abzug Posted: Thu May 25, 2006 8:48 pm
Shed's New Show--It MUST have a role for Simone, no?

http://living.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=683442006

A new goal in life after the final whistle
AIDAN SMITH

ON A steaming hot day in London, the two women look for all the world like stragglers from a coach party of TV fans down from Scotland about to embark on a visit to the set of their favourite show, Footballers' Wives.

"Do you fancy a wee drink?" one of them says. "Och, why not!" says the other. Wine is ordered, and soon the reminiscing begins, about over-the-top weddings, over-the-top everything. Favourite lines bounce back and forth across the table of the pavement café. "How about this one: Tanya, bragging to Amber about shagging Conrad in the laundry-room: 'We went through the full cycle, including fast spin, because he had such a heavy load'?"

If they carry on like this the coach will leave without them. But guess what? There is no coach. It was simply my plot device to get this story started. (Don't accuse me of peddling ludicrous storylines - take a look back at Footballers' Wives...).

Eileen Gallagher and Ann McManus ARE Footballers' Wives. That is, they are two-thirds of the tartan triumvirate behind Shed Productions, who make the camp drama with football overtones - or did, until a few days ago, when it was axed after five years.

Small, fortysomething with cropped hair, and dressed almost identically in sensible blouses with not even the merest suggestion of leopardskin, neither of them looks especially devastated by the axing when we meet up in Islington. "Footballers' Wives was a zeitgeist show, so by its nature could not go on for ever," says Gallagher. McManus is more blunt: "The last series just wasn't as good as what had gone before."

They don't look much like what the Daily Mail dubbed them - "Britain's leading purveyors of prime-time sex" - but it's always the quiet ones you've got to watch. Publicity-shy, they repeatedly thank me for coming to see them.

Chief executive Gallagher is very much the business head of Shed, and as well as "zeitgeist" - used three times in the first quarter of an hour - talks of "brands" and "high-concept" and "increasing our portfolio".

McManus, creative director and thus involved at the writing end of the operation, has to be stopped by her friend from blabbing too much about future projects. The word she uses most in the first 15 minutes is "communist".

But after another bottle is ordered, Gallagher lets slip details of one new show they're very excited about. Shed are in talks with BBC Scotland to make a drama which, if it comes off, will surprise and maybe even shock audiences used to the standard heather-fringed evocations.

"It will be very different from Monarch of the Glen," says Gallagher. "We're not slagging off that show, but it wasn't really aimed at Scots, was it?"

"It did what it said on the shortbread tin," adds McManus. "Can we say this one will be a bit like Northern Exposure?" A nod from Gallagher, and she continues: "More about the way folk live now, but also funny and quite dark and controversial."

Together with the third member of the team, Brian Park - who is today unavoidably detained in Los Angeles - McManus and Gallagher are big successes in London. You get the feeling, chatting to them, that when they moved south, it wasn't a moment too soon. Occasionally they reveal a remoteness from Scotland, such as when McManus, who is more steeped in football lore than the five series of Footballers' Wives would suggest, asks: "Do you think they'll ever get the sectarian problem sorted out?"

But both are keen to work in Scotland again. "It's where we're from and we don't forget that," says Gallagher.

The new show, as yet untitled, would see them renew professional contact with their homeland for the first time since meeting at STV during the days of High Road, which seems like 100 years ago.

Hamilton-born Gallagher, then a big player at Cowcaddens HQ, was keen to inject young blood into a Scottish soap she says was "in danger of turning into an historical drama". Young actors duly arrived, but the scripts continued to groan. "There were references to pop bands, but unfortunately they were the Beatles," says Gallagher. This, by the way, was the 1980s.

Enter McManus, a schoolteacher from Ayr, who had learned the basics of scriptwriting after answering one of those newspaper ads that appear next to puffs for hair restorer. "I was teaching in Castlemilk. I knew how kids talked," she says.

ONCE A card-carrying member of the Communist Party, McManus recalls rallies and marches during the turbulent Thatcher years and how she played her part in the naming of the Glasgow's Nelson Mandela Square.

