I AM RELATED TO ONE OF THEM, YOU KNOW

My cousin is a screenwriter. And a hugely successful and wealthy one he is too. Look at him, residing in a large and beautiful mansion in a faraway country adjacent to a very pretty coastline, he's pathetic and he is a bastard but I refuse to display any kind of bitterness towards him. So good luck to him and his overly hairy wife.

For the past few years I have been engaging in some kind of twisted game with my cousin in order to see who is the more talented of the two of us. He constantly seems to be in the lead.

But it is a long held desire of mine to usurp the blackguard as he was always the favoured child of Mum and Auntie Gert (Auntie Gert moved in with us shortly after the divorce of my parents - Come to think of it, I'm uncertain that Gert was a conventional Auntie, but she lived with Mum all the same. Come to think of it again, despite being wealthy, they did insist on sharing a bedroom. To save on heating two separate bedrooms, one supposes. Mum was always frugal. And she rather adored Rugby Football.)

But I digress.

I am acutely aware that I am not getting any younger and that my advancing years may hinder my progress in the chosen sphere of screenwriting, and fearful that success may ultimately reveal itself Eva Cassidy style (more famous dead than alive).

My loyal girlfriend, the redoubtable Helen, has in her time written many articles for such giants of the magazine world as Family Circle and contributed many readers letters to various newspapers such as The Guardian, The Observer and The Kilburn Times. Therefore, she can provide me with the professional knowledge, but since the little woman is given to pottering about in the garden of her mind (out there for days she often is) I trust that I will have no shortage of willing combatants in The War Against Cinematic Mediocrity. How the hell Four Weddings and a Funeral topped the list in a recent 'Favourite British Films' survey is anybody's guess.

Also, by way of warning one must inform you that Geoff has some ground rules. He abhors swearing, rudeness, intolerance, and queers. That was a joke by the way. I really don't mind the queers.

Geoff's Blog: Keeping it up on a "Four Weddings???" basis

Geoff Prickett (It's pronounced Prickett)
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