Location, location, location. It’s important in real estate, in a script’s budget and also in sparking creativity for a writer’s mind. But for me, location isn’t the only thing – it’s the combination of location, people, and inspiration that puts words on the page. Location Finding the best location to write is just as important [...]
Congratulations to all of the writers who went to Screenwriters World Conference East last weekend in New York City. It was an honor and a pleasure to meet our community of writers and learn alongside you. Since my return, my inbox has been popping with post-pitchfest questions, starting with the Pitch Slam experience. I wasn’t [...]
When pursuing a screenwriting career, you have to get out of your writer’s cave and meet executives face-to-face. The BEST way to pitch your work is to sell yourself! After all, should an exec like your script, s/he will have to work with you for a long period of time developing it. It’s just as [...]
I’ve always enjoyed blending genres, even though many of the great tomes of screenwriting wisdom caution against it. “From the first few pages of your screenplay, the audience has to know exactly what genre it is.” I’ve come to learn that it’s not the audience that needs to know what genre it is – the [...]
Money? Fame? Love of the process? What is it? Why do we continue to write screenplays when aside from the outrageously arduous task of getting it even remotely right, the odds of then getting it sold and then made and then becoming a hit are…well, tremendously long and then… sustaining or repeating that success is, [...]
After twenty-five years of writing screenplays, always while working two jobs, an Ohio woman decides that she has had enough. Along the way, there have been nibbles here – producers who have taken a shine to a particular script, free options, partial financing – and bites there – mangers and agents who have promised the [...]
If you’re going to pitch your script you’re going to need certain materials: a killer logline, a short pitch that captures the essence of your story, and a two page treatment that shows how it all works in relation to your character’s journey. But often so much focus goes into figuring out the perfect pitch [...]
Meet one of our fabulous speakers at Screenwriters World East Conference in NYC, Susan Kouguell. Now that I’ve caught your attention with a spin on this infamous Broadway musical title — I must make a confession. This title is wishful thinking. How to succeed in the screenwriting world is not all about trying. It’s so [...]
What do you call the guy from the 7th Cavalry regiment who, at the Battle of the Little Bighorn, said, “General Custer, reinforcements are on the way”? An optimist. I admit that when it comes to assessing another type of seemingly “hopeless” situation– a new writer’s chances of selling his script– I’m an optimist too. [...]
