BIZ TIP TUESDAY:
DO YOU FEEL LUCKY, PUNK?
When you are on the other side of the wall it seems like the guys inside got in there by luck. They lucked out and sold something or maybe were born with luck: their father was a producer. Or maybe they got lucky by bumping into someone in the biz? The press love stories of luck, because it means that ANYONE can win the Lotto. They downplay the hard work part of any success story. It easy to get the idea that
all of those guys inside had it easy, then the rules changed when you tried to get in.
Not the case.
Sure - some people do get lucky. Some people do win the Lotto.
But most people have to work their butts off to get anywhere.
The guys inside the wall went through everything that you are going through. They struggled, fought, found a way in.
The press made a big thing about SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION being Darabont's first directing gig - see, a first timer can make an amazing film! But Darabont was a screenwriter with a long resume before SHAWSHANK and had, um, directed TV movies and a short film based on a Stephen King story. Oh, and he had worked as a prop guy on film crews for years while he was trying to break in. Behind every overnight success is about 15 years of hard work that the press likes to erase so that everything is that Cinderella story... everything is that dream of luck.
Recently someone on a message board brought up John Logan who wrote SKYFALLL and GLADIATOR and LAST SAMURAI... who also wrote the low budget film BATS! (Which should be upside down like it is on the cheesy poster) and TORNADO!. I don't think anyone mentions those movies when they talk about his blasting on the screenwriting scene with ANY GIVEN SUNDAY.
Just like your characters, every successful screenwriter has a backstory where they struggled... and then they just got lucky.
I MAKE MY OWN LUCK
In the classic Noir film GILDA, Johnny (Glenn Ford) is an American who is down and out in Argentina during World War 2. He's wearing a dirty suit, probably living in some hotel that's more like a rooming house. The film opens with him throwing dice in some street craps game with a bunch of day laborers and sailors. He's lucky, and wins the game - scoops up the money and gets the hell out of there before those burley guys decide they can't afford to lose their paychecks.
In a alley, he counts his winnings - a fat roll but all singles. That's when the mugger attacks him.
He refuses to hand over his money, and it looks bleak... then a man who has been observing from the edge of the alley steps forward and chases off the mugger. This is Ballin (George Macready) - the wealthy owner of an illegal gambling club. He had been watching Johnny throwing dice earlier and followed him down the alley... which is how he just happened to be there to chase off the mugger. When Johnny sees how well dressed Ballin is he calls him a lucky man. Ballin says, "I make my own luck" then suggests that Johnny come to his gambling club and try his luck there... but they won't let him play with his own loaded dice. "I didn't know it showed." "A man who makes his own luck, as I do, recognizes another."
Our job is to make our own luck. Not with loaded dice, but with creativity and hard work and some sort of *plan*.
I think that finding the way in is part of the screenwriter's job test. There ARE ways in - all of those "lucky" guys got in. Each one found a different way in... and your mission should you decide to accept it is to find YOUR way in. If you pass the test, you're inside. If you fail, you're still outside. You don't have to wait 6 months before you can take the test again, and you can takes as many tests at once as you can handle. So you ALWAYS have a new Lotto ticket! You ALWAYS have a chance to win!
Try everything. Use your creativity.
I have a notepad titled CHANCES TO WIN. I list all of the e-quieries I send, all of the scripts I send, anyone I talked to about screenwriting. It's a record of my Lotto numbers. I always try to have LOTS of chances to win. If two companies reject scripts, I work until I had two more companies reading scripts. Last thing I want was NO chances to win (that's depressing). By putting my "chances to win" on paper I have a list of things I was actually doing to get scripts sold. Not what I'm thinking of doing or dreaming of doing on planning on doing - what I *am* doing. If there's nothing on that list - I'm not doing a damned thing and not making my own luck. I'm just hoping to buy one lottery ticket and win those Mega Millions. Not likely, is it?
If you keep hammering away at that wall, you will eventually break in.
And if you get your stuff out there enough and get read enough and your scripts are good enough (the most important part) eventually something happens. People read them and like them and then somewhere down the road you may get a call from those people about some project they think you'd be perfect for. Or they read that script that is exactly what they are looking for. That may seem like luck, but if you shovel enough scripts through the doors the odds say you eventually will get the peg that fits the hole... or the winning lottery numbers... or whatever analogy you like. If you don't try, you can't succeed. The secret behind all of those lucky guys who broke in is that they kept trying... and kept trying to find some interesting way in.