The city centre was also the battle zone in the fight to save High Road and banners like "First Ravenscraig, now they want to close the Ardnacraig" displayed wit and a social conscience. But the show was killed off despite the best efforts of Gallagher, an expert in PR spin before the term was invented. "I told the papers it was the Queen Mum's favourite. Completely made up. I reckoned that at a time when the Royal Family's image was poor, the palace wouldn't deny it and I was right."

But Gallagher and McManus have no cause to live in the past. Footballers' Wives has croaked its last, with not even Viagra-fuelled orgies capable of saving it. The show pre-dated footballers' worst excesses and maybe latterly it became just too believable. "I wish we'd dreamt up a dogging storyline before a real footballer got caught doing it," says McManus.

But Shed move ever onwards and upwards: with Waterloo Road, a drama set in a tough comprehensive which the BBC have commissioned for a second series; with the company's takeover of Ricochet, who make Supernanny, which adds factual entertainment to their output; and with Bad Girls: The Musical.

Still wearing her social conscience on her sleeve, McManus is proud of Shed's first hit, the series about a women's jail. It continues to run on the goggle-box and now has transmuted into a stage show. McManus quotes a leading criminologist, David Wilson, who acclaims it as the best prison series ever. Then she joins Gallagher in a chorus from the musical: "We're all banged up without a bang/This little chassis needs a full-front prang."

The musical has its world premiere in Leeds and Shed are hoping for a West End transfer. "To be honest I wasn't sure about it," says McManus. "But it's a fantastic show with terrific songs, lots of melodrama and the odd bit of camp humour as well." (No, really? She must be kidding...)

But the conversation turns back to the show which has brought them the most shock-horror headlines, Footballers' Wives.

It may be dead in the UK, but it's doing well in the US thanks to BBC America, proving it's possible to take shoulder pads to Newcastle - Newcastle, Texas, that is. The Americans did this sort of thing first with Dallas and Dynasty, but Footballers' Wives has reinvigorated the genre. And a deal has just been struck to screen the show in South America, where they might even find it too understated.

"Maybe we'll bring it back one day," says Gallagher. "The All-New Footballers' Wives has a nice ring to it, don't you think?" Personally I'm more concerned about its legacy: the 91 baby girls (so far) named Chardonnay after the tragic heroine. "Yes I am too," says McManus, social conscience to the fore one last time. "Do you think we should set up a help group?"

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COOLUK1 Posted: Thu May 25, 2006 11:03 pm

Simone's sister and brother in law were involved in the Scottish soap 'Take the High Road' l believe..

'Northern Exposure' has got to be one of my all time favourites!!!
I loved it, so if Shed's new show is going to have that feel about it l look forward to it avidly.

Being set in Scotland it would be great for Simone [although there are a lot of Scottish actors around]but l guess it all depends what the time frame is and what her contractual obligations are with WiTB..and of course whether she wants to work for Shed again?
Also when is she going to have all these babies..one way or another she's going to be quite a busy bunny....lol

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Vergil Posted: Thu May 25, 2006 11:42 pm

Quote:
ONCE A card-carrying member of the Communist Party, McManus recalls rallies and marches during the turbulent Thatcher years and how she played her part in the naming of the Glasgow's Nelson Mandela Square.


bet shes not living a communist lifestyle now. Funny how so many people who were so anti thatcher in the 80s have now embraced the capitalist lifestyles they used to hate. Sorry had to put that in - i just hate communists and how they are treated by the left-leaning media as perfectly exceptable when really they should be outcasts like those on the far right- Communism has killed more people than facism/nazism.

on a lighter note- would it be great if there was a role for simone in this? of course- we need more simone - we have seen so little of her in the past couple of years- and i love simone in grittier roles. Will she be in it, if it takes place? who knows? lets hope

Not a contest I'd like to be part of, that's for sure! I think once a political movement hits the seven figure mark when it comes to murdering innocent people, then they can just go into the Deeply Irredeemably Evil category. But yeah, the problem with communism is that the spirit of it (in terms of do according to your ability, get according to your need) is rather lovely. Its just when implemented on a broad political scale, its been horrific.

