Pearse elliott biography examples

Pulling Moves

BBC THREE

Pearse Elliott, Writer

Pearse Elliott has a gift for picking up the way the people of West Belfast speak - and for transferring that style and humour onto the written page.

He has written as authentic a series as anything to have come from the pen of Roddy Doyle or Jim Sheridan.

In his own words he talks about the genesis of the project, life in West Belfast before and after the ceasefire and his inspiration and motivation.

Why did you write Pulling Moves?

"I wrote Pulling Moves the way I write anything, I thought there was fecund territory in characters and a world that had largely been ignored and was relatively unknown - and I thought that considering the current zeitgeist that there was a superb opportunity to elucidate this.

"I was sick to the death of inept dramas made about the North that certainly weren't representative of my community and were made by people that hadn't one clue who this community and people are. So I wanted to address that from a fresh, rather than formulaic point of view."

Can you sum up what it is about?

"Pulling Moves is what it says on the packet. It is about a group of guys surviving and augmenting their manual labour jobs by opportunistic, and sometimes altruistic, moves.

"I stress this because the lads aren't criminals or lazy, just guys that exist in every working class community in UK and Ireland, only with the added bonus that we have this colourful world and background as their environment."

Do you know real people like the four main characters?

"The answer is an emphatic yes. I know people like the characters from the main leads to the much smaller parts and right down to the extras (who in our film are quite often the real people who've inspired aspects of the major characters).

"I got the name Wardrobe from a bouncer downtown but the character is the amalgamation of a few characters I've run into.

"Shay is partly based on my youngest brother.

"Crazy Horse was an old drunk who used to stand bare-chested on the Falls Road in Belfast, come rain or shine, and this is really an homage to him.

"Aspects of Ta, Darragh and Hoker's characters were inspired by different people I've known."

Was growing up in Belfast as funny as it appears to be in the series?

"Growing up was as funny as it was sad, I think that is part of the heritage of the people - people needed an escape valve in times of great trauma and conflict - no better way than with laughter."

How much did the Troubles impact on your life in West Belfast?

"Every day life, I don't want to harp on about the past, as this series is not about that.

"But the Troubles did have an impact on every day life, but I know my experiences are not as severe as the experiences of many others in West Belfast and across the country."

How many of the stories in Pulling Moves have happened to you?

"I'm pleading the fifth."

How and why did you become a writer?

"From when I was a kid it's all I've ever done - write and tell stories, I don't think I can really do anything else.

"In 1995 I won the BBC young playwrights competition, for a play written on jotter paper and four types of pen!

"And from then on in I've made a living from writing for radio, TV, stage and now film. The simple reason why I write is coz' I love it!"

What is your next project?

"I have a novel I'm trying to finish and flog called Havana Blades and it's about a knife fight in Cuba.

"I'm going to be directing a feature film that I've written for Treasure and BBC Films, called Valhalla - it's a crazy action road movie comedy set all over Ireland.

"I've also just completed another film script and will be promoting the new feature I've written - Man About Dog - which will be in a cinema very soon."