Notes From A Hole In The Floor

Jack Thorne is the writer of The Scouting Book for Boys, a Celador, Screen East and Film4 production, directed by Tom Harper, which starts shooting this September. An acclaimed playwright, he has previously worked on 'Skins' and 'Shameless'. Here he opens up his diary during the crucial time of script amendments, contract signings and location hunts.

The Scouting Book for Boys follows young David, played by rising star Thomas Turgoose (This Is England; Somers Town), who lives with his friend Emily on a caravan park on the Norfolk coast. Rocked by the news that she has to move away with her father, David helps Emily to hide out in a remote cave. But as their secret becomes more complicated, David's world begins to transform in ways he never imagined.

My name is Jack Thorne. I wrote The Scouting Book For Boys. I want to call this diary 'Notes From A Hole In The Floor' after my first ever screenwriting job. I was employed by a great man called Pawel Pawlikowski and a great woman called Tanya Seghatchian. Pawel liked me because, apparently, I was just like the lead character in 'Notes From The Underground' (real translation: Notes From A Hole In The Floor) and he wanted me to adapt the book for him to direct.

I hadn't read the book when he told me this and was very excited both by the notion that anyone would want me to write anything, particularly Pawel who is a hero of mine, and also by the notion I might be some literary romantic character. The first notion turned out okay, the second, less good, because it turns out the lead character in 'Underground' is not such a literary romantic character, instead he's a nervous, angst ridden, unlikeable guy who turns out to be a slight bit of a rapist.

July 28 2008
Last week, me and Tom went on a recce to the film's locations. We visited about 15 caravan parks, some forests, lots of cliff tops and numerous beaches. We also stayed in the caravan park that will be one of our principal locations for the film - and enjoyed the night's entertainments.

Norfolk was never the location I had in my head for the film - I wrote it sitting in a caravan park in Wales about a childhood going on caravan holidays on the Isle of Wight - but the longer we spent there, the more right it seemed. The landscape is stylish - long, flat - I want to call them salt plain vistas (I'm probably wrong - if so, blame Lionel Ritchie). I told Tom he could shoot one scene like David Lean and it really is David Lean-type country. He nodded and smiled.

But it's the parks themselves that really pleased me. There were a few details I saw and now desperately want to get in the script - the habit of flying club football flags from the top of caravan roofs, a girl on roller skates dancing at the caravan karaoke, and a granny being pushed up a steep slope from the beach, her dress blowing in the wind. But mostly I was pleased how well the world fitted with what I'd written.

The other sort of purpose of the trip was to spend a large amount of time with Tom. When he first got involved with the project we sort of knew each other, but not well. Tom pitched for a script I'd written, but another director was deemed a better match. He sent me an e-mail anyway and we met up for a coffee and sort of got on. We've become friends since - a few dinners, some drinks, I've flirted (badly) with his wife, we've been 10-pin bowling twice and we've become genuine collaborators - we're also working together on a one-off for the BBC.

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