It was one cold winter evening in Roscrea. We were doing an outreach in the boarding school down there. Basically, teaching TY students how to make short movies and trying to discourage them from making movies involving swearing, drinking and football hooliganism, y’know, their interests. So myself and Alan winded down in our rooms in the monastery we were staying in. Then we got up later in the evening to go into Roscrea town for dinner. After dinner we were sat in Alan’s car, getting our seat belts on and all that when we noticed something strange in the building in front of us. The building itself was pretty non descript, it was old and grey with a stone plaque on the front of it but no other distinguishing marks. But there were a bunch of middle aged men in suits who would knock on the darkened door and would be let into the building. Every so often a man (or men) would show up and in they’d go. It seemed terribly odd to us. It was 7.55 so we deduced that they were there for something that started at 8. But why the suits? Why so many of them? What the hell was it? We sat there and theorised away:

    * Stone masons. Like in the movies!

    * Some other form of secret society.

    * A secret gentlemen’s club.

    * Some sort of AGM. (Boooorrrrrrinnnngggg)

    * Drug dealing crimelords (Clllllaaaasssssss)

So we went through all these theories, staked out the building for about half an hour to get more information. In the meantime we theorised that this unconventional impromptu stakeout would make a great episode of a sitcom... and this kick-started the whole shebang. In my little notebook of various garbled scribbles I had an idea about a character called Vulture, a detective who picked things from the dead in order to solve murders. It had hit me when I spent about an hour watching the vultures in Barcelona Zoo earlier that summer. I thought the idea of a vulture being like a private detective was a good analogy and coupled with Sla’s (Alan’s) perpetual sitcom enthusiasm I kinda figured it could be a nice simple sitcom idea: A trio of private detectives operating a shitty business in some Irish small town. Myself and Sla spent the next couple of days teaching school kids about the intricacies of filmmaking (or just giving them easy smoking opportunities), hanging out with the monks in the monastery guest house we were staying in (vespers are a solid prayer by the way) and watching lots of comedy to feed our fertile tea drenched minds.

The characters soon fell into place. Each would be based on an existing fictional detective. The woman phobic, cold, keen, deductive mind, disguise mastery, not to mention tweed jacket, perpetually smoking and slight drug addiction elements of Sherlock Holmes would be poured into the anti social misanthrope Jim Vultour. There were various other inspirations of course. Two local ones I won’t mention for fear of reprisal and also I loved Bill Pullman’s classic drug addled Holmes inspired turn in Zero Effect so that fed my mind. The polite, well groomed, impeccably dressed, deliberate, methodical and moustachioed Hercule Poirot from Agatha Christie’s novels transmuted themselves into the OCD afflicted gentleman sleuth Dan McGrain. The resilient, ass kicking, adventurous, sexually ambiguous and generally nice Belgian adventurer cum journalist Tintin became the similarly battered and bruised little dog owning Niall Tennyson. Chances are mentioning this could get us sued….. ah yeah. 

And like those scary birds who pick away at rotting carcasses, we would call the show… VULTURES!

So this was all scrambling and stewing around in my brain when I asked a friend of mine, Paddy Dunne, if I could bounce some ideas off him. Paddy has a scary knowledge of tv and if any man would be good for sitcom ideas, I figured Paddy would be that very man. What initially started as me bouncing ideas off Paddy became Paddy bouncing ideas back off me and we ended up with an absolute shit load of Vultures related material.

In fact, in most cases Paddy’s ideas just made the material even better than it was. So for me it was but a little leap to say ‘Hey Paddy, do you want to write this thing with me?’ His reaction was very much a warm ‘Eh?’, as if I had asked him to join me in solving some great mystery when he was more used to operating on cadavers. So, really, it was like the first time Holmes met Watson! (Except they were sweating a bit and sitting on a shit bus stuck in Athy en route to Dublin). Paddy was unsure as to why I would want to give up sole writing duties on this potential project. But why not I argued? All the best comedy writers work in duos. Cook & Moore. Gervais & Merchant. Linehan & Matthews. Those lads who did Bachelor’s Walk. Eh, Shortt and Kenny? Paddy jumped wholeheartedly in and thank god he did so. With an entirely clueless spring in our step we went about brainstorming Vultures as a whole series, with plot ideas coming out of our arses and a very firm idea of what our touchstones were: the aforementioned writers pretty much and of course, a serious adherence to the conventions of detective literature.

