How on earth have Eastenders written in Micheal Jackson death and aired it tonight!

[MrsBonJovi]

Thats it really....two scenes at least. One with Densie asking Patrick if he had heard the news...the other with the boy looking at his album.

How on earth have they managed that and aired it today?

[TwoSunnyDays]

Brookside did it first when Princess Diana died.

[georgepig]

Lol at this thread, (in a nice way).

People who are already at the days filming, they just get them to do an extra scene and slip it in somewhere. They have extras on set all the time, so its not hard to set up.

The world cup storyline wasnt filmed in advance, "gary" and "minty" were already on set and they put on england shirts, stood in the caff and discussed the result. Honestly it takes 5-10 minutes in reality to film but gets such good publicity about how "up-to-date" EE is!

It is supposed to represent real life, and in real life, 2 blokes stood in a caff in london would be talking about the football, and people would be talking about MJ dying or barack obama becoming president etc. It will be done many more times in the future, i promise ya!

[Blondeshavemorefun]

i can understand that they shot scenes about a world cup with 2 different stories, ie england won or england lost as obv one of the 2 was def going to happen

but

they normally film ee 6 weeks in advance and obv didnt know then that MJ was going to die

[inscotland]

They did it when the queen mum died too.

[Blondeshavemorefun]

they did it over something else as well - but cant rem what

some reference to something that was BIG in news that day

might have been 11 sept ie 9/11

[MrsBonJovi]

Well done for the link...interesting.

[SameAsYou]

here

[ChippyMinton]

Presumably they were filming market scenes today for a future episode so could just shhot and edit the extra scene.

[FabBakerGirlIsBack]

i completely missed both references

[Tortoise]

Thriller is the back ground music in the pub just now too.

[myredcardigan]

Yes, the Obama thing was the other one I remember.

[Heated]

They definitely have done it before - Barack Obama elected, World Cup football and something else that had dh & I looking at each other, but for the life of me can't remember what.

[myredcardigan]

No because they mentioned a goal or something. I remember at the time thinking how disjointed the scene was.

Whatever you think of MJ, he was iconic and the whole world is talking about it so it stands to reason that we'd expect EE to be too.
...Well I wouldn't because it's just a soap opera filmed months in advance but YKWIM.

[SameAsYou]

It was also done with Obama too

[MrsBonJovi]

But the boy was looking at Michael Jacksons 1s Album and patrick offered to buy it for him...that would have needed market extras too.

I wonder what they edited out!

[myredcardigan]

Ug! There you go then!

[myredcardigan]

Yes, they just bring one or maybe two characters in to do a short stand alone scene. As I said, they have done it before at least once.

[Nappyzoneisabeetrootrunner]

Yes i have to say i was impressed to! the england thing though previously done could have been filmed weeks before as a just incase. Maybe they have scenes already in stock for every celeb!

[Ug]

myredcardigan

[BakewellTarts]

Can't be too hard to film a couple of short segments and edit them in...

[Ug]

I think they can shoot and slip in a couple of short scenes at very short notice (well evidently!).

And as it goes I'm sure they've done it before, can't remember when exactly but I remember thinking cor... It involved Gary and Minty discussing something I think... maybe football? or Eurovision winner???

[Phoenix]

We just saw that too and me and dh stared at each other open mouthed for a second . He says they must have got them in especially to film it.

[MrsBonJovi]

Because i know filming normally happens months in advance...they would also have to ensure Patricks outfit ready to match with the rest of the scenes.

[myredcardigan]

They have done this before.
When England were knocked out of the world cup there was a stand alone scene with Gary and Minty saying what a shame it was.

I think I remember it on another occasion too but can't remember when.

[giddykipper]

My criticism of Eastenders has always been that it's not culturally topical - never any reference to sport/TV/music, which makes it completely unrealistic. I think this is the first time they have ever done anything like this.