EastEnders
"EastEnders" is often filmed on location, away from the studios in Borehamwood. Sometimes an entire quartet is filmed on location, which has a practical function and are the result of "EastEnders" making a "double bank", when an extra week's worth of episodes are recorded at the same time as the regular schedule, enabling the production of the programme to stop for a two-week break at Christmas. These episodes often air in late June or early July and again in late October or early November. The first time this happened was in December 1985 when Pauline (Wendy Richard) and Arthur Fowler (Bill Treacher) travelled to the Southend-on-Sea to find their son Mark, who had run away from home. In 1986, "EastEnders" filmed overseas for the first time, in Venice, and this was also the first time it was not filmed on videotape, as a union rule at the time prevented producers taking a video crew abroad and a film crew had to be used instead. In 2011, it was reported that eight per cent of the series is filmed on location.
EastEnders: E20
The first series was written by a team of 13 writers from London aged between 17 and 22 who responded to a writing competition and attended a summer school in August 2009 as part of the BBC's new talent initiative, where they created the entire series. The summer school took place over four weeks, with the first two weeks in Theatre Royal Stratford East and the last two at the BBC centre at Elstree Studios. The writers did not know they would be writing a spin-off to "EastEnders" until they arrived. The writers, including Florence Vincent, Alex Oates, Kashman Harris and Emer Kenny, also wrote the ten episodes of series 2. They are from various parts of London, which Sathe said was "brilliant" as they represent different parts of life in London, and they have grown up with the Internet as a native medium. Santer stated that the writers created a new Walford, calling it a "fresh perspective on a British classic." The writers were given a day to travel around East London to listen to people talking to get ideas. Sathe commented: "We created some brilliant scenes from the eavesdropping stuff." After the summer school, the writers were commissioned to write the 12 episodes of series 1. Some of the scripts were allowed by be changed by the actors if they thought lines were not authentic, such as the use of London street slang. Sathe considered the use of slang to be a highlight of the series, calling it her proudest moment. Storylining and character creation for series 2 started in January 2010. The third series used mostly different writers to the first two. Each potential writer had to send in a monologue for a character they would like to see on television and the production team chose their favourites. The writers were then asked to write a scene between their character and one of the established "EastEnders" characters. Following this, the writers were interviewed and the most promising fifteen were selected. Kenny returned as a writer for series 3 and was joined by several of the young "EastEnders" cast members: Arinze Kene (Connor Stanley), Himesh Patel (Tamwar Masood) and Charlie G Hawkins (Darren Miller).