One thing I've noticed is how often Shed likes to use actors they've cast on other shows. Its almost like they are this nice little repertory company. For instance, Renee Williams goes on to play a lead on Footballers' Wives. Snowball Merriman and Sheena are in the musical. And I understand that many of the BG actors were previously on Coronation Street, which many of the Shed folks worked on in the pre-Shed days.

Yes, that and the way communism has tended to get a really bad press. The communist party in the UK was a far cry from the practices of so-called communist countries like Russia. The idea of communism as originally envisioned by Marx involved the withering away of the state and not the state terrorisim that it became associated with in Russia & China. It was about everyone having a say in the running of their lives and an end to all authoritarian governments.

While the top Shed people have become very successful and rich I see no evidence they have embraced the ideals of unfettered captialism. It certainly isn't evident in the style of dress and behaviour shown in interviews with the Shed women Gallagher, Chadwick & McManus. BG & Bombshell that's been showing in NZ includes political perspectives that critique oppression, prejudice and inequalities: all things promoted by communist & socialist parties in the UK.... more so than the current so-called Blairite Labour Party.

While I agree many on the left have sold out to the Thatcherist and Balir agendas, the wonder of BG is that it has so successfully portrayed alternative values in the face of all pervasive pressures to succumb to the shift to the right.

Abzug>>One thing I've noticed is how often Shed likes to use actors they've cast on other shows. Its almost like they are this nice little repertory company. For instance, Renee Williams goes on to play a lead on Footballers' Wives. Snowball Merriman and Sheena are in the musical. And I understand that many of the BG actors were previously on Coronation Street, which many of the Shed folks worked on in the pre-Shed days.

Joss Whedon is well-known for doing the same; although I can't remember their names, the producers of Once & Again also tend to use a lot of the same actors from one show to the next. And of course the number of directors who are partial to certain actors is too large to enumerate. My conclusion is producers & directors like working with people who are skillful & reliable & good directors are as loyal to their crews & actors as they hope audiences will be to their shows. Easier to produce consistent product if the variables are Knowns.

I wish I'd said that, ekny. <G>

Hi guys
Shed's New Show--must Have A Role For S, No?
Surely that would depend on if She could be pursuaded to work with Shed again.
Personally I would LOVE to see BOTH of them working on future Shed projects

Wasn't sure where to put this. I see that NEITHER of the 2 Shed Prod TV pilots were picked up for production here on US TV.

Football Wives, if you IMDb it had a stelar American cast. Was to be on ABC. This was sorta a "life of it's own" US version of the successful British show....only of course Americans know very little about soccer so it was going to be US Football.

Football Wives (ABC TV Studio) NOT ORDERED
Exec Producers: Chris Brancato, Bert Salke, Bryan Singer, Marco Pennette (writer)
Cast: Gabrielle Union, Brian White, Lucy Lawless, James Van Der Beek, Kiele Sanchez, Ving Rhames, Eddie Cibrian, Arielle Kebbel, Holly Robinson Peete
Logline: U.S. version of the popular British series that will focus on wives of professional football players.


Shed's other project was to be on Fox. The Shed women were higher profile on this project, listed as Ex Producers and Writers, but, alas, no go. Was to star Eliza Dushku from Buffy fame.

Nurses (working title) NOT ORDERED (20th Century Fox TV)
Exec Producers: Barry Josephson, Eileen Gallagher, Ann McManus, PJ Hogan
Writers: Samantha Goodman and Andrew Stern
Director: PJ Hogan
Cast: Sara Rue, Eliza Dushku, Gregory Harrison, Drew Sidora
Logline: Nurses in a big-city hospital.

Yeah, word on the street is that Disney was pressured by the NFL to put the kabosh on Football Wives. The NFL doesn't want anything too realistic to tarnish their image. As if their own players weren't doing that for them.

And the Nurses script was soapy at best.

I want more shed!