'k, I don't consider myself a straight to video writer. I know someone who is in tune with what that population wants, and it ain't me. I can't tell you the first thing about what twelve year old stoner boys want to watch at 3 am. I'd really be reaching. Although, ironically because of a lifetime of comic collecting, there probably is a 12 year old boy niche I could write for...it's just the men would be wearing spandex, not the women.
When I say low budget, I'm thinking indie films for smartiepants women, or MOW and TV for cable channels like HERE and Oxygen. That's more the crowd that gets me.
I'm just saying, willing to start small...I'm not one of those jackholes who thinks they deserve to break into big budget feature films with their first spec. I'll pay dues, and my goals are small. Working writer. That's about it.
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Go to the Lifetime Movie channel website (or Oxygen or what have you) and get a list of the movies that are playing there for this month. Then plug the titles into IMDB and get a list of the production companies, do some web research and get their addresses. Then write introduction letters to only those companies. A focused attack can't help but get you somewhere. It might take time, but if you know the market and the films they've done in the past, you can break in.
Soooo... how much are you going to write today?
Me, I plan to finish up about 2 single-spaced pages. My hope is to get nearly done with this section. I've got it outlined; it's just connect the dots. It should be easy. Right? Right??
(Um, here's the place in the plot where all knew things would go wrong.)
It's be easier if my mind didn't wander off every 15 minutes or so... did you know that I could write with my left hand so that you can read it in a mirror?
Wait. Back to the part where I start writing again...
NN
NN
NP - OMG, gotta read this, from "Query Letters I Love":
If you unleashed Attila the Hun in a corporation today, gave him a good shave and appropriate business attire, then placed him in a powerful position, would anyone notice? My latest comedic screenplay depicts the tale of a Marketing Executive who becomes possessed by Attila the Hun and wreaks havoc on his firm in an effort to secure the promotion he was destined for. It's AMERICAN BEAUTY meets NETWORK, only ten times more hilarious!
You'd think *I* would have thought of that!!
2 SINGLE spaced pages...you go girl!
Only TEN TIMES MORE HILARIOUS!
'Cuz I got big giggles out of American Beauty and Network.
"The promotion he was destined for" Huh. So we can assume the screenwriter was passed up at work and is pissed enough to write a query about it.
I don't know, I'm so out of touch with Middle America and the blockbuster mentality (UNLESS it's a superhero movie). Maybe this would sell to the red states. Half the time I find the creative grammar, spelling, and bad query manners more offensive than these people's story ideas.
Hey Nicholas, thanks for the advice. All very sound, and something I might try if I weren't at UCLA with some connections.
The word we're getting at UCLA from the guest speakers is that pretty much all query letters are going in the recyling bin right now. Spec sales are at an alltime low because of the shitty economy, and agents aren't even hip-pocketing baby writers anymore. People are only reading scripts handed to them by a referral - so it's all back to who you know.
That's why I'm networking with other writers, and we're all trying to help each other out. I used to work for a big director/writer/producer, so I'm trying to get two of my friends' scripts to her because they're right up her alley. And a friend of mine is going in to HERE next week and pitching one of my scripts because of the gay content and TV spinoff possibility. Basically, us writers are banding together and doing it for ourselves.
That friend also has one of my scripts out to her manager right now, so if I sign with her I'll probably have a different plan.
I totally appreciate the advice though, thanks. Have you sold something? I saw you were an actor, but I didn't know you were a screenwriter.
I always wondered why a bunch of writer's didn't band together and form a conglomerate, twelve people calling their firm The Writer's Block or something. Everyone writes and sends their stuff out like usual, but whatever money that rolls in goes into the pot and divied up so everyone can buy groceries. Then when one gets a lucrative job and his first run-through is rejected, you could tell the producer 'hey, there is a few more people in the Firm that can take a stab at it'. That way if the fourth person in the Firm gets a sale, THAT money now is divied up
Okay: here's a request, NP. Having a hard time today... so, why do we write, again? Just now I can't remember... there's just blank screen... and lassitude...
NN
Moviequill, I'd actually be down with that. Then again, I am a commie.
NN, my lethargy today is totally self-induced...i.e. alchohol based. But at least I have a smile on my face.
Okay, when I'm staring at a blank screen for too long, I like to yell "PENIS!" It helps. Try it.
As far as the why we write. Er, 'cuz society needs to have it's ass kicked, and that's why you're writing about circumcision?
Seriously, you have the most rock star disseration topic ever (yes, you've even topped my Catwoman thesis). So just go have fun documenting foreskin. Giggle about how your name will always be, uh, attached to that topic.
I just used the wrong "it's." What a moron. God I hate that.
Actually, the only offer I've gotten yet for production, I turned down because I didn't want the movie shot in LA. Is that dumb? The money was there, the director attached, but they wanted to shoot in LA and I felt that the location was inherent to the story.
Writing, for me, isn't a career goal as much as something I really enjoy. So I'm not really focusing on selling anything.
And I totally agree with your assessment of "networking as only way to get work". Some people don't like to hear that, but it's the hard truth. Even the query letter process is really only an attempt to get to know the producer you're courting.
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