Potter's work is known for its use of non-naturalistic devices. These include the extensive use of flashback and nonlinear plot structure ("Casanova"; "Late Call"), direct to camera address ("Vote, Vote, Vote for Nigel Barton") and works where "the child is father to the man", in which he used adult actors to play children ("Stand Up, Nigel Barton"; "Blue Remembered Hills"). The 'lip-sync' technique he developed for his "serials with songs" ("Pennies from Heaven"; "The Singing Detective" and "Lipstick on Your Collar") is perhaps the best known of the Potter trademarks. They are frequently deployed in works where the line between fantasy and reality becomes blurred, often as a result of the influence of popular culture (Willie, the Wild West obsessive played by Hywel Bennett in "Where the Buffalo Roam") or from a character's apparent awareness of their status as a pawn in the hands of an omniscient author (the actor Jack Black (Denholm Elliott) in "Follow the Yellow Brick Road" first broadcast in 1972).