Attracting and developing talent is essential for us. Our presence and investment in the North gives us a strong platform to create sustainable talent pipelines and have a positive impact on local communities. This is why our joint collaboration with Creative Skillset, Original Voices, has been rolled-out to Coronation Street, with submissions open to North West based writers from a Black, Asian or other Minority Ethnic (BAME) background.
We first launched Original Voices on Emmerdale, to tap into and connect with local BAME writing talent. The aim of the initiative was to find interesting writers from Black, Asian or other Minority Ethnic backgrounds living in Yorkshire or the North East.
Now our flagship continuing drama, Coronation Street, is on the look out for diverse regional writing talent in the North West with a view to offering the top four selected an opportunity to spend time in the Coronation Street Story Office where they can develop their knowledge of the show and skills at weaving multiple story strands, before writing a trial script to be read by the show’s producers.
Experienced drama professionals in the industry will appraise the Scripts received and the submissions will be shortlisted to a group of 12. The Original Voices team hopes to inform short listed writers during the week beginning 20th October 2014.
These writers will then be invited to a bespoke Coronation Street Story Conference in late October, led by the Story Editor, Kate Brooks. Following this, writers will have a week to write up and submit a storyline.
On the strength of the written storyline, the writer’s skills at the Story Conference and their writing submission, four of them will be selected to go forward.
The four selected will benefit from a unique opportunity on the UK’s most watched soap, spending time in the Story Office, learning how multiple story strands are balanced on the show, while honing their knowledge of how the production works, before writing a trial script, which will be read by the producers.
Applicants interested in this unique opportunity can apply by sending the below to originalvoices@itv.com:
One sample script of 30-90 minutes (television, film, theatre, radio or similar)
Short script synopsis
Biography/CV, stating your permanent residence in the North West (Granada region)
Eligibility & Equal Opportunities form*
All submissions should be received by Tuesday 7th October midnight.
Full details available at itv.com
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Is this an admission that up to now
ReplyDeleteCorrie hasn't adequately managed to represent the diversity now present in our culture? It only took 50 years to have a black family on the show! Better late than never, I suppose. It sure expands the availability of interesting storylines, but it will be intriguing to see how accurate they make them. It's a potential minefield of racial tension and prejudice.