BAFTA and Business HE master classes

Higher Education students at The Bedford College Group benefit from access to real role models in the careers to which they aspire.

Recent talks hosted were to Performing Arts students by Bafta-award winning script writer Rob Butler who gave some fascinating insights from the twists and turns of his career.

After university he worked 12 hour days, sometimes seven days a week, for £9k a year at a post production company where he “passed a biscuit” to Madonna, among others. But by gaining experience and contacts he progressed from runner to a pool writer for the Dave channel, producing witty continuity scripts. The three-day-a week job allowed him to work on his own ideas and gig for the CBBC children’s channel: “I still get re-run cheques from work in 2004.”  Through a friend he got a foot in the door at the Hollyoaks soap script room and eventually became a core writer, exhausting work over six years. Then came a big break with writing partner Bede Blake and Creeped Out was born. Nominated for a Bafta, they thought they had no chance of winning and literally made up their lines for their acceptance speech: “I forgot to thank my partner.”

To show the fickleness of the industry, Creeped Out was then “put on hold”. However he has since gone on to write critically acclaimed work aimed at young men on serious subjects and has a range of projects in development.

Creeped Out is a BAFTA winning British-Canadian anthology horror television series created by Bede Blake and Robert Butler as a co-production between CBBC Productions and DHX Media. It premiered in the United Kingdom on CBBC on 31 October 2017 (Halloween),and in Canada on the Family Channel on 5 October 2018. In the United States, the show was announced as a Netflix original series.

Sean Doyle Course Manager said:

“It was fascinating for students to be able to hear Rob and ask him questions about his pathway. They are all working on their own scripts as we speak.”