It's Grim Up North: new comedy
HADRIAN’S WALL IS SETTING FOR BBC RADIO COMEDY
A radio sitcom based that started off life as an internet download has been snapped up by the BBC and will be broadcast in February.
It’s Grim Up North, which follows the exploits of dodgy Roman auxiliary soldiers building Hadrian’s Wall in Northumberland on AD126, has been penned by Ed Waugh and Trevor Wood, the Tyneside-based writers whose national and international comedy stage play hits include Dirty Dusting, Waiting For Gateaux, Son of Samurai and Maggie’s End.
Supported by Sunderland University, the duo called on actor friends to record the pilot episode in July for their website, which Nigel Dyson, controller of BBC Cumbria, heard and commissioned the lads to write five six-minute episodes.
Starring Dale Meeks, Dean Logan, Gary Kitching, Mat Hobbins, Karen Traynor, Chris Connel and Jackie Fielding, who also directed the show, it features characters based around Drizzlewort, a milecastle on the wall: Britons from south of the wall, rebellious Picts and Roman auxiliaries from sunnier parts of the vast Roman Empire; hence their dislike of the constant rain in the wilds of Northumberland’s picturesque but cold and wet moors.
Mr Dyson said: “I loved the idea, the setting, the script and the passion of Ed and Trevor when pitching this. It captures the imagination and uses our own region’s history to suggest just what it might have been like to be a soldier when Hadrian’s Wall was built!”
The duo, who have penned a sketch for next week’s Sunday for Sammy at Newcastle City Hall and who also scooped the Best Comedy Screenplay award at New York-based Gotham Screenplay Festival in 2010, are delighted a home-grown comedy will be broadcast by the BBC.
Trevor said: “ Hadrian’s Wall is a fantastic setting for a show and we hope people in radioland find it as funny as the positive responses we got from the website broadcast.
“Apart from further radio broadcasts, our aim is to add more episodes and tour the show long Hadrian’s Wall as a live radio stageshow in a similar manner as we did with Son of Samurai when it was performed at the Latitude Festival and at north east venues.”
For further information visit: www.edwaughandtrevorwood.co.uk .
