TV comedy script writer Colin Bostock-Smith (Not the Nine O’Clock News, The Two Ronnies, The Clive James Show and many more) has turned to crime with the publication of his debut cosy-crime novel.
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00:00Good afternoon, my name is Phil Hewitt, Group Arts Editor at Sussex Newspapers. This is
00:06a real treat this afternoon to speak to Colin Bostock-Smith, no less, who wrote for, well,
00:11goodness, one of the best TV programmes ever, Not the Nine O'Clock News, who wrote for The
00:15Two Rons, who wrote for so many comedy greats. But you're writing something slightly different
00:21from Uckfield, and you are writing your first crime thriller, Sting of the Nettle. And this
00:27takes you back, really, to your early days back in Devon, doesn't it?
00:33Yes, I think of myself as a 10-year-old, in short trousers, and leaning around the village.
00:45It's very nostalgic. But it is, there's a serious theme in the book, and people die
00:51and things like that, which isn't very nice, but it's...
00:56What prompted you to turn to crime then?
00:59That's a good question. I suppose, well, for one thing, I do know that the crime market
01:06for books is huge. But I think it was simply having something exciting to write about,
01:17something you could build in themes and clues and progress and defeats and things like this.
01:25Crime does carry you along. And in a sense, there's not a great deal of crime in Sting
01:30of the Nettle. There's more bad behaviour, if you like. So, it does come under the heading
01:38of cosy crime. Did you know this? There's a section of crime known as cosy crime,
01:43which just means there's not too much blood splattered across the page, as it were.
01:49Well, that's a blessing, at least. But you've come up with a really appealing central character
01:53in the newly married PC Derek Martin. Tell me about him.
01:58He's 22 years old, and he's from Exeter, and he joined the police force, so he didn't have to get
02:02into the army, which you did have to in those days, of course, National Service. And he's
02:12sent to occupy the post of village policeman in this small village of North Tor. And
02:19it's how he fits into life there, what he discovers about it, and how he finds things
02:27that have gone wrong. And the lovely thing is that this is book one, but up your sleeve,
02:33one up each sleeve, you have book two and book three already, don't you?
02:37Yeah, well, getting there, yeah. I'm especially looking forward to those two, because now the
02:44character is established, you can use him more, you know, you can get to know him more. This used
02:50to be true when I was writing comedy, especially situation comedy, where once you got into the
02:57character, you've got the character, you know how he spoke, then the writing became so much easier,
03:02because you could hear him speaking, or her. And the same has been true with Sting of the Nettle
03:09and the other two books. So it's him coming alive in your mind,
03:13isn't it?
03:14Yeah, absolutely. I know him intimately, and his wife.
03:21And as you mentioned in passing, writing comedy, let me drag you back to, I say,
03:25absolutely fabulous show that meant so much to us. It's my sixth form, really, not the nine o'clock
03:30news. And you are, it's wonderful to speak to the man responsible for the American Express sketch.
03:38I'm ashamed of myself, really.
03:39Of course, you should be. You wouldn't get away with that now, would you?
03:43No. We also got away with a sketch I wrote about abortion. Can you believe that?
03:49But it's a very funny little sketch, if you look it up.
03:55I will go to that straight away. But I remember that series,
03:58Not the Nine O'Clock News, so fondly. It had such impact, didn't it? Why did it, do you think?
04:04I think it was down to the producers, particularly John Lloyd, who looked after
04:08the editorial side, as it were, and the freedom they gave writers, and the fact that several of
04:14us writers had been working on different shows in radio. And John Lloyd himself came from radio. He
04:20was kidnapped, as it were, by BBC television and given the job of making this show. And
04:29with it, he bought not only me, but Andy Hamilton, for instance, and David Renwick,
04:36who wrote World First and the Grave. And writers like that came along, as it were,
04:42they crossed over too, and all our careers blossomed. I've been doing a bit before for
04:48television, but after that, everybody wanted to know you, which was very rewarding.
04:53So at what point did the two Ronnies come along in your career, then?
04:57They were sort of always there, you know, they were around for a long time. And it was always
05:03very difficult to get a sketch on the Ronnies, because so much of the show was formatted,
05:08and pre-written. There's always Ronnie in the chair, you know, and the party scene,
05:13and the music at the end, and so forth. So to squeeze a sketch in,
05:20it was quite a rare thing to achieve. I got some in, in the end.
05:24And one of those was the squash sketch from your own bitter experience?
05:29Yes. Oh, the squash sketch, yeah.
05:38It was chosen by the Ronnies, actually, as one of their favourite all-time sketches,
05:42their five favourite sketches of all time. And the BBC, in 1999, held a Two Ronnies Week.
05:50And every night, apart from other interviews and talks, they showed one of their five favourite
05:56sketches, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday. And listeners and viewers, if I get it
06:03right, viewers were invited to phone in to vote for what would become the nation's favourite Two
06:11Ronnies sketch. And I was delighted when they chose the squash sketch as one of them. And I
06:16think I went out on the Thursday, and then Friday rolled around, and the last votes were counted,
06:21and guess what? Didn't win.
06:26But you hadn't lost your comic timing, then?
06:28It was some rubbish about four candles, yeah.
06:31No, no one will remember that. Brilliant. What fantastic memories. Congratulations
06:38on Stinging the Nettle, and really lovely to speak to you. Thank you.
06:42You too, Phil.