Over time and brainstorming it became less and less clear what story was Paddy’s and what was mine and what character was his and what mine and then we’d forget which of us had the black mug of tea and which of us had the white. Basically, the process became very organic, didn’t it? And for me, I soon realised there was no way I could have pulled this off on my own. It’s been a 2 man job all the way and without Paddy there would be no Vultures. He’s like the surrogate womb I put my sperm into when I had no one else to birth a child with. I honestly don’t know how I got to that analogy but it’ll have to do for now.

And all the while Alan was there, waiting patiently with a camera, crew and shoestring budget in hand. The first episode of Vultures where we would introduce the entire world of the story was called ‘The Mystery Of The Nighttime Refuse’, inspired by my old college summer job of rooting through bags of illegal refuse for clues as to who the dumping scumbags were (another seed that planted Vultures in my head). But then we realised that shooting time would coincide with Christmas so we just decided to jump right in and go for a Christmas special... on our first episode. And that we did, it was full of chocolate Santa’s and Christmas RTÉ Guides and Advent Calendars. We named it ‘The Kris Kringle Konundrum’ and it went online in pretty rough shape on Christmas Eve 2007. A couple of weeks later we tidied it up and sent it out in better but still just as long shape. It was great to actual get filming on it and see the characters come to life and while we started off I shoddy oul shape, we’ve picked things up along the way and learnt our lessons.

Dave and Seán, having so long being prepped for their characters (usually in drunken rambling conversations) effortlessly threw themselves right into it and were just there in character and chemistry. We were also very lucky to assemble such a fine supporting cast: Ross Costigan’s masterfully sleazy Jack Street, Gus McDonagh’s Italia 90 loving Noah Hennessy, Paul Young’s slimy Inspector Leeson, Liadain Kaminska’s sweet Isabelle Vultour and of course Spade, the bastard hound, played by Jack, (who’s quite a nice hound) all of them receiving serious praise from the folks who spent their hard earned free time watching Vultures. Not to forget all the other actors who’ve dropped in to give us a finer supporting cast that any mega low budget internet sitcom could ever hope for.

We’ve since got funding to do an entire 6 episode broadcast for which we’ve plotted out a whole story arc which will no doubt overreach our budget and cause Alan more sleepless, editless nights. But hey, at least there’s a plan, right?

Vultures is due to conclude in early summer 2009. Oh, and ‘The Mystery Of The Nighttime Refuse’ became our third episode. And it’s going to be the next one so keep an eye peeled. I, meanwhile, have got addicted to menthol cigarettes. And have grown quite accustomed to tweed. 

Elementary.

JOHN MORTON

September 2008

Making Janine Drew (The Case Of The Poisoned Dates)

John Morton - Writer

'We fixed on the character pretty early on as we were developing it, before we'd even laid out the entire series groundwork. She was probably the earliest supporting character we came up with. Firstly because the whole work experience thing hasn't really been exploited in comedy enough and there's something so inherently funny about it. We just thought there was comic gold to be had there. When we were in school, you'd get one pick of your own but the other place was picked for you and invariably, you just ended up in some really shitty place at Christmas and it made you miserable.

But we liked the idea of a teenage sleuth wanting to do work experience with the lads and when we thought of teenage detectives Nancy Drew was the first to come to mind. And initially, we wanted the character to be a more permanent fixture, like she'd do secretary work after school and always ragging on the three detectives. We were thinking in terms of a kind of Mrs. Doyle character, so that's the dynamic we were going for. Except younger, louder and a chav. But we just couldn't find the room for her to become a permanent fixture. So when it came to Episode 4, there wasn't really a comfortable fit for her plot wise but we just loved the character so much that we had to put her front and centre.'

"Knowing that Janine was to be a TY student doing work experience at VPI, we thought of how that character would be utilised by the detectives. If a bored, brazen sixteen year old chav showed up at their workplace, what work could they make her do? Being that a lot of the show takes place within the confines of the office, it would seem only natural that Janine do some secretarial work for the lads. Janine takes her first name from Janine Melnitz, receptionist and friend to the Ghostbusters. It's not only the name she shares but her red hair, glasses,  constant chewing of gum and shrill, nasally phone voice are all a nod to the character played by Annie Potts from the film. If only there was some way for us to write in a Slimer-influenced character to kiss her. An opportunity lost, we suppose.

