Hollyoaks: Discussion Thread

[Toups]

So as the "Producer" does he produce the show in the sense of the EP does on American soaps? Or does he actually write the storylines making him a "Head Writer" (American soaps) while his storyliners or like Co-HWs? Why are there so many SWs though? Having like 15-20 is a lot!

[Y&RWorldTurner]

The producer both produces and comes up with storylines. He doesn't "write" them, the storyliners plot/structure them with his input.

It's common for UK soaps to have 20 or so SW's. It works for them, but the producers and script editor's are very hands-on with the scripts and scriptwriter's. If you notice, there's very little, if any, continuity errors or characters changing their tones from script to script. These scripts are written months in advance, so the producers, storyliners, and editor's can judge them and make adjustments if they want.

Even though everything passes through the producer and he/she can kill storylines if he/she wishes, anyone can contribute a storyline if they wish. Lyn Papadopoulos has done that a lot, and she's probably Hollyoaks' best scriptwriter, or the one most fans seem to love.

[Y&RWorldTurner]

Former Hollyoaks SW, Lucy Gough, explains the writing process:

http://www.asax84.dsl.pipex.com/articles/hollyoaks.html

Edited October 18, 2008 by Y&RWorldTurner

[anita30]

Ok well this storyline has come to an end. What an ending. I mean dam why cant American soaps do this and really do this.

Jac is pissed. Part of me understands her being upset espically when she told Myra to fight when Myra was trying to explain why she chose Jac and Carmel to die. I say she did quite well holding it in espically for her when her mother chose her to die and finding out your sister slept with you husband and had his kid which i think I missed.

Dom speech to dead Tina wow didnt think he had it in him but very good.

Ross is lost espically what he said to Tina after she left max and got kidnapped by Niall. That is going to haunt him for a minuate.

My baby left, final episode of JP but I am happy he finally got to say goodbye to everyone this time and they truely understood why he could not stay.

These episode for me are up there with the reveal at the dog of JP and Craig. Another classic ending to a very important storyline but will wrap into another storyline because Myra you will have some groveling to do when it comes to Jac and I dont believe for a minuate Carmel is quite over with it.

[Y&RWorldTurner]

Mercedes and Tony only slept together once, a year ago. Mercedes got pregnant, but had an abortion. Jacqui, of course, wanted the child because she can't have any. Anyway, Mercedes thought it would be too painful to have her sister raise her child with the man she cheated with.

Gotta love the whore that Mercedes is. I love "Mercy," she's usually an unapologetic bitch who does things her own way, and she's hot.

[Sylph]

So in the end... And this is what I hate about British and Australian soap operas... Who the hell is creating the storylines? In this case, I'm guessing Bryan Kirkwood, of course? This is a mess, but strangely it works.

[anita30]

Whatever the formula it works for them in strides because people were excited and happy about the stuff Bryan was doing. Its all they were talking about and it started with Justin and Becca which was a huge risk in a teacher falling for her student and them having an affair as well as a child later to come out. .

Me personally think the biggest risk he took was with JP and Craig because that came out left field for Craig. After seeing the recaps I would have never thought he was gay. It had great story telling, acting and was not pushed to the back they should us how two men can fall inlove and have scenes like that. They were not ashame of what they telling.

[LondonScribe]

Bryan Kirkwood joined in January in 2006, but didn't jump straight in. He sat back and waited, though he did work with the previous Series Producer, David Hanson to steer the show to where he wanted it to be when he took over.

Justin and Becca was the work of David Hanson and Previous EP Jo Hallows (who between them nearly destroyed the show in my view).

The dates escape me, but the week that led up to the Twins Birthday/the reveal of Justin and Becca was Kirkwood's first set of episodes. I believe it was May or June 2006. The next few months that led to the explosion at the pub were what could be classed as a 'transition period' where characters came and left (Warren, The Valentines, McQueens, Kris, Zoe, Will, etc arrived. Olivia, Joe, the Twins, Sam Owen, Jez, etc left) and the stories shifted. The tone of the show also changed.

According to Bryan Kirkwood, one of the first things he did was call a massive story conference, in which he and his storyliners (details might be sketchy, as I'm typing from memory, here) mapped out the show's stories for the next two years. (These included the explosion, Clare's terrorising of Max, Tom and O.B, Clare being pushed, JP and Craig, Hannah's anorexia, the continued McQueen sagas, Will and Zoe, etc).

I'm sad to see Bryan Kirkwood leave, as he clearly has talent as a storyteller (Coronation had problems with their stories around the time he left, which wasn't helped by the fact Steve Frost was an inept producer, but that's another topic). If he is able to adapt his storytelling style, then he will go far. It's not likely going to happen, but imagine if he was given the pen to an American soap. He could be the 'new blood' some have been asking for.

Imagine he and Bevan Lee (Home and Away) being allowed to write a soap in the U.S.

