Thoughts on Queen's

I turned on the television to check the Queen's final score yesterday afternoon, fully expecting it to have gone into a deciding set, only to find Marin Cilic wandering around with the trophy. This puzzled me, since he'd just lost the first set the last time I checked the score and there was definitely something going on - for one thing, he was booed when Sue Barker tried to get a comment from him. It took a few more minutes to decipher what was going on but it eventually transpired that his opponent David Nalbandian had overreacted to being broken by Cilic and had kicked an advertising hoarding beside the court. Unfortunately, that hoarding shielded a line judge: the hoarding struck the judge, causing him to fall off his chair as the wound on his leg started bleeding fairly heavily. Nalbandian was disqualified, handing the title to Cilic. The Telegraph article includes the video of the moment Nalbandian lost his temper.

What astonished me, however, was not the actual kick but the reaction of the crowd to Cilic. I honestly can't believe they booed him for the fact his opponent ended the match in a sudden and rather violent manner. Yes, they felt deprived of their tennis final; yes, some of them didn't realise the severity of the line judge's injury. Still, wanting a match to go on when someone outside of the two players has been hurt feels selfish beyond belief on the part of the crowd. More than that, it seems like they wanted to reward Nalbandian for his antics. In fairness to them, though, they did boo Nalbandian himself when he waffled on live television and tried to blame the ATP's hectic schedule for his reaction.

All this got me thinking. As a collective, humans are very selfish. We boo if something unexpected goes wrong in a tennis match; we boo if a band doesn't perform the song everyone wants to. What about authors? I would imagine the criticism they receive online is akin to crowd booing. If you write a series which people become invested in and then make an unpopular turn I'd imagine the crowd can be fairly harsh: what were the reactions, I wonder, to the killings of Sirius Black and Albus Dumbledore in the Harry Potter series?

Step back another inch, to somewhere in-between writing and spectacle: television drama and soap. These combine writing with performance and therefore any 'blame' can be spread around a large group. However, anecdotal evidence suggests that actors are criticised in the streets for the actions of their characters - this is a nice way for writers to avoid criticism!

Of course, I don't think there's anything wrong with debate. The recent Alzheimer's storyline in Coronation Street provoked a lot of debate, most of which seemed to shy-away from outright 'booing'. However, the actions of the crowd at Queen's yesterday edged away from polite irritation at the rules (and the right of the line judge to work in relative safety) and moved into outright hostility. What happens if you start listening to the crowd's demands to be entertained? I don't know. But I do know I'm not keen on trying it.

Love On Coronation Street

I don't often drift into Coronation Street philosophising on here but bear with me for one post. There's something niggling me about one of the storylines - and I bet it's not the one you think either.

I love Rita Sullivan. Definite Corrie legend and one of those characters who you feel deserves a bit of happiness. After all, she's had two husbands die on her, been pursued by a madman through the streets of Blackpool and had a tram dropped on her head: let her enjoy a few years of peace, eh? Well, the producers may have had a similar notion (I say 'may' with deliberate cautiousness because this is Corrie, after all). Rita has just become engaged to Dennis Tanner, following a year of friendship that always implied it would become something more. Now, I love Dennis as much as I love Rita. He's a neat link to a bit of Coronation Street history and he's a funny character, always having a pop at Norris in The Kabin. Ah, there lies the problem - Norris.

Quite a while ago - in a post about longing - I suggested that I wanted Rita and Norris to settle into a happy retirement strangling each other. Part of me still does. I'm torn between enjoying the couple actually on screen and wishing that irritating curmudgeon Norris would get the woman he so clearly loves. My prevailing memory of the tram crash isn't linked to a death but is Norris plainly saying 'all I care about is you' when Rita's brought out of the rubble. But now Norris is trying to hide his emotions under a thick layer of sarcasm as Rita and Dennis celebrate their engagement. I just find the situation difficult to watch! How can you like two couples with equal weight? And, more to the point, how can the engagement of a pair of pensioners be trumping the drama of murders, affairs and family meltdowns for me? I really am a funny one. And I'm looking forward to the wedding.

One final point about the engagement episode - I was really impressed with the script and the whole 'where were you when JFK was shot' conversation. Set aside from the mayhem of the current murder plot, the party was a gentle reminder of Corrie's comic capabilities, a hat tip towards its past and a demonstration that wonderful characters can still be sensitively written. It's odd the things that I look for in my soap viewing.