INTERESTING WAYS IN
There's a two part Script Tip in the garage waiting to be worked on that lists over a dozen ways over the wall you may never have thought of. When I get that Tip rewritten it may never run - I might just use it as a chapter in the Selling Blue Book expansion. But just writing screenplays and e-mailing queries is a basic... what *else* are you doing to get over that wall? How else are you making your own luck?
In GILDA Johnny not only has loaded dice, when he goes to Ballin's casino he knows how to count cards and manipulate the deck when he cuts the cards. Though some of what he does is cheating, he's also a skilled player who doesn't just sit there and play - he is doing everything he can to win. He is looking for an angle. He is trying to improve the odds... making his own luck.
We don't have to cheat to get in, but some writers (me included) often classify an interesting way in as "cheating" when it's really just being creative. We get jealous of other people's "luck"... when it was really hard work. I know a writer who pretty much stalked a handful of his favorite directors, going to every event where they spoke or were on a panel and eventually this "payed off" when he got a job working as one of the directors' assistants... picking up his laundry and walking his dogs and buying gifts for his girlfriends. Awesome job! How lucky! Well, that "luck" paid off, because he ended up making a bunch of connections and got scripts to places that would be closed to the rest of us. Cheating? Or working his butt off finding the other way in?
I know another writer who's friend sold a script and looked like he was going places - so he offered to be his friend's assistant. Again, I think dog walking was involved... but also lots of retyping and proof reading scripts and trips to the post office (this was a while ago when everything was hard copy) and trips to the copy place. He drove his friend to meetings and when his friend's career moved up... he ended up getting paid to do these things. Yeah, before that he was doing it for free. At one point, the friend overbooked himself with assignments and the writer ended up writing the first draft of a big studio film that his friend did a quick rewrite on to give it that Barton Fink Feeling. That film was a big hit... and the writer decided to use the connections he had made working for his friend to his own advantage. Heck, he was the one who called all of the studio producers to confirm meetings and he was the one delivering drafts. Everybody knew him at this point. There were even some rumors floating around that he did some writing on that hit screenplay with his friend's name on it. So, was using all of the contacts he made cheating? Or working his butt off to find a way in?
Not everyone who is lucky was a dog walking assistant. I know another writer who is a reader, and one who is an on set production assistant, and one who is an extra, and one who is a studio security guard (hey, that's how Antwone Fisher broke in), and one who works for a state film commission, and a couple who are film editors, and a whole bunch who make web films and ultra low budget features, and...
I'm not suggesting you walk dogs, but that you use that creativity you usually use for writing screenplays when you are trying to get people to read and buy your screenplays (or hire you to write one). Look for the alternative ways over that wall. The interesting way in. From the outside it may seem like "cheating", but it's just working hard to scale the wall when nobody opens the door after you knock. Yeah, you should keep on knocking at the front door, but if the producer is out by the pool sipping martinis and can't hear you, maybe finding another way to get their attention is the best plan?
So, what are your plans to get over that wall? What are you *actually doing* to break in? Make your own Chances To Win list and keep adding to it. Keep querying and sending scripts out and making phone calls and all of the other "expected" ways to break in. Every week - do something. Don't just think about it, *do it*. Pick a day every week to e-query and do any follow ups. Yes, this may cut into your writing time a little, but what's the use of writing if nobody reads what you are writing? You need to get your work out there. Yes, most of the time no one will even respond - but that's just like buying a lotto ticket every week (except your script idea is like having the ability to know *some* of the winning numbers).
Querying and sending scripts is the A Plan, but what's the B Plan? What's the Make Your Own Luck plan? You're doing what is expected of a writer, but what are you doing in addition to that? No one gets promoted for doing the job as expected, they get promoted for doing what is expected *plus*. What's your plus? Do you go to film festivals and make contacts? Are you making films for YouTube? Are learning film editing or some other set jobs that gets you close to a director or producer or star... What are you doing to make your own luck?
There are a million ways to get in - sure, 999,999 of them won't work for you - but that
ONE way WILL. If you're lucky, the one way will come early. Like Johnny and Ballin in GILDA, you have to make your own luck.
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Tips FAQ
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I WRITE PICTURES!
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***
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SUBPLOTS?
*** SUPPORTING CHARACTER SECRETS *** - For Kindle! (Exclusive)
Expanded version with more techniques to flesh out your Supporting Characters and make them individuals. Using the hit movie BRIDESMAIDS as well as other comedies like THE HANGOVER and TED and HIGH FIDELITY and
40 YEAR OLD VIRGIN and many other examples we look at ways to make your Supporting Characters come alive on the page.
Print version was 48 pages, Kindle version is around 170 pages!
