Apologies if a similar question has been asked.

I'm a writer collaborating with a Director friend who, openly admits, he is not skilled enough himself to write his own work.  We are currently working on a short; it is his story, for the most part, he intends to direct, but I'm writing it.

My question is, who gets what credit?

Sounds like you get writing and he gets story credit.

That's what I thought but he believes he gets a joint writing credit, even though I've spent the last three weeks writing what will become the finished draft.

Thanks for the response.  This is more for his benefit than mine.

He gets the story credit.  You get sole writing credit, unless he helped in writing it.  Telling you what changes to make in earlier drafts doesn't count.


Phil

Thanks dogglebe.

Our last short; again his story that I wrote but he directed and produced, I got the sense he told all the crew he hired that he had written the script since I was totally ignored my entire time on-set.

Just don't want the same thing to happen again.

You should have in your contract who gets what credits, just to be sure.


Phil

Credits for writing are a very funny thing, it is not always about who wrote the most of the script but more to do with who helped create the first draft in many cases. "Story by" does not have to be used, most cases "written be would be used by both the writer and the story creator.

George Clooney, for instance, had a spat with the WGA after he was refused a writing credit on Leatheads, he re-wrote just about the entire script himself, what ended up onscreen was his script, no doubt about that. The WGA instead gave credit to the original writers and not Cloony.

Hollywood is filled with tales of writers who do not get any credit for work they do, and people who have full written by credits when they only contributed a few scenes to the first draft, sometimes scenes that does not even make it to the final movie.

The is no logic involved, I think you probably should split the written by credit with the director and move on. Is there any point in arguing it?

I'd say you get first billing and him second billing as writers, and he get story credit.  Murphy has a point about just giving a partial credit, but don't let him remove your name completely!

I was going to mention the George Clooney Leatherheads thing.  It has something do with with what percentage of rewriting someone has done before they receive what credit.

If you're writing the script from scratch it should be your name soley in my opinion and his name for the story.

At the end of the day, your writing the dialogue, the action the scenes and evrything else to make it flow, not him.

You should make a written agreement on that, before or during working with him or else he can just technically steal your work and have all the credit, which seemed he did in the last project by not including your name or giving you recognition.

Quoted from Muse32 You should make a written agreement on that, before or during working with him or else he can just technically steal your work and have all the credit.

That's the first thing to do.

Michel

Where did Breanne's comment go?  It was terrific and it was right after mine.

Thanks guys.