Fundamentally, a Red Dwarf script is a battle plan for making a TV show, and as Napoleon Bonaparte once remarked "No battle plan ever survived contact with the enemy". In Red Dwarf's case the enemy is what's possible, given a tight budget, a short production period, and the physical laws of the natural universe.
The enemy is a prop that doesn't work. A guest star who can't say the word "soup". Another who can't say the word "phenomenon". Writing the stage direction "Beach in Paradise", and finding yourself on a wet winter day in Rhyll. The enemy is reality, and reality is, unfortunately, everywhere.
—
Grant Naylor,
Red Dwarf: The Least Worst Scripts
This covers a number of areas where real life circumstances alter the plot of an episode, e.g. the lack of suitable locations, timing when filming, the pregnancy of a lead actress (which happens a
lot). Occurs often in
Professional Wrestling. May overlap with
Actor-Shared Background.
Not to be confused with
Very Loosely Based on a True Story or
Ripped from the Headlines, where real-life events merely provide inspiration for a plot.
Specific instances:
