PITCHING -- TO STUDIO EXECUTIVES, NOT BATTERS

Imagine you're in need of a driver. Someone to take your precious child to and from school every day. You're going to pay them a fortune and hand over the keys to your brand new Bugatti Veyron. So you start to interview prospective candidates. Instead of having them take you for a drive and seeing their skills for yourself, though, you chose to let them tell you what kind of driver they would be. They crack jokes, make you laugh, and command the room. So you hire them on the spot without so much as looking at their driver's license. That is exactly how pitching works in Hollywood. Want to know one of the reasons movies can be so awful? Because most writers are hired by how they talk --- not how they write.

What is pitching? Well, if a studio needs a writer for an idea they have or they are looking for new projects, they have writers come in and "pitch" their "take" on the project. It's as simple as it sounds. The writer sits (or stands or dances) in a room with some executives and tells a story. If the executives like the story, they then hire the writer to write a script.

Let's break this down. Writers, by nature, are geeks. I'm one. You're one. We were (and sometimes still are) the shy, dreamy ones sitting in the back of the classroom hoping no one calls on them and asks them to actually speak. That's why writers write. There's a big strange world in their heads that can only be adequately expressed through the written word.

So, let's take that wilting flower and put them under a sun lamp in the desert --- in a studio executives office --- and make them act out a story. Guess what? Writers aren't actors for a reason. We write. Wait, let me say it again. We're writers.

When suddenly forced to become actors, some writers do all right. They rise to the occasion and sell pitches. I've done it. It's painful and frightening and totally inorganic to the process of writing, but it can be done. Some really good writers are really good at pitching. The majority of pitches sold, however, aren't from good writers. They are from good pitchers. Believe it or not, there is a difference.

Inevitably, the studios end up with a script that is in desperate need of extensive re-writing because it was written by "pitcher", not a "writer", and then they start the process all over again by having more "writers" come in to "pitch" to re-write the script that they bought from the "pitcher" they really hoped was a "writer" but didn't know because they never read what the "writer" wrote.

Crazy, right? It really is. It's like death and taxes, though. There's no escaping it and it will never go away. Why? Because studio executives don't have time to read and reading takes a lot of time. Of course, they do read. They read projects that are already in development. But by then it's too late. Caveat emptor and all that.

In a future post I'll tell you about how to pitch. Or at least I'll tell you what everyone else says because I wouldn't say I'm an expert. I'm a writer after all.

SO YOU WANT TO WRITE MOVIES...

I wrote the film "A Cinderella Story" (and was re-written by about fifty other writers --- so if you loved the film, I take responsibility for the good parts and if you hated it you can blame the other writers). I also wrote a new movie coming out called "16-Love" which I will write more about another time. Believe it or not, having ONE movie made is a Herculean accomplishment. Having TWO made is an act of the God. I'd love to say there will be a third, but that is crazy, put me in an asylum, talk. Why? Because writing movies is an art, selling scripts is an impossible dream and having them filmed is a one is million convergence of lucky breaks that often has absolutely nothing to do with the talents and merits or the screenwriter. It's a happy (sometimes) accident.

If it's so hard to do, why do it? I ask myself that every day. If you're reading this, you probably know the answer. Because you think making movies is fun. And it is. It really is. It's intoxicating and, like a drug dealer, calls you back again and again. You want that hit. That high. You'll do anything to get it. You'll work with frazzled studio executives who have so little time they have to listen to shy, awkward writers tell their stories rather than read what writers write. (That's called pitching, something else I'll talk about another time). You'll work with producers and directors who can't stand each other, crew members both wonderful and awful, managers and agents who swear their undying devotion to you then don't return your calls when you hit a rough patch, and your own persistent self-doubts and feelings of desperation. You do this all so one day you can sit in a movie theater and watch a version of your movie that bears absolutely no resemblance to anything you wrote. But you'll do it all again. Happily. In fact, you'd pay someone to let you do it.

I get sent scripts all the time by new writers. Inevitably they ask for advice and notes and then take neither. My producing partner and I both realized that when someone sends a script, they don't really want your advice or notes. They want you to get their movie made. Fair enough. But, really, trust me --- take the advice and notes. Almost everyone who has made a movie has done the time. They've been an assistant to some jerk, worked long hours for no pay, wrote a dozen scripts no one wanted. It's hard work. You hear about someone selling their first script to some mega-producer they bumped into just as they were getting off the bus from Nebraska. I'm sure it's happened, but those are fairy tales. They resemble reality, but they aren't real. Just like there could have once been a put upon waif of a stepdaughter who snuck into the ball and met the handsome Prince, but we all know glass slippers don't exist for a reason. They would be really uncomfortable. Sounds good but it's just not true! So, if you want to write movies, most likely, you're going to have to do it the good old fashioned way. You're going to have to work for it.

So, here is what I usually tell new writers to do. These are the steps that can give you a better chance and these are the things no one ever follows. But they should.

1. Go to film school. I went to USC. When I went the screenwriting program was new and it sucked. I didn't learn a darn thing. But things are different now. You will learn something. But more importantly, you'll start to get plugged into the system. You'll see how it all works. You'll begin to make contacts. You'll work well with others. (And some day you'll see that it's all about working well with others.)

2. Intern at a talent agency. I worked at the Gersh Agency for a great guy (not all agents are stereotypical monsters) named Bob Gersh. This is really where I learned about the industry. Because it's called the film business for a reason. You may call it "art" but if it doesn't make money it will cease to exist. At an agency you'll learn who the players are in town, who is buying, what they're buying, why they're buying. Why are actors important? Who does what?How do they do it? You'll make your all-important contacts. And you'll have access to the number one most important thing you'll need to learn about screenwriting --- scripts.

3. Which brings me to the big one. If you want to write scripts --- you need to read scripts. You need to read scripts for film and t.v. that are being made. Not only will you start to get an idea of what the marketplace is looking for, you'll also start to pick up on the rhythm of screenwriting. I'm amazed at how many writers send scripts and they don't even have the formatting right. At the very least, your script should look like a script. Pacing and structure and all the other hard stuff comes through practice and through reading. Really. It really does.

Those are my top tips. You will come closer to doing the impossible by making contacts, knowing the marketplace, working anywhere in the industry, and praying for a lot of luck. But as Thomas Jefferson (or Arnold Palmer or Miley Cyrus) said "the harder I work the luckier I get."

Good luck.