by Adele Parks
‘Afternoon,’ I breeze.
‘Afternoon,’ they mumble sulkily. For a nanosecond I think they are going to add ‘miss’, but they don’t.
‘What’s this?’ I ask, pointing sceptically towards a cardboard box in the centre of the table. It’s overflowing with balloons, Christmas decorations, crayons, sticky-backed plastic, old magazines, a toy trumpet, several Comic Relief noses and a cappuccino.
‘Oh, that’s my coffee,’ says Di, reaching into the box and rescuing her drink. She takes a huge slurp, oblivious to my disdain.
‘Yes, that’s clear. What is the rest of it?’ I fear Debs has been let down by her childminder again and had to bring her five-year-old son into work. I hope not – Bale just isn’t in the mood.
‘It’s the creativity box,’ pipes up Fi, enthusiasm oozing from every pore. I look at her, waiting for a more meaningful explanation. She tries, ‘It’s to help stimulate more creative thoughts.’ Even if I hadn’t read Fi’s CV I would know by this comment that she had an idyllic childhood, went to the best public schools for young ladies and had a father who adored her. How else could she be this happy with life? I think I’ll piss on her parade.
‘Remind me, Fi, which industry do we work in?’
‘TV.’ She looks cautiously around the room, unsure where this questioning is going.
‘And wouldn’t you agree that TV is generally considered a creative industry?’
‘Well, yes, but—’
‘We’re not bloody management consultants, we don’t need sticky-backed plastic to prove we are capable of ideas.’ I don’t raise my voice. I don’t have to. She sheepishly drags the box off the table and tries to hide it behind the more conventional ideas aid, the flip chart. The others disloyally look away, distancing themselves from her. That doesn’t impress me either.
‘OK. You have read the brief. We have to come up with a hero show, something that will draw in the viewers and the advertisers; interest of the press would be a bonus. Mr Bale has articulated the problem here, rather succinctly, I’m sure you’ll agree.’ I read, ‘“We need a ‘bang-those-bastards-and-their-new-shows-in-to-the-ground-idea”.’ The team treat themselves to a nervous giggle. I’m tough, but Bale is a tosser and our common loathing of him unites us again. I roll up my sleeves and sit on the side of the table, smiling and allowing the good humour to penetrate. ‘So what’s the competition doing?’
‘ITV are concentrating on their main stable of shows, successful soaps, quiz games that make people rich and buying in blockbuster films that earned a fortune in the box office. Here’s their schedule for the next four months. The docusoap features heavily too,’ says Ricky. He’s done his homework efficiently. Unfortunately the news is depressing. The room falls silent again; the good mood has evaporated.
‘What about Channel 4’s scheduling this year?’ asks Fi hopefully.
‘Just as strong,’ adds Ricky, embarrassed to be twisting the knife. ‘They have everything. Arts, music, drama, comedy, entertainment, lifestyle, leisure, documentaries, film premières and something called “4 later”.’
‘What’s that – porn?’ asks Mark.
‘I don’t expect they even need porn,’ answers Tom.
I read the descriptor. ‘It’s porn,’ I assure. No one knows whether we should be glad that C4 have resorted to this or depressed because it will be a crowd pleaser. I clap my hands. ‘OK, to business. No idea is a daft idea, any thoughts, please?’ I pick up the marker and stand with my pen poised in front of the flip chart.
Silence.
‘Come on,’ I encourage. ‘Don’t let those schedules intimidate you. I really think you can overestimate a period drama with high production values, big stars and great plots. I think they are too highbrow. Let’s catch another niche market.’
Fi gets it. ‘Drama is too expensive for TV6. Entertainment is cheap.’
‘Exactly,’ I bolster. ‘With entertainment the main outgoing is people’s pride and common sense.’
‘What about a game show?’ offers Tom. The look on his face suggests that he thinks he’s just invented electricity.
‘Good,’ I assure. He’ll be the first to go, when the P45s are being dished up. ‘Now try and think of what type of game show.’ I consider whether, if the worst comes to the worst, I could retrain as a primary school teacher. I have all the core skills.
We bandy a few game show ideas around but they’ve all been done before. Often on bigger budgets than we have available. We talk it round and round.
