Wednesday 1st April 2009, 12:41
Not Going Out lives up to its name
...or other lazy puns about Not Going Out not going out. But then lazy punning is very convenient when what's happened is a sitcom called Not Going Out will no longer be going out.
Yes, it's been axed by the powers that be. A great shame, partly of course because as one of the writers' names that whizzes past at the end just before the screen minimises to plug Horne and Corden, that means a loss of work. But to be less selfish for a moment, also a great shame cos it was a show I wrote for that I actually really really liked.
I like jokes, and it had 'em. I want list any here simply because there are so many and I wouldn't know where to begin, but have a quick google and you'll find plenty. Lee (Mack - star, writer, exec producer) is a tough man to satisfy, in terms of script gagging-up, but that's a great thing for the final product. Many's the time I'd send a script back to him with my contributions, and I'd get the script back again of an evening with a request for another look at it, back by tomorrow morning please. Tight turnaround, but it ensured the scripts had eight jokes a page rather than the industry standard of three.
Granted, quantity of jokes isn't everyone's benchmark for a sitcom (it clearly failed to impress whoever's axed it), but for myself, and many others who watched it, it was a welcome refreshment from other sitcoms that, while full of quirky characters or darkly comic situations, often only made you laugh out loud once or twice in its half-hour. I just hope that the shows's cancellation doesn't mean the powers that be are turning their back on this more traditional type of sitcom - yes I like some no-laughter-track, single-camera, on-location, edgier sitcoms, but not all of them. So here's hoping there's still room for one or two gaggier, studio-audience style ones.
I feel like this is a eulogy for a job I've had, which feels odd. I should add I don't feel Not Going Out was my baby or anything - it was 100% Lee's show. I think it's more like a nephew. But now it's a nephew I'm not going to see any more, except for when I video'd that nephew... Now this analogy's got weird.