Suzanne O'Brien was always earmarked for the part. In fact, she was approached very early in the developmental process about the part. We had previously worked with Suzanne in theatrical productions by The Devious Theatre Company. By having an actor on board at an early stage, it gave us all plenty of time to hone the character with her, until the time finally came where we wrote her dialogue and she stepped in front of a camera. There was never any doubt that she had the chops to pull off the role and we're delighted with what Suzanne has brought to the series. Plus, she has red hair, so it only strengthened our Janine Melnitz connection! Also of note: Suzanne provided us with some costume from the part, which has lead us to believe that Ms. O'Brien might have lead a past life, similar to that of Janine. Hmmm...

One of the most exciting parts for us came when we began writing "The Case of the Poisoned Dates" and we decided to pair her up with Vultour. There's a huge clash in personality, demeanour, confidence and colour palettes. This made all the more reason to place the two in the same frame together.

One of our favourite Suzanne O'Brien adlibs was during the brawl in the pub at the end of "The Case of the Poisoned Dates". "Wha are you sayin' abou' me friend?"

Chavs = Comedic Gold. That's pretty safe to say.

Making Pat Cairo (The Case Of The Poisoned Dates)

Paddy Dunne:

John Morton:

Because the normal sitcom staple is the asshole new boyfriend, the one which our hero has to combat in order to get back the girl he loves. But for us, it was far more interesting that our protagonist was the asshole ex-boyfriend. And that's what Jim Vultour is. It's not that he doesn't love Sarah. It's just that she deserves so much better.

Paddy Dunne:

We had discussed what would work the most as a faux-enemy for Vultour. We had already done the smarmy, sleek and sexy douchebaggy boyfriend that stood in the way at at chance for love between McGrain and Isabelle. What we needed was someone who was ostensibly the opposite of Tom Moriarty: a man who was infinitely smiley and nice and who rub Vultour up for simply being kind.

Enter Pat Cairo, a man who has an smile ever-present on his simple, yet lovable face. Something which we strive to do with Vultures, is to keep the "Irishness" of things always floating on the surface. We try to pepper some very "Irish" pop-culture throughout our scripts in an effort to do this. One such area of Irish culture we had not yet tapped into was the Irish music scene. It was quite inevitable then, that Cairo be a musician. After all, what girl doesn't love a man who can belt out a note or two?

Pat Cairo is the kind of boyfriend that you should be really happy your ex is with. But you just can't be. Why? Because he's just so much better than you. This is something that happens to most chaps at some stage: your ex is with a really, really top chap. And no matter how much you'd like him to be a dick. He's not. And this was comic material we thought we could really have some fun with.

Paddy Dunne:

Cairo, like most of our ensemble of characters, pulls inspiration from many places. We would normally try to tie some form of detective fiction into their personalities but with Pat Cairo we had a very obvious visual template and a fairly oblique aural template. And both would take their cue entirely from the world of Irish music.

It was always clear that Liam Clancy would be the look we'd go for. A flat cap and an intricately woven, pattern jumper would entirely sell this. A pair of boots, roll up the sleeves and stick a pint of Guinness in there and it says it all really. In an ongoing attempt to have all our male cast sport some form of facial hair, it was decided that Pat should have a goatee. Just a goatee. Unfortunately Paddy is incapable of anything more manly than that.

John Morton:

And we figured, how many trad musicians are arseholes? Anytime you see them with girls, girls are always smitten with them. And maybe myself and Paddy were venting our own frustrations through Vultour. Because we can't play instruments worth a shit. And those are the guys who always get the girl. So we sit in dark rooms and bitterly write comedy. Although Paddy has a great set of pipes on him so that's a one up. Pat Cairo, I'd love to hate him. But no, I just can't. Look at his lovely jumper.

Paddy Dunne:

How would Pat Cairo speak and sound? What neck of the woods would he hail from? For this, we would look toward legendary Irish musician and songwriter of such hits as "The Dunnes Stores Girl" and "Orca, Orca, Killer Whale": John Spillane. John Spillane speaks... and you hang on every single word he says. Perhaps it's something to do with how. he. always. spaces out. his. words? Perhaps it's his endless enthusiasm for every single facet of humanity. Perhaps it's his wonderful Cork accent. We just don't know. What we do know is that the man was prime for an homage.

