Grab The Opportunities (You Never Know Where They Might Lead.)

August 2021

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In Spring 2021 I saw an ad for an innovative course for TV script editors funded by Sky Drama.  They were looking for 12 participants for a 3 month course in script editing for TV.  The course offered a basic salary and daily masterclasses from key figures in the TV industry.  Producers, writers and editors such as Nicola Schindler (It’s A Sin and Happy Valley among others) Paul Abbott (Shameless, Clocking Off, State Of Play).  I have been editing scripts for years.  I had wanted to work in TV, but having a young family and living in Cumbria meant I parked that idea.  I began to fill out the application form and got to a box that asked: age?  I typed in 55 and then I hesitated.  For the first time in my life I had to consider the fact that I might be too old.  I considered it and dismissed it.  I was short-listed, interviewed and was accepted.  And yes, I was old enough to be everyone’s mother, and that was a brutal truth that quite literally stared me in the face I took part in the daily Zoom sessions, but I had the time of my life, I learned so much, and the very real possibility of a TV career opened up in front of me.  At the end of the course I was encouraged to write, not edit.  To develop my own stories for TV.  Here, my foreign name was not a problem.  I was actively encouraged to include migrants in my stories, to explore my own, authentic voice.  So, for the last year I have been creating stories for TV.  One is now in funded development with Rope Ladder Fiction in Manchester.  Will you ever see it on TV?  Well, that’s down to serendipity, the right person seeing it at the right time.  Fingers crossed for that.  But for me, it’s creating the stories that matters.  25 years of writing and I am still finding my voice.