Tuesday 3 April 2012

Announcing The Eurovision Sitcom Contest May 24th

Calling all comedy writers, actors and comedians - May 24th in London sees the first ever Eurovision Sitcom Contest and you are invited to enter.


The High Life's Eurovision episode. Just be funnier than this and you're onto a winner

As with our regular show The Sitcom Trials, we will be showcasing five mini sitcoms (live on stage at The Camden Head in London) and letting the audience vote for which one they like best. And for this show the added twist is we want sitcoms with a European or Eurovision theme.

A couple of the scripts will be performed by writer-performer teams who are working on their work independently, and in the spirit of the Sitcom Trials' mission to showcase new writing talent, we are now putting out the call for fresh sitcom scripts. From you.

If you want the chance of having your sitcom showcased in the Eurovision Sitcom Contest, all you need to do is write 10 minutes of situation comedy, with a Eurovision theme. There's a Sitcom Trials format to write to (see below) but most importantly we want it funny and we'll try and do it justice.

Deadline for script entries is Sat 5 May. Then the deadline for voting (where readers and writers get to help choose the scripts) is Sun 13 May. You upload your scripts to the SitsVac files. First read The Brief below for guidelines.

If you have any questions about the Eurovision Sitcom Contest or The Sitcom Trials you can ask at
The Sits Vac Forum
The British Comedy Guide Forum
or Facebook

The Sitcom Trials present: THE EUROVISION SITCOM CONTEST

Thu May 24
The Camden Head
100 Camden High Street London NW1 0LU
8pm - 10pm £3

THE BRIEF for submission to The Sitcom Trials


The Sitcom Trials wants situation comedy scripts that a small group of actors can perform in a live environment with minimal stage in front of an audience, who will hopefully laugh. Ideally these sitcoms will be so marvellous that the TV & radio industry representatives in the audience will snap them up immediately.

THE FORMAT:

Your script must have a first 'half' of no more than 8 minutes This first half should end in a cliffhanger, or something that leaves the audience wanting more.

It must then have a final scene of 2 or 3 minutes long. This will be performed only if your sitcom is the winner on the night

Your script must have NO MORE THAN 4 CHARACTERS. Ideally 2 boys 2 girls. If you can write a script with just 2 or 3 characters, all the better.

The sitcoms we are to test out in our regular pub theatre shows with an eye to them being developed for TV must be
PERFORMABLE LIVE (ie no filmed or location inserts)
ON ONE MINIMAL SET.

Think in terms of a radio script.

WRITER-PERFORMERS - INCLUDE YOUTUBE DEMO

We are particularly interested to hear from writer-performers, especially those with an on-stage track record (eg Edinburgh) who would present their own sitcom as a self contained package. To demonstrate your live potential we would need to see a video, ideally a link to a YouTube video, which we can judge alongside the script. Please include the video link as part of the script.

UPLOAD SCRIPTS TO THE FILES:

Upload your entries to the appropriate folder in the files section of the egroup: http://tv.groups.yahoo.com/group/SitsVac/files/

Deadline for script entries - see latest SitsVac egroup notice or sitcomtrials.co.uk.
Deadline for reviewing and voting for scripts - see as above.

VOTING

All members of the SitsVac egroup, you included, will be invited to read, review, and vote on all scripts in contention. Vote YES, MAYBE or NO as to each one's potential and add a short one paragraph review. Send reviews including Yes/Maybe/No votes either to the Sits Vac message board. or to the British Comedy Guide Forum.

Writers are welcome to vote on their own scripts.

Votes are then totalled thus; Yes = 2 points, Maybe = 1 point, No = minus -1 point. This way we draw up a shortlist for a script reading, from which we select the items to go into the stage show.

Any questions, ask the egroup so we can all benefit from the answers.

Happy scribbling

Kev F Sutherland
Producer and Presenter
THE SITCOM TRIALS
http://sitcomtrials.co.uk

Sunday 1 April 2012

Sitcom Trials review by Martin Lejeune

Here's a nice find, a review of Friday's Bristol Sitcom Trials by film maker Martin Lejeune:

Last night I had the pleasure of being in the audience of the Bristol Sitcom Trials. A project that takes script submissions and whittles down the five best to be performed live on stage. The scripts had to be 10 minutes long with a cliff hanger and a five minute resolution. We saw the ten minute scenes and then voted on which sitcom got to show its final scene.
It was a really fun evening and not just a great opportunity for people to amuse me but for writers to get peer feedback on their work. There are so many writing competitions out there offering fantastic development deals or fabulous cash prizes but very rarely do they bother to give feedback on why your script didn’t make it. Unfortunately I only found out about the competition the day before it closed when I was two thirds of the way into writing my pilot script.
So the five sitcoms -

“Shock Treatment” by Richard Dowling
Dr S. Lime is a Bond quoting therapist who takes on an apprentice who questions his working practices. It’s always hard to be the first out the gate and the cast did a good job some great moments like the doctor flicking fag ash on a patient wanting to give up smoking.

“The Tragic Life of Roger Bulwark” by Luke Cedar
This started out terribly clichéd with the titular Roger wanting to ask a girl out but manage to rise above it when he suspects the girl may be behind a robbery being investigated. Oh and he has an imaginary friend.

Whitecoats” by Katie Boyles
Two pharmacy workers bicker about how much pride to take in their work. Probably the most ‘SitCom’ of the lot with it being very character and dialogue focused.

“Games Night” by Ed Campbell
A women gets very competitive when her brother comes over to play monopoly and her husband realises he knows the brothers date. I couldn’t help feeling it was a set up I’d seen before with competitive siblings and would have liked to have seen more time given to the secondary characters.

“Making Heavy Weather” by Eddie Robson & Julie Bower
A scientist and a repair woman are assigned to a space station that controls earths weather have to deal with a religious fanatic who thinks it should be left to god alone. I have to say this was my personal favourite by a country mile. The two women in the leads had instantly defined characters the snooty scientist with delusions of grandeur and  the IT girl who has to put up with her constant bitching. The grounded characters allowed the over the top story and setting to really work. 

Here is a compilation of the entries and the winner in video form:
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