Derren Litten

Drove to Teddington Studios this afternoon in the lovely sunshine listening to Matt Monro. It was the recording of one of my episodes of John Sullivan's sitcom, The Green Green Grass. Went early to avoid the traffic but there wasn't really any so I decided to taste the delights of Teddington for me tea (northern expression meaning dinner or evening meal). I ended up eating in Pizza Express, so I could have been anywhere really, Birmingham, Manchester, Edinburgh; I do think it's a shame that every high street in the UK is going to end up looking the same and I thought about making a one man protest by eating in the local family run restaurant; but it looked shit so an American Hot with a mixed salad it was! After my early dins I went into the studios canteen and said hello to John Sullivan, Julian the producer and some of the cast; then got lost trying to find dressing rooms to annoy people that had escaped me by not going into the canteen then before long it was time for the recording. I was given the choice of either sitting in the gallery (where the director, vision mixer etc sit) or in the audience; being a supportive type of guy I opted for the audience seat; mainly so I could laugh very loudly for the soundtrack when my jokes were met with inaudible indifference from the 200 or so Only Fools and Horses Fans. The show went well and after a drink in the studios bar (not the nice one round the back near the river, a horrible, atmosphere-less one I'd never been in before that looked not unlike a school canteen) I whizzed off home and straight to bed… Gone are the days when after a studio show it would be out to a club to party until the early hours. Although it's not quite the same being at a TV show recording in the capacity of writer rather than performer; there's not quite the adrenaline rush from playing to an audience. At the end of the first week of filming for BBC sitcom Perfect World in 1999 Paul Kaye, Nina Wadia, myself and a couple of production people went out to some bizarre night club which seemed to be part of a shopping centre in Ealing (this was after getting very pissed in the Ealing Studios pub). Must have been a good night because I can't remember a thing about it but I fear those days are long gone. In saying that, all the location filming for 'Benidorm' is going to be in Spain, Benidorm itself, in fact - now that would be just rude not to go out and get blathered during that…. Watch this space.