Producers here can vary in role. Usually, they work with all areas of production and writing. They set the tone of the show. They are an amalgimation of the Head Writer and EP. They may not map the specifics, but the direction and outcome generally come from them. Each has their own strengths. For example, Diederick Santer's strengths lie in production (compare it to Edward Scott), whereas Bryan Kirkwood is a storyteller, so he is hands-on in that department.

[Sylph]

Smells like teen spirit

Hollyoaks was dismissed as a bit of a joke 18 months ago, but now with Bryan Kirkwood at the helm the show looks set to clean up at Saturday's British Soap Awards

Stephen Armstrong



Soap operas and gameshows are broadcasting's only true inventions. You can usually gauge the creative health of the medium by the ideas in each genre. Over in the US, the rise in drama has been driven by long-form quasi-soaps like Desperate Housewives. In the UK, that same level of plot complexity, hyper-real scripts and slightly camp dramedy is suddenly at the heart of Hollyoaks - the idiotic teen soap that has just undergone a curious rebirth.

Over the past 18 months, Hollyoaks has scored its best ever ratings, with an average of 4 million per episode and a peak of 4.5 million - inching closer to Holby City but still a little short of mainstream shows like EastEnders (7-8 million) and Coronation Street (9 million). Suddenly, the show that was a bit of joke is being taken seriously by the industry and critics alike - Hollyoaks was the only soap to be nominated in every single one of the 15 categories at the British Soap Awards.

"It's transformed itself, after years of being rubbish, into something lovely and delicate and clever and fun," says Russell T Davies, executive producer of Doctor Who.

"They've got better storylines and a broader range of characters," adds Gareth McLean, Guardian writer and Radio Times soap columnist. "The stories all used to be about chlamydia or one identikit blonde stealing another identikit blonde's boyfriend - and you just didn't care. Now you've got families like the Valentines - the soap's first black family - and the McQueens - neighbours from hell with a touching story about a young guy coming out. It's finally reflecting today's Britain."

Killing spree

Much of the credit for this lies with the show's producer Bryan Kirkwood (pictured, right). Kirkwood, 31, joined the show in January 2006 straight from the Coronation Street writers' room where he'd worked on Richard Hillman's killing spree and Peter and Shelly's bigamous marriage. When he arrived, it's fair to say the Hollyoaks awards cupboard was a fairly dusty place - one win in 2005, two in 2006.

He set about changing the show from the ground up, losing half the writers' room and some 15 cast members. "Hollyoaks used to have a reputation for blonde blandness," he says. "I don't have a problem with really good-looking actors, but I do want them to be able to act. We replaced the departing writers with some strong talent from the Liverpool theatre scene because a soap is only as strong as its storylines. I want to make Hollyoaks credible and cool like The OC and Dawson's Creek. That's where I see its future."

For him, the sheet of nominations are actually overdue. "It feels like I've been knocking on this locked door for the past 18 months, and everyone has only realised how good we've become in the last two weeks," he says with a wry grin.

Kirkwood's route to Hollyoaks was unusual. Born in Scotland, he moved down to Brighton when he was eight shortly after his mother died: "It was the defining moment of my life really. My little brother Graeme was five at the time, and it was an awful thing to happen but we have decided to take whatever positives out of it that we can and be as successful as possible."

He left college after his A-levels and worked in PR for six years before deciding he hated his job and needed to do something else. He quit and went to Australia to plan his next step, then came back to the UK and sent a begging letter asking for work experience in Coronation Street's archive. "I just loved the programme," he recalls. "I remember watching it, sitting on my granny's lap. The theme tune to the show brings it all back. She loved Coronation Street and Crossroads. I remember my grandad ripping the mickey out of her constantly about that 'dull rubbish' she was glued to."

He worked his way up through the ranks, constantly banging on the writers' room door with ideas until he was storylining the show. When Phil Redmond sold Mersey TV, it became Lime Picture and Corrie's Carolyn Reynolds and Tony Wood moved over to run the company - taking Kirkwood with them.

"I'd known Bryan a number of years both when I was at Network Centre and when I was on Corrie," says Wood. "He just never stops working. I promoted him twice - both times beyond what others thought were his abilities and he stepped up to the plate every time. He's got a very strong eye for story, but he knows that character is important as well - otherwise you're just a runaway train screaming from big bang to big bang."

Kirkwood is at the helm in some fairly stormy seas. Soap operas are having to struggle twice as hard as other dramas to keep their audience's attention. "The genre is vulnerable in the new climate," Wood acknowledges. Younger viewers are already illegally downloading episodes, despite careful cross-scheduling on supporting channels like ITV2 and E4.