 

The Mileage of Longing

As anyone who follows me on Twitter will be aware of, I'm currently going through one of my periodic binges on excellent television. This time, it's American sitcom, Frasier, which I hope many people still remember fondly. It told the story of radio shrink, Frasier Crane, as he returned to Seattle to start a new job. His father, Martin, moved in with him, along with English physical therapist, Daphne Moon. And, quite often, his brother, Niles, dropped in to visit. From their very first encounter, it was clear Niles was entranced by Daphne, something which later developed into a strong love.

The comedic value of that attraction was massive. There were some notable episodes which played on it: the series one episode, 'A Midwinter Night's Dream', in which Niles and Daphne are trapped by a storm at his house:

Another favourite of mine is the series three episode, 'Moon Dance'. Daphne helps Niles learn how to dance and eventually ends up accompanying him to the event after his partner cancels. Martin has warned Niles that he'll say something he'll regret in the heat of the moment. Niles duly does this, only for Daphne to surprise everyone by declaring her love as well. For a blissful few seconds both Niles and the audience are ecstatic, only for Daphne to joke that they had everyone fooled:

By series six producers had decided to end the audience's agony. During this series there were several hints Niles and Daphne would get together, despite Daphne accepting a proposal from someone else. Series seven saw Niles start a relationship with someone else, only for Daphne to finally learn how he felt about her for six years. As will occasionally happen, she finds herself suddenly attracted to him too. We get the happy ending, despite Niles marrying someone else and Daphne preparing to walk down the aisle with her fiancée. They start series eight as a couple, in a move which altered the dynamic of the show considerably.

I'm probably not the only one who thinks the most magical aspects of the Daphne/Niles relationship occurred while they were apart. Aside from the merits of the earlier years, when Niles pined silently after her, I'm extremely attached to series seven. From the very next episode after Daphne has discovered how Niles feels about her, she begins to alter her perception of him and starts to look at him in a different way. In a half-an-hour comedy where the spotlight is on another character there isn't much space devoted to the on-going trials of the ensemble cast. That said, the writers and Jane Leeves (playing Daphne) pulled it off magnificently. With little moments scattered throughout series seven, the audience were as involved in Daphne's realisation as they had been in Niles's adoration over the previous six years.

The Frasier producers seemed to have realised they'd pushed the unrequited love boat as far as it could go. It was a key ingredient of the show and I know people who think it suffered for losing the will-they-won't-they strand. But it had to happen. They had to get together. You can't build the expectations of your audience up for years then betray them. This sense of longing can offer immense mileage to a writer, whether you're writing fiction, scripts or anything else, but you have to be careful to resolve the tension before interest diminishes. Soaps are one medium where you can milk this kind of thing too much. For every wonderful Olivia/Natalia storyline (from American soap, Guiding Light, now sadly defunct) there is an Ashley/Bernice (Emmerdale, quite a few years ago now). The beauty of the former was that it switched from longing to fulfilment at just the right time. The viewer had been able to follow both Olivia and Natalia's emotional journey's and jumped when they jumped. However, the problem with the Emmerdale storyline was that the couple couldn't last. They were too different. Once they were together the producers didn't know what to do with them and so the character of Bernice eventually left.

I love my will-they-won't-they dramas. Currently I'm hoping for Rita and Norris to settle into happy retirement strangling each other in Coronation Street. Or what about Sean and Vicky in American import The Event? The tension there is beyond belief! As a fan of Downton Abbey I was screaming at the screen for Bates to admit how he felt about Anna all through the first series and it's one of my motivating factors for watching series two later this year.

Let's face it, if love makes the world go round, longing from a distance certainly makes it a more interesting ride. Anybody else have some excellent will-they-won't-they shows for me to get hooked on?

Farewell 2010...

I must admit, at first I had some difficulty in establishing what had changed in my life this year. After all, I'm still living in the same place with my father and I'm still in the same relationship I was twelve months ago. Yes, I'm doing a PhD but I was reading so many books before that I really can't tell the difference...

The truth is, though, I've accomplished more than I thought I could, at least on a personal level. I've left two jobs of my own accord and devoted myself entirely to a subject whose depth astonishes me on a daily basis. I now have two full-length manuscripts vying to get themselves revised and published. I've also come on leaps and bounds with my confidence in the creative sense. Generally, I feel better about that aspect of my life.

I owe thanks to a lot of Twitter people for helping me out this year, whether by posting links to massively informative and inspirational blog posts or just responding to my own ramblings. And, of course, a special shout-out must go to the (old) stalwarts: Claire, Laura, Nicola and Sal who have all egged me on this year to the point where I want to strangle them. Thanks!

