Newspaper research

We were given a brief to look through some newspapers and find a story that interested us, and then to write a pitch for either a documentary or a drama to do with that story or an issue that we felt that story raised.

Initially i had 3 ideas:

- The rise and fall of John Terry as he went from enthusiastic youngster, to leader of his country and role model, and then to something of a villain as he cheated on his wife with a friend, and national teammates, girlfriend.

- Portsmouth football club and how they have gone from winning the FA cup, to being debt ridden, having had 5 owners in the space of half a season, and are now facing the prospect of not being around any longer

- The New Orleans Saints and how they went from being the laughing stock of the NFL, to winning the super bowl, via the devastation of Hurricane Katrina.

I decided to go with the New Orleans Saints idea as that also highlighted the damage done by the hurricane, and could also be relevant after the recent Haiti disaster.

My pitch was:

For forty years, the New Orleans Saints were the laughing stock of the NFL, then the devastation of Hurricane Katrina sent the city into despair. We follow their journey as they look to recover and make it to their first Super Bowl.

I envisaged the documentary being an hour long, and airing on channel 5, and it would be called "Aint's to Saints"