I sometimes wonder if this ever actually happened, so I’m going to write it down to make it feel more real. The director of the Hodgson pilot, Ewan Taylor, got in touch with me a few years ago to see if I would be interested in writing a script. I’m always interested in writing a script, so I obviously said yes.
It was a sitcom vehicle for Normski.
Yes. Normski.
And you’re now wondering if I mean the same Normski as you do, and yes, I do.
We met him in the offices of RSA Films, and he was brilliant. Normski sure can tell a story. He chatted for hours, and his life is riddled with some amazing and interesting stories. He’s also an incredibly talented photographer, which has bought him into contact with a string of bands and recording artists. The one constant thing in his life is that people are always approaching him and asking, “Didn’t you used to be Normski?”
I loved this idea, and thought it would be a fun theme to weave into the script.
Also in the room was Felix Dexter, who is also brilliant. He too told some stories that were funny and interesting, so it was great to try and knit them together with Normski’s. (It’s very hard to write about Normski without constantly wanting to write Normski.)
So, off I went and was so excited by this that I very quickly had a full length draft. I submited it, and we never heard from Normski again.
I didn’t think it was that bad.
But the fun part was sitting in a room with someone who could tell a good story and taking that away to work up into a script. Try it. Sit and chat with a raconteur sometime.