Since I started this blog back in April I've made 71 posts. These have been on subjects from politics to coincidence, but mainly concentrating on the world of writing and entertainment.

2010 saw the triumph of Downton Abbey, for instance. I was reluctant to watch it at first and allowed four episodes to build up before I started. Of course, then I sped through it. It's escapism, I think that's why it's so popular. Plus, it's well-written, it's coherent - both exceptional things in the world of modern television. Read my series review here.

As for the rest of the television world this year, I haven't really been into much. I've taken to watching American import, The Event, which I'm hooked on. It could be said that I've watched Glee religiously but there are gaps in the plot and characterisation on there that the Titantic could squeeze through. Coronation Street hit 50 and I tuned in for the special tram crash week. Aspects of the soap really make me want to keep watching as another form of escapism but I may put my fist through Kate Ford's face. We'll have to see what 2011 brings on that score.

I haven't read many books this year, many that aren't directly related to my degree anyway. I'm swimming in Sensation Fiction which is fine because I seem to have developed an adoration for it. However, several of the new books I've read this year I've managed to review: The Good Doctor, Tell It To The Bees, Nights At The Circus and The Haunted Hotel.

All in all, it hasn't been a terrible year. I've learned more than I thought and lost less than I should have.

I went to places I would never have considered going twelve months ago. I've met new people, reconnected with the old, and tried to be a decent human being. That's not a bad sum total for a year.

Coronation Street at 50

It may seem strange for a twenty three year-old to say that the era of Corrie she identifies as her favourite is the one during the decade before she was born.

Thanks to the wonder of now-defunct channel, Granada Plus, I spent most of my childhood caught up in the lives of Elsie Tanner, Ena Sharples, Rita Fairclough and company. The world of the contemporary Corrie was the period before the axeman, Brian Park, took hold. It was slightly boring and nothing at all like the episodes I idolised.

As Coronation Street celebrates fifty years on television there are a lot of people reminiscing. Indeed, ITV have Victoria Wood narrating a 'Top 50' moments as part of the celebrations. I was one of the many who voted in this and I wonder if I was the only person annoyed by the prescription of the exercise. After all, a drop-down box with a list of events that we had to pick ten of required somebody to narrow down what they thought were 'noteworthy' storylines. The number of modern ones included obviously pandered to the modern audience. We'll get a couple of classics in the top ten, I'm sure, but I would've liked a system of choosing half from the prescribed list then selecting some of their own. I'm sure some would've cropped up often enough to be included in the list.

No one denies that times have changed in the television world. The Barlow family sitting around the table throwing dismayed looks over the sauce bottle won't cut it in a world that wants action, action, action and non-stop emotional drama. Hence why a tram just crashed into the Corner Shop and dropped its rear end on Rita Sullivan's head. To be fair on Corrie, it doesn't indulge in enormous events as often as Eastenders and Emmerdale do. Of course, you get the disproportionate number of murders, fires and affairs, but very rarely is a huge slice of the population put in danger.

One of the reasons I stopped watching Coronation Street regularly about five years ago was the swelling size of the cast and the introduction of characters I couldn't be bothered to care about. I think that's still a problem. If I went in tomorrow as another Brian Park style axeman I would take out a number of characters without hesitation. John, Kirk, Cheryl, Russ, Chris, Lloyd, Steve, Janice, Dev, Sunita, the Windass family and Julie are some of the characters immediately on my hit list (this disregards any deaths from the tram crash as I'm avoiding spoilers like the plague for this one). My favourite current characters are some stalwarts and some new legends: Eileen, Rita, Emily, Peter, Carla and Sophie. It's no coincidence that five of them are women. Strong female characters are what Corrie has always done best.

However, if you look at the names on the cobbles now and compare them with the Seventies, for instance, there's no comparison. How do Elsie, Annie, Hilda and Ena stack up against Gail, Eileen, Becky and Leanne? The former wipe with the floor with the latter any day of the week. In another fifty years I don't know how many of the modern crop will be remembered but Elsie Tanner won't be a name easily forgotten.

It was while watching the first episode on Monday that I realised how good it once was. Pat Phoenix lit up the screen, Violet Carson made you smirk, Doris Speed made you feel faintly uncomfortable. I don't know if you can ever recapture that success; I don't even know if a modern audience would want to try.

There's a lot of talk that Corrie could continue for another half-century. Unfortunately, I don't think the appetite for good television will last that long. Coronation Street has already changed beyond recognition and you have to wonder how much further the soap can bend.