Dirty Water
Logline: Fun times during hard times, the jobs we hate to do and everything in between.
Episodes: 30 minutes.
Set in the housing schemes of Glasgow, Dirty Water follows a misfit team of cleaners who work for the worst cleaning service in the country – The Eager Beaver Cleaners.
Jock, Boab, Crawford and Brian delude themselves with the mantra that they’re only doing this job until something better comes along which, of course, it never does, trapping them in their respective situations; and how they try to derive some semblance of meaning and purpose through their comradery with one another.
This show is about friends who work and playtogether. It’s about sex, love, relationships, careers. It’s about searching for love, commitment and security and the fear of love, commitment and security.
Each episode will have it’s own standalone story but there are also continuous storylines that will play out through the duration the series;
-
The company is on it’s knees as it struggles to land cleaning contracts and if they don’t make improved deals at this years cleaning convention the Eager Beavers will go under. The boss aka The Beaver built the company and was once an emerging prospector in the cleaning industry until her ex boyfriend stole the patent and the glory. A betrayal she has never gotten over, he now owns the most lucrative cleaning company and a big hitter at the cleaning convention every year.
-
Brian and Rachel (the new local barmaid) will they? Or won’t they? Brian is easily lead a stray and although the lads intension (for the most part) are for the best, anytime he follows their advice it has the opposite of the desired effect. Rachel has just moved to Glasgow from her small town, she is searching for many things but just another man is not one of them, she’s had enough of the same. Rachel is strong energetic and not phased in anyway of being the only women in a pub full of men, she happens to also be The Beavers niece.
Main characters:
-
Jock, their titular leader is a smart ass, shunning responsibility at every turn whilst simultaneously always on the lookout for the next harebrained “get rich quick” scheme.
-
Crawford, the oldest but certainly not the wisest member of the team, is a functioning alcoholic, in the mould of Falstaff, an avid dispenser of nonsensical epigrams and unasked for advice.
-
Boab hides his struggles with illiteracy and being a carer for his ailing mother behind a carefully cultivated persona of a lady’s man.
-
Brian, the newest member of the team, is a romantic yet pretentious wannabe actor from a well to do family of high achievers, who’ve disowned him not wanting to endorse his lifestyle choice.
Dirty Water’s humouris in the vain of Still Game, not limiting too but targeting a Scottish demographic, channels such as BBC Scotland, STV and streaming services such as Netflix could be the ideal platform. As the potential seasons evolve each person has to contend with the flaw in their character that has held them back from fulfilling their true potential.