‘We could diversify. We could buy a publishing house or a football team,’ suggests Gray. He’s thinking of the free tickets that he could blag for his friends.
That’s a stupid idea,’ comments Di.
‘Gary, the commercial director, likes it.’
‘I think it is a great idea,’ says Di.
‘Can we keep to the point, please,’ I instruct. It’s getting hot and late. I call out for more coffee and Coke. The rest of London’s workforces teem out of their offices and escape into pubs for a long cool lager. This isn’t an option for my team.
‘How about a “fly-on-the-wall” programme?’ asks Jaki. ‘They are cheap and popular.’
‘Absolutely. On which subject?’
‘The police force?’ offers Mark. ‘We could expose their ruthless tactics and racist tendencies.’
‘They do a pretty good job of that themselves, without TV,’ points out Jaki.
‘The fire brigade?’ offers Ricky. I know he’s simply getting hot and sweaty over the idea of them swinging down their pole. He’s a sucker for uniforms.
‘Been done.’
His disappointment is criminal.
‘Banker-wankers ?’
‘Same as the police force, really.’
‘The gas board?’
‘Done.’
‘Electricity?’
‘And water. Nothing left to be said on the utilities scams.’
‘Or builders or mechanics.’
‘It’s all been done before,’ sighs Mark. ‘It’s all too undemanding and formulaic.’
‘We are talking about an escapist medium,’ I remind him. ‘No one wants demanding. Demanding is how we describe our kids, red bills and the lover we no longer want to have sex with.’
We fall silent again. I look at the trash that’s lying on the table. Numerous empty cans of diet Coke, overflowing ashtrays, curling sandwiches. This mountain of debris and my Patek Philippe watch tell me it’s time to call it a day.
‘OK, go home. Go and see your partners and kids.’ I flop back into my chair and put my head on the desk. The cool surface is a relief. ‘But don’t stop thinking about this. The idea may come to you on the tube or in the bath or whilst you’re making love.’
‘You’re sick,’ grins Jaki. She seems to think that part of her job description as production secretary is to tell me how it is.
‘Look, Jaki, football is not a matter of life and death, it’s more important than that. And TV? TV is more important than football.’
She laughs and closes the door behind her.
But I’m not joking.
3
I live on my own, in a spacious pseudo-loft apartment in a trendy part of East London. I say pseudo because it’s not in the loft, it’s on the second floor. But I do have exposed brickwork and genuine iron girders that keep the roof from falling in. My space is the antithesis of both the abandoned family home in Esher and my mother’s two-up-two-down in Cockfosters. It’s modern and light and empty. I only allow things into my flat if they are both useful and beautiful. Except for the men who visit, which would be asking too much. My two favourite possessions are my charcoal-grey B&B Italia couch that seats umpteen and my B&O TV, which is the size of a screen at a small local cinema. I love my flat and Issie hates it, for the same reason: it’s clinical and impersonal. Issie keeps trying to introduce chintz by buying me floral bathmats and tea cosies for Christmas. I return the favour by buying her aluminium, slim-line pasta jars, which
she can’t open.
Josh and Issie both have keys to my flat, as I do to their homes. We are Londoners so we don’t literally drop in on one another. But sometimes we make arrangements to go round to each other’s pads for supper, as it’s nice to occasionally come home to the smell of cooking and the clink of someone pouring you a G&T. Tonight I’m delighted we’ve made this plan. I need their company. I push open my door and am hit by delicious cooking smells.
‘You’re late,’ shouts Josh from the kitchen. He’s responsible for the delicious smells. I drop my bags and PC and head straight for the kitchen.
‘What’s cooking?’ I enquire, lifting lids and spooning small amounts of heaven into my mouth.
‘Out,’ he snaps, playfully swiping at my hands and trying to replace the lids. ‘You have to wait.’ But he can’t resist showing off. ‘It’s peperoni con acciughe e capperi.’
‘Chargrilled peppers with anchovy and capers,’ translates Issie, as she hands me a glass of Australian Chardonnay. ‘Mountadam, Eden Valley 1996,’ she assures, knowing it’s important to me.
‘And maiale arrosto con aceto balsamico,’ interrupts Josh.
I turn helplessly to Issie. She fills in, ‘Roast pork with balsamic vinegar.’
