Late one December I got a surprise phone call from Brian Clemens. It was a surprise because, although we’d met a number of times over the years and shared consultancy credits on BBC1’s BUGS, long phone chats weren’t something we really did. I wrote about it here. If you know my stuff at all you’ll…

Why does my heart sink at the prospect of a new Jonathan Creek? Because it’s a prime example of how the BBC doesn’t know how to handle a hit. They set out to make it good, and you think it’s brilliant. When they realise that, they set out to make it brilliant. And that’s when…

I’m one of a series of interviewees discussing writing and rejection on A J Ashworth’s blog. Contributors so far include Alison Moore and A L Kennedy. A sample: AA: You’ve written successfully for television (as well as for radio) many times, but I know that some of the projects you’ve worked on have failed to…

Well, no matter how long you’ve known them, your friends never lose the capacity to surprise you. Jo Armitage, with whom I worked back when I was represented by the Curtis Brown Agency, read my last entry on the British Library’s Victorian Entertainments exhibition and wrote: Well I never, just read the blog about your…

In London for a couple of meetings last Thursday, I called by to spend a few minutes at the Treasures of the British Library permanent exhibition. That’s the beauty of our free museums, as I found in the 70s when I was in the capital looking for a way into film or TV; when you’re…

Just back from a weekend of frolics, wine and conversation at 2016’s Fantasycon by the Sea in Scarborough, a town of shabby-chic Edwardian charm with a fantastic coastline and some, er, interesting after-dark streetlife. The Grand Hotel made for a highly sociable venue in a spectacular clifftop location. Dining options on the doorstep, and some…

The book’s now shipping and preorders are being filled. They’re preceded by an interview conducted by Gwenda Bond for Subterranean. It’son the company’s Facebook page; follow the link to see the whole thing. Today we’re bringing you a fascinating new interview with Stephen Gallagher about how he created the character of investigator Sebastian Becker. Gallagher…

Down by the British Museum in Bloomsbury runs Montague Street, a terrace of Georgian townhouses of the classic Upstairs/Downstairs kind. They’re now mostly brass-plate offices and boutique hotels, and I can never walk along it without thinking of Charlie Grant. Charles L to the literary world, Charlie to just about everyone who knew him. The…

Here’s a film I’d never seen before, and have finally caught up with. I don’t quite know what to make of it. As you might expect it’s a B-movie through and through, but the production values took me by surprise. With the Mexican locations, and widescreen cinematography, its look is great. Like the later Valley…