Matthew Graham interview
Some writers can be cagey and cautious but Matthew proved completely open and forthright, allowing us a fascinating insight into some of the series we reeled off earlier.
We began by asking what we can expect from Redwater…
Well, you can expect it to look amazing! The lead director, Jesper [Danish helmer Jesper W. Nielsen] is a film director and has a tonal and visual ambition for this which is amazing. It’s to make Redwater as big as anything you see on terrestrial television and I’ve tried to write a cinematic episode 1. The show has a heightened realism at times – I wouldn’t go quite as far as to say ‘magic realism’ but through parts of the story we are allowed to take tonal liberties! It’s very family-based. Very character-based. And it’s very emotionally real and raw. The cast are amazing! It’s one of the best read-throughs I’ve ever been to... And it’s very dramatic!
What drew you to the show?
When I got the call about Redwater from its producer, Vicky Wharton, I was in America and I’d spent a year in the States and Australia making a big American mini-series called Childhood’s End which was a huge, alien invasion type story with massive special effects and five continents and the world getting blown up! And so the idea of writing a family drama about a community in rural Ireland just seemed like a wonderful counterpoint to everything I’d been spending the last year doing. I pretty much said yes to Vicky during that first call! I came in and helped storyline it and found a more driving narrative for the series and I wrote episode 1. It was a real joy to come into something smaller and more intimate.
You worked on EastEnders many years ago and this is set in the same world. Was it like coming home?
Yes! I was around when Tony [Jordan] devised the Slaters and I was around when we all created Alfie Moon. I LOVED writing for Kat and Alfie. They were two of the best characters to write for. They’re so funny and tragic. You can put big, funny gags into their mouths and it works… Or you can break people’s hearts with them. So that opportunity to write for them again was irresistible.
I think Kat is up there with the greats of soap. Even if you don’t watch the show, you tend to know who the character is, in the same way that you once knew who Else Tanner was, even if you didn’t watch Corrie. What do you think makes her such a great character?
I think, for whatever reason, Jessie [Jessie Wallace – who’s played Kat since 2000] knows how to tap into pain. Jessie has had a very big life. Had a lot of things happen to her – good and bad. And she knows how to use those things as an actor.
When you’re writing for her is there anything you always bear in mind? One thing that’s paramount about the character of Kat?
Yeah. Hurt. Everything she does comes out of the fact she doesn’t think much of herself. So, her humour and her in-your-face qualities all come out of a place of insecurity. She doesn’t think she’s good enough. That’s what I use when I’m writing Kat.
You first wrote for EastEnders in the 90s. How has the business changed since then?
It’s international now. When I started writing for British television, as far as the Americans were concerned, you might have been writing for Cypriot television! Apart from a couple of shows, they just weren’t interested. Now when I’m working in Los Angeles they want to talk about Happy Valley. They want to talk about Call the Midwife…I’ve been working with a film director who loves Vera! Can’t miss an episode of it! You see, everything is international, now. There was a piece in Variety in LA last week about Redwater, so you can see there is a global expectation on almost everything we write. The writers that are going to thrive and flourish in this new world are the ones that have the confidence to stand up and be counted on an international arena!
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/writersro...a-76b3e166e1d0
