I think about a handful of people are getting their scripts made. Does anyone know how I would go about pitching it to someone?

THE 7 G'S
Write a Good script, write a Good logline, write a Good treatment, find a Good studio, pitch to a Good producer, or find a Good director.

Find a good studio by A- interent B - A newspaper if you live in a good area for that sort of thing.

When you're an up and coming writer, your best chance of getting produced is to write shorts and try to get film students to produce them.  You won't make money, but you'll have something on your resume when it's time to shop the big stuff around.

Another way is to enter your scripts in writing competitions.  Winning a competition or two is a good way to get noticed.


Phil

You could also write query letters and send them out. Creative Screenwriting (www.creativescreenwriting.com) has a weekly newsletter that gives a company per week to query. There is at least one service called Scriptblaster that, for a fee, sends your query out to multiple companies in their database.

That's another way to do it. Writing a tight query is the hardest part of that.

A novel writer that I'd been friends with for a long time sent his novel into a childrens publishing company. They like the story. A few months later the same people, though I didn't know they had talked to him, were talking to me about doing a few animation clips and stuff. Now I've got the job to adapt, direct, and animate that boys novel into a 3D fantasy movie. We're working on the DVD distribution right now...he he...I'm good luck, ya know. Just send in your script to a random company and chances are that I'll end up getting my hands on it. ha ha.

Taken from a Wordplay column at http://www.wordplayer.com , a website ran by two working professional screenwriters (Ted Elliott & Terry Rossio).  

The question posed was, "How do I get an agent?" but much of it applies to breaking into the industry as a screenwriter, in general.  I'd urge you to check out the website in full, however; it's quite informative.

Enjoy.


First, write a great script. Now, be very careful to have only one copy of it. Immediately upon writing FADE OUT, THE END, take that single copy and place it in a small, sturdy safe. Close and lock the safe. Take the safe directly to your basement, dig a hole seven feet deep, and place the safe in the hole. Refill the hole. Lock the basement door securely, and then go to bed.

The next day, get up and go to the basement. The place will be lousy with agents, several of them already involved in a bidding war over your script.

I'm being facetious, of course, but to make a point. The really hard part is step one -- 'write a great script.' It's like that Steve Martin joke where he says, "I know how you can make a million dollars, tax free!" He looks out over the audience, then says, really fast: "Okay, firstyougetamilliondollars. Then..."

Once you have that great screenplay, nothing after that much matters. I truly believe that you can't complete writing a great script without finding an agent along the way, or the people who will lead you to an agent. In other words, worry about the writing, and the rest will take care of itself. Write a great script and copy machines throughout the industry soon will rumble to life, and you won't be able to keep your screenplay from breaking down doors and careening straight on up to the big buyers.

And without a great script, no amount of networking is going to amount to anything.

Now, I fully realize this is not a popular position among writers. I spoke to a screenwriting seminar at UCLA, and it wasn't hard to see that the students were incensed. The prevailing opinion was, "But my script is great. If only I could get it in the right hands, its brilliance would be appreciated. It's not what you do, after all -- it's who you know."

So I wrote my name on the board in big letters. Beneath it I wrote my address and phone number -- which is what I always do when I give a seminar. I turned to the class and said, "From this moment forward, none of you have to worry about contacts ever again -- because you know me. And I know agents, producers, directors, studio execs. Plenty of people in the industry. And I promise I won't overlook a great script. Now, write a great script, and send it to me."

Not one of them ever called.

In the five or six seminars I've given, no one has ever called.

Contacts are easy. I know lots of people who have set out to make contacts -- and they did it. Takes about three or four weeks, tops, of concerted effort to make a contact in the film industry.

Contacts are easy. Writing a great script -- that's hard.

All right. So let's say you are absolutely convinced that you do have a great script. It's a bidding war just waiting to happen. In point of fact, nobody's going to come dig it up out of your basement. You do have to actually put it out into the world. But I swear, this is the easy part.

You can enter screenplay competitions. If you win, you gain credibility in an agent's eyes.

You can send your script to the agencies on the Writer's Guild 'open for submissions' list.

You can target specific stars and production companies.

You can attend seminars, and talk to the industry pros afterwards. If they're impressed at what you have to say, they'll quite often be willing to read your work.
You can make contacts with readers and assistants, get them to read your script, with the idea of passing it along.

You can take classes. Often professors have special access to the industry.  You can work with independent, low budget, or no-budget filmmakers, perhaps even get something produced.

You can meet 'journeyman pros,' online. There are thousands of them. In other words, you don't have to target Tom Hanks or Oliver Stone. There're plenty of anonymous, mid-industry level people who'll give you a chance. Journeyman screenwriters are always good to approach, I believe -- they're easily flattered, and sympathetic to the cause.

If your screenplay is truly great, any one of these approaches will be enough.
Another strategy is to not try to find an agent. Instead, get the agent to try to find you.

Get a development deal in the works, for example, and you can have your pick of agents.

Winning a prestigious screenwriting competition can have the same effect. Making an award winning student film can, in some cases, result in overall representation, including writing services. Have a play produced, or sell a novel -- hell, even create a comic strip -- and you're instantly more desirable in an agent's eyes.

One quick tip I'd like to pass along, if you get to that point where you're interviewing an agent, and the agent is interviewing you. Some phrases an agent wants to hear are "I'm almost finished with my next script." "I have several ideas I'm ready to pitch." And, "There's a little-known out-of-print-book I've always wanted to do."
Some phrases an agent doesn't want to hear include "How long will it take for you to sell my script?" "How much can you get for my script?" And, "How long will it take for you to get me a job?"

But more on that later. Working with an agent, and what you can expect them to do for you is a topic for another column.

"Sure, that's easy for you to say," is one likely response to this column. "You have an agent, you don't know how hard it is to get one."

Fine. Here's the story of how we found our agent. Ted and I, when we were first starting out, wrote the equivalent of 12 feature film screenplays. And we didn't send any of them out. (I say the 'equivalent' of 12, because we wrote episodic TV specs, short films, half-hour comedies, etc., along with features.) That was FIVE YEARS of writing, where our self-assessment was that we weren't quite good enough yet. Five years of study and training. Close to what it would take to get through med school. (Hmn -- maybe this is brain surgery, after all!)

Finally, at script number 13, we felt we had something good enough to put on the market. The script got into a bidding war, and we signed with our current agent.
It's that sort of patience, and willingness to learn the craft, that pays off in the end.