Grandma's House, another article

Another article from gurdian.co.uk

Meet my Grandma's House co-writer, Simon Amstell: he's a self-obsessed so and so

Former Popworld and Buzzcocks presenter's new sitcom stars a fictionalised Simon Amstell. But it's nothing like Curb Your Enthusiasm, no way, says co-creator Dan Swimer

Dan Swimer
The Guardian,Saturday 7 August 2010

Amstell delight: fictional Simon gets used to his fictional mum's front room. Photograph: Tiger Aspect

Firstly, by way of an apology, I ought to point out that the reason I'm writing this alone is definitely not because Simon is too lazy and self-important to do something as menial as penning a few words about his latest product himself. It's because he is a "genius recluse" who's much too busy being both reclusive and a genius to go grovelling to Guide readers in a bid to promote his new TV show.

I just hope this doesn't become like the Seinfeld episode where George and Elaine go to the cinema together and find that without their mutual friend Jerry they have nothing to say to one another. Well, I'm aware we don't know each other, and we're both disappointed that Simon (the "genius recluse" – he makes me call him this) was unable to join us, but let's at least try to get through this, shall we?

While discussing Grandma's House I might mention other, far better, sitcoms without making comparisons. This is in no way to induce you to believe it to be anywhere near as good; absolutely not. Furthermore, you are way too clever to be fooled into allowing me to create a subliminal connection between some show you haven't seen and a lot of classic sitcoms. To be honest, I'd rather just stick to discussing Grandma's House, as it's so mind-blowingly unique you can't compare it to anything.

Besides, this show's nothing like Seinfeld, starring comedian Jerry Seinfeld playing a comedian whose name is Jerry. Or Curb Your Enthusiasm, about the creator of Seinfeld, Larry David, who if I recall is played by a man called Larry. Nor is it anything like Hancock's Half Hour, Roseanne or It's Garry Shandling's Show. No way. For starters, this is about a guy called Simon who used to present the TV shows Popworld and Never Mind The Buzzcocks. It just happens to feature the actual former presenter of Popworld and Buzzcocks – a guy called Simon – playing the lead character, whose name is Simon. Anyway, you know when presenters become a bit famous and they're invariably given a substandard sitcom which they spend the next few years struggling to make people forget about? Well Simon thought it best to avoid this, so instead we set about writing a good sitcom. It turns out this is quite difficult when you have no experience, unless writing the voice of a talking horse interviewing the Strokes on Popworld counts.

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This was to be our first and only rule: everything committed to paper should feel 100% authentic, rather than existing for comic effect
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So partly to guide us and partly because it was something inherent in the many brilliant sitcoms we wanted to emulate (but which it would seem crass to mention in this article), we decided to base everything in truth. This was to be our first and only rule: everything committed to paper should feel 100% authentic, rather than existing for comic effect. As rules go, this sounds like a pretty bloody good one, but in hindsight we might have made more headway if we'd added a couple of extra rules like, "Remember to include storylines", or, "Construct the episode from a number of distinct scenes rather than just one long conversation." But you learn as you go, right? Well, no, not really.

We figured that you pitch an idea, they commission the script, you shoot a pilot, and you're away. And that is indeed the process, give or take a draft or 70; a number of table reads; a pilot which flies straight on to the pile marked, "Hmmm, might work with a story"; a lot of arguing; hours – even days – of silence; and some actual crying. All in the space of four years. In our quest for truth, we managed to turn out a show about depression, death, and the pointlessness of existence (while also in our view being funny and brilliant). It tells the not totally untruthful tale of a guy who quits his glamorous TV-presenting job due to an underlying discomfort with himself, while his divorced mum shacks up with the most objectionable man on the planet, and his grandfather suspects he's probably dying.

All this truth stuff can become quite complicated, especially when the lead character is a fairly realistic portrayal of the actor playing him and writing his script. Obviously not everything in the show can have actually occurred in exactly the same way in real life, but that was the rod we made for our backs. So every reaction of Simon's character had to be a reaction we could envisage him having in real life. Otherwise how could we be certain it wouldn't feel fake, and not thrillingly realistic like, say, The Thick Of It? But does it have to be actually true, or just feel true? Does the actual Simon need to have actually said the line, or can it be the kind of thing the actual Simon might say in the situation, were it real? And round in circles you go, until you eventually snap and start screaming at your co–writer that he isn't "him" and vice versa. He's the actual person in front of you, while "he" exists only on the paper that you're screwing into a ball and trying to stuff into his mouth. Ultimately I resolved it by referring to Simon the character as "Simon", and Simon the person with whom I used to enjoy working and socialising as "you". Eventually it stopped being weird to look up from a moment of reading and remark to Simon, "Simon really is a self-obsessed prick isn't he?"

Anyway, we tried our best, we hope you enjoy it, and it's called Grandma's Office. Sorry, House. Grandma's House. It's about depression and death.