ONLY $4.99 - and no postage!
ACT TWO SOLUTIONS!
*** ACT TWO SECRETS *** - For Kindle!
Expanded version with more techniques to help you through the desert of Act Two! Subjects Include: What Is Act Two? Inside Moves, The 2 Ps: Purpose & Pacing, The 4Ds: Dilemma, Denial, Drama and Decision, Momentum, the Two Act Twos, Subplot Prisms, Deadlines, Drive, Levels Of Conflict, Escalation, When Act Two Begins and When Act Two Ends, Scene Order, Bite Sized Pieces, Common Act Two Issues, Plot Devices For Act Two, and dozens of others. Over 67,000 words (that’s well over 200 pages) of tools and techniques to get you through the desert of Act Two alive!
Print version was 48 pages, Kindle version is well over 200 pages!
ONLY $4.99 - and no postage!
BRAND NEW!!
All About Rewrites!
Rewriting In Waves?
*** REWRITES Blue Book! - For Kindle!
The end is just the beginning! You’ve finished your story, but now the rewriting begins! This 405 page book shows you how to rewrite your screenplay or novel to perfection. Everything from Character Consistency to Shoeboxing to How To Give And Receive Notes to 15 Solutions If Your Script’s Too Long! and 15 Solutions If Your Script’s Too Short! to Finding The Cause Of A Story Problem to Good Notes Vs. Bad Notes to Finding Beta Readers to Avoiding Predictability to Learning To Be Objective About Your Work to Script Killer Notes and Notes From Idiots to Production Rewrites and What The Page Colors Mean? and a Complete Rewrite Checklist! The complete book on Rewriting Your Story!
ONLY $4.99 - and no postage!
All About Endings!
GRAND FINALES Blue Book!
The Perfect Ending For Your Story!
The First Ten Pages Of Your Screenplay Are Critical,
But What About The Last 10 Pages?
Creating the perfect ending to your story! This 100,000 word book shows you how to end your story with a bang, rather than a whimper. Everything from Resolution Order to Act Three Tools to Happy or Sad Endings? to How The Beginning Of Your Story Has Clues To The Ending (in case you were having trouble figuring out how the story should end) to Falling Action to How To Avoid Bad Endings to Writing The Perfect Twist Ending to Setting Up Sequels & Series to Emotional Resolutions to How To Write Post Credit Sequences to Avoiding Deus Ex Machinas, to 20 Different Types Of Ends (and how to write them) and much more! Everything about endings for your screenplay or novel!
Only: $4.99
NO KINDLE REQUIRED! Get the *free* app (any device, except your Mr. Coffee) on the order page on Amazon!
All About LOGLINES, TREATMENTS, and PITCHING!
LOGLINES, TREATMENTS, and PITCHING! Blue Book!
Distilling Your Screenplay!
Loglines, Treatments, Pitching, Look Books, Pitch Decks, One Pagers, Rip-O-Matics?
You have written a brilliant 110 page screenplay, but how do you get anyone to read it? You need to distill it down into some form of verbal moonshine or story rocket fuel that will ignite that bored development executive or manager or agent and get them to request your screenplay. But how do you shrink those 110 pages into a 25 word logline or a 2 minute elevator pitch or a one page synopsis or a short paragraph? This 100,000 word book shows you how! Everything you need to know! From common logline mistakes (and how to solve them) to how your pitch can reveal story problems to the 4 types of pitches!
272 Pages - ONLY $4.99!
READY TO BREAK IN?
THE BUISINESS SIDE
*** BREAKING IN BLUE BOOK *** - For Kindle!
Should really be called the BUSINESS BLUE BOOK because it covers almost everything you will need to
know for your screenwriting career: from thinking like a producer and learning to speak their language,
to query letters and finding a manager or agent, to making connections (at home and in Hollywood) and
networking, to the different kinds of meetings you are will have at Studios, to the difference between
a producer and a studio, to landing an assignment at that meeting and what is required of you when you
are working under contract, to contracts and options and lawyers and... when to run from a deal!
Information you can use *now* to move your career forward! It's all here in the Biggest Blue Book yet!
Print version was 48 pages, Kindle version is over 400 pages!
$4.99 - and no postage!
Movie Magic Screenwriter is the best selling screenplay formatting software and the choice of Hollywood professionals. Screenwriter automatically formats while you write so you can focus on what you're writing, not where it goes on the page. It also formats for television, stage, novels and comic book scripts so you've got an all in one package for any story you want to write. Academy Award Tech Winner!
* * * Buy It!
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