John O'Farrell

I am REALLY excited to be able to catch up with John O'Farrell folks. His book The Best a Man Can Get is one of my faves. He has also written lots more books including; Things Can Only Get Better: Eighteen Miserable Years in the Life of a Labour Supporter, This Is Your Life and May Contain Nuts (2005) which have been translated into around twenty languages. His book, An Utterly Impartial History Of Britain - Or 2000 Years of Upper Class Idiots in Charge has been serialised on BBC Radio 4 while his novel, May Contain Nuts, was recently filmed as a two part drama for ITV!!

John O'Farrell previously wrote for comedy television and radio. Early roles include many years writing for SpittingImage (where he is credited for having had the idea of making John Major entirely grey) and the non-spontaneous parts of Have I Got News For You, later becoming a guest himself. He co-wrote many of the 'Head to Heads' for Alas Smith and Jones, worked on Murder Most Horrid, and is also credited for additional material in the Nick Park comedy Chicken Run. What a career! I'd better get a move on then.

Describe your writing style in one sentence

Most of all I want to make people laugh, but I think comedy can be much more satisfying (and powerful) if it has a worthwhile serious point to make. There, see how funny that was?

John, if you were a cocktail, what one would it be?

I would be a Manhattan, because that was my dad's favourite cocktail and just after he died last year I had one in Manhattan just for him.

What's your typical writing day like?

I walk with my daughter across Clapham Common where she heads off to school and then I carry on with the dog for half an hour or so. Then back to my desk where I set myself a target of around a 1000 words which I rarely meet because I get distracted by phone calls and emails or editing NewsBiscuit, the satirical website that I run.

Who are your fantasy dinner party guests (dead or alive) and why?

Frankly I'd rather not have any dead dinner party guests as it always puts such a dampener on the evening. But I'd like to talk to great writers about the every day business of writing, and about putting big ideas into convincing situations and characters - so Shakespeare, Tolstoy and obviously Enid Blyton (to do the washing up)

Describe your fantasy writing retreat...

I do occasionally disappear to hideaways to start a novel and ensure some thinking space. I went to a lovely old mill in France a while back, I loved the rushing water and the total seclusion. Then a few hours later I was really missing my wife and kids!

If you had one wish?

I would love it if all the people in Britain who currently send their children to private schools, suddenly saw how much they were denying their children in terms of getting a proper education. And if all classes and colours went to school together, those who currently opt out would have to use their influence and energy to ensure that the standards rose right across the country.

Your favourite book of all time is...?

There are so many but I really love Three Men in a Boat by Jerome K Jerome. I grew up besides the River Thames, and recognise every pub, lock and backwater he describes, and the comedy is still funny even after more than a century.

If you hadn't become an author, what would you be?

I am very involved with Lambeth Academy in Clapham where I am chair of governors, so perhaps I might have got involved in education. Or perhaps I would have been involved in politics or campaigning of some sort - the only problem is that as I get older the things that really bother me are all the trivial ones - mobile phones in the cinema and UHT milk in your tea on trains!

Any advice for aspiring authors? (Make this bit the longest, pleeaase!)

My advice would be write and write and write, but different stories or short plays or whatever it is that interests you. Don't invest all your hopes in one massive project like a huge novel or epic play with a cast of 60. If you are writing a book keep on going to the end even though you keep discovering there are things that you will have to change at the beginning - so many new writers rework Chapter One twenty times but never finish the novel. Only once you have got to the end of your very flawed first draft should you go back and do all your improvements.

Show the work to people you trust and respect but be prepared to accept their criticism. You will have to jettison stuff that you love to make the overall piece work. Give yourself the best chance of succeeding by writing something that a lot of people will want to read about. And of course be honest - honesty is very important in writing, as I always tell Martin Amis when he rings me up for advice.

Brilliant! Thanx John!

© Lola Jaye