleven plus, I mixed with kids who weren't poor, and that's the only time I became aware of the fact that we were poor.
Presenter asks
12:26Is there a link perhaps between the stammer and the writing?
Yeah, exactly, yeah. And and I could pick the apt word, you know. Because I'm a word switcher, even as a child, I had loads of words at my disposal. My vocabulary was wide because I was constantly, you know, pick this word, pick that word, choose that word. But when I came to write, I could pick the the mo just as that's the word, the the apt word, you know.
Presenter asks
27:00Do you really think the world is such a dark place, or is it just for the purpose of drama?
It is for the purpose of drama and in Kraker there are huge issues there, you know, uh an issue like racism and rape in in the same programme. That's huge to tackle. But I think I approach that with honesty and integrity, and it's dangerous stuff.
“Success has many fathers. Failure is always an orphan.”
“I think all men are potential rapists. You know, that's a feminist argument. But it's my argument. I think there's a tremendous capacity for evil inside us all.”
“I think the thing to have a conscience about is if you have any kind of clout or influence, how do you use that clout and how do you use that influence? How do you spend your money?”