Finally the name: Cairo is a reference to Peter Lorre's character in The Maltese Falcon - Joel Cairo. Pat is basically a variation on Paddy's name he doesn't like very much.

Making Tatiana Leeson (The Case Of The Poisoned Dates)

John Morton:

Paddy Dunne:

The Making Of A Modern Law Lady

John Morton:

"This was one of the characters we had chalked down from the beginning and again, one we thought would get woefully lost in our overriding Pinkertons arc. However, I think that from episodes 4 to 7, Jane Tennyson is going to achieve what we intended for her character. A basic idea we had thrown around in 2007 was 'McGrain gets set up by Tennyson with Tennyson's sister and she turns out to be a bit overbearing'. So that was the general idea. But we refined it a bit. The main focus for Jane Tennyson is not to have her as some sort of bunny boiler character but as someone who can throw into focus what exactly McGrain is looking for in a girl. Jane is lovely, no doubt about that, and she shares her brother's honest attitude, hard working ambition and solid work ethic. But she is a thoroughly modern lady. And this is not something that works well for Dan McGrain's quaint notions. Although we do love how into him she is, even though he is very much the antithesis of a modern gentleman. I don't want to give away too much plot wise but I think the dynamic between the two of them has played out wonderfully and I'm really happy with how it progresses. For anyone who has gone out with someone polar opposites to themselves I think the storyline will ring true. Or indeed, if anyone has ever been deathly terrified in a relationship, the same will apply.

And yes, the name Jane Tennyson is supposed to directly refer to Helen Mirren's Jane Tennison in Prime Suspect. The alcohol guzzling attributes of our Jane is also, not a coincidence. If you're going to base a character on anyone, then why not someone played by Helen Mirren? If we get her for Mammy Tennyson I'll be happy out."

Paddy Dunne:

As John mentioned, Jane was a character who we had ideas for very early on but had to find a way to shine a spotlight on her but without entirely shoe-horning her into the overall arc of the series. We had ideas before about sending McGrain on a series of different dates, speed-dates, blind-dates etc, where he would eventually end up with Niall's sister somehow. She would charm McGrain but he would eventually be slightly shocked by her increasingly uncouth manner on their first date. In an effort to get the ball rolling on this plotline, we dropped the progession of dates and cut right to the main event, by simply having Niall say "I should set you up with my sister". I reckon we shaved approximately 25 minutes of running time by doing that. Magic.

In the initial sketches, I had pictured Jane to be a little more "lady-like" than her final incarnation. The sketches presented here show her look being a lot closer to that of Isabelle Vultour, which her long flowing dresses and bohemian dress-sense. As Jane was to be a Lady of the Law (aka. Bán Garda), we decided to make her look less soft, but nothing so extreme as to be ward McGrain off entirely. As John mentioned, Jane is a nice girl: it's just that she's not exactly the most perfect girl for Dan. One thing that was a absolute definite was her colour-scheme, which was to remain predominantly blue, as to compliment her twin brother Niall.

Along with the obvious nod to Prime Suspect, Jane draws inspiration from a few other fictional female police officers namely Officer Stacy Sheridan from T.J.Hooker and WPC Annie Cartwright from Life on Mars. In later episodes of the series, you might see her don the Garda garbs and arrest a perp or two.

The Making Of A Stoner Tech Whizz

We got this idea pretty early on that we wanted to have some kinda Q like tech whizz for the detectives. Someone who could furnish them with cool detective technology and surveillance equipment, but in a very low-fi way. And because the basis for the character was Q, we gave him a name with Q’s in it. Yup, obvious as that.

By the time we got around to writing The Adventure Of The Hidden Microfilm, that element of his character got sidelined and instead we focused on the tech whizz side and how good he was at designing, and ultimately hacking websites. But he does show up with all the elaborate pellet guns in Attack Of The Pinkertons, although again, we didn’t write a scene that showed that.

One thing we did for his character though was take all the stoner jokes and potty humour we said we’d try to avoid and put it all into Quigley. At that stage we’d gotten to 5 episodes and we were delighted that we might actually finish our first low budget series so we said ‘Fuck it, weed jokes and shit gags, here we come.’ And we did.

Still didn’t give him any cool technology though. Maybe next time.