Last week Emmerdale tried to recruit the online community by showing possible solutions to its Tom King murder mystery on YouTube. Ten different murder scenes were shown, with users invited to say which they thought the most likely - with the actual solution revealed on Thursday night. Series producer Kath Beedles says the results were promising. "We got an average of 8.6 million, with a peak of 9.1 million and a 47%," she says. "EastEnders averaged four million with a 20% share. We had three confessions on ITV.com, and they had 30,000 hits in five hours, while the YouTube films had something like 20,000 viewings. On our Who Killed Tom King website, we had around 1.5 million people using it in some way. It's certainly going to be part of our strategy in the future."

Meanwhile, Coronation Street is continuing the policy of celebrity casting established by Tony Wood when he put Sir Ian McKellen into the show - although he insists it started by accident when he signed up Status Quo to stop them ringing and begging. Next month comedian Sean Hughes is in the soap playing Eileen Grimshaw's love interest, taking up the comedy slack left by Peter Kay and Roy Hudd.

"I certainly see a role for online," Kirkwood agrees. "We've got a very strong proposition and it helps us get constant viewer feedback on storylines and characters. At the end of the day, though, a great soap is about writing really good characters and good stories. You have to get that right before you can do anything else."

Kirkwood's classics

Coronation Street "I'm paraphrasing Paul Abbott here but he remembers being really annoyed when he got a Jack-and-Vera storyline, then realising that taught him more about story than any blockbuster yarn."

The Muppet Show "I'm still amazed at the strength of characterisation, that you could focus kids' minds so that they absolutely believed these puppets were real people."

Dynasty "For the sheer scale of the story and its unashamed soapiness."

Moonlighting "The greatest TV romance. It should never have been consummated. It's a sign that you shouldn't always give in to the audience."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2007/may/21/mondaymediasection4

Edited October 18, 2008 by Sylph

[Sylph]

It would be splendid, but it would never work. Especially since Darran Little's arrival totally flopped.

Bevan is now writing for Packed to the Rafters, a dramedy. Why on Earth did he decide to go back to Home & Away for only six months is beyond me...

[JamesF]

I think Bevan is a fairly heavy hitter these days with Channel 7 and he went back to Home and Away because he wanted to write the bulk of the 20th anniversary stuff. It's clearly a show he's got a tremendous soft spot before despite going up in the world. I've not seen Packed to the Rafters but as far as I'm aware it veers more towards drama like his old show Always Greener. I hear dramedy and I think Ally McBeal.

I'd love to know more about Darran Little's role but that's a discussion for another thread.

To stay on topic I chose to watch the two episodes surrounding Niall blowing up the church. God knows I can never get on board with Hollyoaks ordinarily. There are flaws about it that I can't get past including some of the acting and the fact that character groups can go for weeks on end without being shown. I also found out a while ago that the storyliners/script writers are instructed to make sure they do not begin or end a scene with any of the older characters i.e parents. The emphasis is supposed to remain solely on the young characters and this undermines Bryan Kirkwood's wishes to make it a more inter-generational show.

HOWEVER.

As far as soapy goodness, these episodes were well done. John Paul, Tina and Mercedes couldn't act but the others were good enough to elevate it. I've got to give credit to Hollyoaks for one thing. They really know how to build up a long term storyline and give it a payoff.

[Y&RWorldTurner]

Thanks for the timeline! Even though she's been working on Hollyoaks for a while, I really a expect a shift in tone when Lucy Allan's episodes as producer starts to air. I really hope she doesn't get rid of any of the storyliners (which is doubtful). Kirkwood always had a clear vision for the show and everything was, for the most part, carefully planned and it showed on screen. That's all we can hope for.

[Sylph]

But as it turns out, when these talented, one-of-a-kind soap opera writers leave the soaps, they rarely achieve anything worthwhile. I really haven't watched those shows, but from reading the synopses, they seem nothing special. And kind of disappointing. It's just a traditional drama with little innovation.

As for dramedy, I actually detest that word. There's tragedy, drama and comedy. And drama by definition inludes tragic and comedic elements. So the term ends up redundant.

Boy, did that new move plummet or what...

I totally share this view. I'm so not a die-hard fan like Y&RWorldTurner, but I really appreciate how he (Bryan) turned it from an idiotic soap into something truly watchable and worth someone's time.

[Rakesh]

OMG, this is my favorite soap on air!!!!

Just saw Monday and Tuesday's episode. I freaking love it!!!

I'll be back later to post my thoughts on everything.

[Y&RWorldTurner]

Hollyoaks has been very consistent over the past two and a half years, and the show has always been youth-centered though, that was its original premise - a soap about youth and adolescence problems. Hollyoaks has always been the lighter, more warmer soap, which is appreciated.

I do enjoy Corrie and EastEnders, but over the past two years, I've gone through the motions with those soaps. Corrie has been boring as hell for a good year now to me, and EastEnders is severely slipping in quality. I've never found Emmerdale watchable, but Hollyoaks has treated me very well in terms of building story and creating a great resolution over the past two and a half years, and as a soap fan, that's all I can ask for.

Edited October 18, 2008 by Y&RWorldTurner