Stoush on the New Tricks set

I can tell you EXACTLY how much of it the actors wrote: not a comma.

--New Tricks writer Julian Simpson on Twitter.

We're fans of the popular cop show "New Tricks" in this household (though we could do with rather less of Amanda Redman's bosom), and the writing has always seemed snappy and the plot kept tight.

However, the BBC reports that the actors are unhappy with writers who keep on going over the history of the characters, considering it repetitive.

New Tricks star Amanda Redman has told the Radio Times the show is "more bland now" and the characters are not as "anarchic" as they used to be.

Co-stars Alun Armstrong and Dennis Waterman agreed with her assessment.

"My character has got saner. Which I'm not too enamoured with," Armstrong told the magazine.
Waterman added: "We're always talking about history and some writers - not all of them - can go on and on, repeating themselves."

The actors have just finished filming the ninth series of the popular police drama based on solving cold cases, the first without James Bolam, who announced he was leaving last year.

The eighth series attracted the show's highest ever ratings.

Waterman added: "You have to remind yourself that people aren't as stupid as writers think. But that's the way things are going in the industry. Basically, we all want to move to Copenhagen to get to do some extraordinary television."

Armstrong said: "We put a lot of time into making the scripts work.
"If we felt that a story didn't work, or that bits of the story could be improved, then - if the writer wasn't around - we would set about re-writing it ourselves."

Although the cast did not single out any particular writer, one of the show's mainstays has hit back at the comments.

"A New Tricks I wrote and directed airs on Monday. I can tell you EXACTLY how much of it the actors wrote: not a comma," said Julian Simpson on Twitter.