Hall Brown Family Law is one of the country’s leading and busiest firms specialising in the various aspects of family law.

Even so, we fully understand that many individuals never require the services or support which we offer.

For them, exposure work of family courts is represented either in the news or drama – be that in books, television or the movies.

Whilst journalists are drawn to stories which are new or significant, they are still bound by certain rules regarding how the details of cases are reported.

When it comes to the entertainment industry, however, there is a need to make the narrative on screen or in print compelling. If not, there is a risk that people won’t turn on or go to the box office and bookshop.

That means playing up certain aspects to build characters and dramatic tension in a way which keeps people glued to their seats or turning pages.

It is perhaps little surprise, therefore, that the way in which family court cases involving divorce or disputes about how parents raise their children can be shaped by the way in which situations are portrayed.

For a time, that meant the way families approached such issues being influenced by the likes of the Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner black comedy ‘The War of the Roses’ or the Oscar-winning ‘Kramer vs Kramer’.

I have dealt with matters in which men and women have even cited some of the phraseology associated with far more dramatic – and fictional – depictions of their broad circumstances.

Yet I believe the cycle of life being influenced by art which is in turn influenced by life may be changing.

In my opinion, that is due to an acknowledgement on the part of politicians, the judiciary and families of the strain created by an enormous caseload handled by the family courts and the potential for that to compound whatever problems exist within households across the country.

As a result, there has been a growing appreciation of how non-court dispute resolution (NCDR) can defuse rather than inflame tensions between spouses or cohabiting partners and avoid causing lasting difficulties to children.

It is something which I found myself contemplating while reading a recent article in the New Yorker magazine, in particular, explored how awkward it can be to articulate such issues for children’s television.

The article noted the observation of one writer for the renowned American children’s show ‘Sesame Street’ that it was easier to deal with the subject of death than divorce.

By way of context for the very different audience on this side of the Atlantic, the latest statistics show that there were 102,678 divorces in England and Wales in 2023.

Given that divorce can be complicated and stressful, we should maybe not be too surprised, therefore, if some of those feature an element of conflict.

In my experience, that is especially true when those involved are not represented by trained family lawyers.

Figures published by the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) recently show that only 15 per cent of private law children’s cases featured parents who both had legal representation, something which has been a factor since the withdrawal of Legal Aid for most types of family law cases in 2014.

Without specialist guidance, some Litigants in Person regard court hearings as an opportunity to make a point at their ex’s expense, not realising that it can mean disagreements take longer to resolve and become even more heated.

That is of critical importance when you consider that the opening section of the legislation governing children law proceedings – the Children Act 1989 – makes clear that “any delay…is likely to prejudice the welfare of the child”.

When it comes to NCDR, the more collaborative approach generally enables discord to be resolved in a more convenient and quicker fashion.

As family lawyers, we know that we have a responsibility to facilitate resolution even for all matters, including those which prove unsuitable for NCDR – ensuring, for instance, that correspondence is progressive rather than aggravating things.

I believe that the family courts’ being equipped with the powers to ensure that parties fully commit to NCDR before taking their grievances to court – even imposing financial penalties if they do not – has helped drill home the point about the benefits of methods such as mediation and arbitration.

The idea of calm, constructive discussion may not appeal to screenwriters and the movie-going public as much as the idea of fisticuffs and fireworks in the family court.

However, as much as family lawyers also enjoy being entertained, our central function is to support clients through some of the most delicate episodes in their entire lives.

It is widely and rightly understood that is best achieved by avoiding friction.

In this sense, an absence of drama really can bring about a happy ending.