‘Fantastic.’ Funny, I’m never irritated by Josh’s pretension of insisting on calling every dish he cooks by its Italian name. ‘Have I got time to shower off my shit day?’
‘Yes, if you are quick.’
Sometimes we chatter non-stop throughout supper and sometimes we watch TV, entertaining ourselves by hurling abuse or a book at the commentary, but tonight we eat in comfortable silence. Or at least I think it is comfortable until Issie asks, ‘What’s up, Cas? You’re really quiet tonight.’ She’s given me authority over the remote control. Normally I love this but tonight, as a diversionary tactic, the remote control is a failure.
I realize I’m grateful to be asked and I slip into child mode, hoping that surrogate Mum and Dad can sort things out for me. There’s only Issie and Josh, in the entire world, who I let see me when I feel vulnerable or down.
‘It’s work,’ I whine.
‘Naturally. We never expect you to say it’s man trouble,’ comments Josh. I don’t have man trouble – that’s the advantage of seeing them as sex objects rather than soul mates.
‘The channel’s viewing figures are down for the twelfth week in a row. It’s serious. Bale’s talking redundancies. Problem is we haven’t got a hero show. We haven’t even got a strong soap.’
‘What about Teddington Crescent?’ Issie is as intimate with my programming schedule as I am.
‘The lives and loves of the inhabitants of Milton Keynes don’t have what it takes to knock Come or Brookie off their spots. We haven’t got a principal game show, or a lead chat show host. Poor ratings – that’s viewership,’ I translate, but it’s unnecessary as they are both educated in my media speak, ‘affect the advertisers we can draw. Without advertising money we can’t invest in cool shows. It’s a vicious circle.’ I pause. They don’t interrupt but allow me to find the words. ‘The worst of it is that Bale has made it into my problem.’ I check to see if they are as pissed off as I am. They both make an admirable job of looking horrified. Satisfied, I continue. ‘Despite his obscene pay cheque he has renounced all responsibility and said I have to come up with a winning idea. He’s—’
‘So rotten. He’s repellent, revolting, ridiculous,’ jokes Josh.
‘A plethora of R words.’ Issie grins and tries to get me to cheer up.
I scowl. ‘He’s a shit.’ I’m not going to allow them to brighten me out of my despair. ‘I’m scared.’
Everyone is silent. They know my job is my world. Josh sits down next to me and puts his arm round me.
‘I’m fucking scared,’ I say with unusual honesty.
‘I don’t see the problem. You’ll come up with the idea,’ he comforts. Normally I love his confidence in me but I shrug, because right now, I don’t think his confidence is founded. My head is aching. Everything’s fuzzy.
‘Maybe.’ I know that it is my problem and neither of them can really offer a solution, so I change the subject. ‘Did I get any post?’
‘Its on the mantelpiece.’
Two bills, council tax and water – marvellous. Three pieces of junk mail, all for pizza delivery services. I spy another heavy white envelope.
‘Hell, another wedding,’ I sigh. ‘It’s nearly September, for Christ’s sake. Haven’t these people any decency? Plaguing me throughout my autumn months as well as the summer.’ I’m only half kidding, but it’s great to see Issie look het up.
‘Who is it this time?’ she asks.
‘Jane Fischer is marrying Marcus Phillips,’ I read. ‘Have we met him?’
‘Yup,’ confirms Josh. ‘He was at Lesley and James’s wedding last week. He was an usher. The blonde one, with the red waistcoat. Jane wasn’t there – some prior commitment, probably another wedding.’
Issie and I freeze.
‘Bastard,’ we assert in unison.
I pass Issie the invite so she can see the betrayal for herself. Issie fingers the white card, caressing the embossing, and sighs. It’s not turning out to be a good day for either of us.
‘That explains the reluctance to give a real telephone number.’
‘Will either of you marry me?’ asks Josh, realizing that Issie’s had a disappointment but not knowing the exact nature.
‘No,’ I say.
‘Yes,’ says Issie, ‘but only for the dress.’
We all laugh. We’ve run through this routine zillions of times. When we graduated Josh promised to marry whichever one of us wasn’t married by the time we were twenty-five. Twenty-five came and went. None of us had managed to find a life partner but we were forced to admit that, at that precise moment in time, we didn’t fancy each other. We decided not to go ahead but put the deal back to when we hit thirty, assuming that we’d be so desperate by then we’d all be less fastidious. Thirtieth parties came and went, but Josh said he couldn’t choose between us and as bigamy is an offence, punishable in the highest courts in the land, we all agreed to think about it again in the year 2005. However, Josh does regularly ask us to marry him, just so we feel good about ourselves. He often tries to coincide it with our menstrual cycles, which with the passing of time he has reluctantly become intimate with.
‘Can you believe that Marcus guy slept with me just days before he sent out invites to his wedding?’
‘Yes,’ I reply.
She scowls and mutters, ‘Well, of course you only expect the worst from people,’ she grumbles. ‘Can you believe it?’ Issie turns to Josh. It’s an annoying habit of hers to think that there is a male and a female point of view on these things. She often dismisses my point of view and turns to Josh ‘because he’s a man and he knows how men think’. Invariably Josh agrees with me.
‘It’s commonplace. The last fling and all that,’ says Josh, and although I know that what he is saying upsets Issie I feel vindicated. ‘I make a conscious effort to look up ex-girlfriends just before they get married, on the grounds that I might exploit the last fling thing,’ he adds.
‘Do you?’ cries Issie, horrified.
‘Do you?’ I say, and once again my respect for him is renewed. Josh tries to settle his face in an expression that will please both of us, a subtle mix between contrition and pride. He gives up and ends up just grinning at me.
‘Tell me,’ I beg. Josh is a wonderful friend and I love him for very many reasons and one of them is that he’s unscrupulous and we can share tactics.
‘It never fails. It’s the combination of the near-legalized indiscretion. Women figure that once they’ve slept with you, they might as well sleep with you again.’ I raise my eyebrows. Personally I’m not too fond of repeat performances – they give the wrong message. Josh catches my glance and understands my scepticism.
‘I’m generalizing,’ he explains. ‘Normal women. Everyone wants a final fling but a s
afe final fling. The ex is that. It’s worked for me on several occasions. One last night of unbridled passion but without the complications that Marcus risked by starting up a new liaison.’ Issie scowls. Josh shrugs apologetically. But what can he do? He’s spent years apologizing to Issie for his half of the human race, but really it’s not his fault. Now he simply shrugs off her disappointments.
‘That’s it! That’s it! Genius,’ I congratulate. ‘You are a genius.’ I cry and hug Josh. Josh happily accepts my hugs but he hasn’t got a clue why I’m so excited. ‘That’s the idea for the fucking amazing ratings-rocketing programme. A Blind Date meets The Truman Show.’
‘What?’ asks Josh. Issie simply stares; she rarely expects to follow my devious mind.
‘A fly-on-the-wall plus. We get couples, the week before their wedding, to come on to the show and tell us all about why they are getting married.’ I rush to explain but my tongue can’t keep up with my grey matter and I doubt I’m making sense. ‘Loads of sucker stuff about how they knew from the moment they saw each other and how there could never be anyone else for them. Then we find out which one of them is gagging for a bit of extra-curricular—’
‘But—’ Issie tries to interrupt me.
‘There will be one,’ assure forcefully. ‘Then we manoeuvre a meeting between that party and an ex. Then we let nature take its course.’
‘Will it work?’
‘Of course it will work. There is nothing more seductive than an ex.’
Issie eyes me sceptically.
‘Except perhaps Gucci,’ I concede. I’m thrilled.’ It has everything! Voyeurism, trivialization of sex, manipulation.’
‘It’s a terrible idea,’ shouts Issie.
I’m genuinely bewildered. ‘It’s brilliant.’
‘It’s the principle I object to,’ she adds.
‘I don’t deal in principles – they are no longer legal tender.’
‘More is the pity.’
I start to imagine the marketing and PR. ‘He’s put on a pound or two, maybe lost a bit of hair, but otherwise he’s unchanged. He was the love of your life when you were twenty-one and ten years have gone by. Yet he has that same boyish grin, he still calls you by your nickname and he remembers that you bought your hair gel in goldfish bowls at Superdrug. How can you resist?’ I’m warming to my theme.
