The Adventures of Writer Boy: A look at pitching a script at Screenwriting Expo

(First published in part on Blog Critic Magazine)

Writer Boy was battling his arch nemesis, Captain Disorder.  Captain Disorder was a short villain with a Napoleon complex.  Writer Boy simply refused to submit to Captain Disorder’s demand to be called by his full name, Captain Attention Deficit Disorder.  Writer Boy called his enemy nothing more than CD and often envisioned the Captain in drag.  It made Writer Boy laugh in the face of danger.  It was a battle that had plagued Writer Boy for years, but like most villains, the Captain became more dangerous and targeted in his assaults on Writer Boy.  As Writer Boy was just convincing himself to be a novel writer, he had been attacked by every writer’s healthy sense of self-doubt. Just as he had begun writing his novel, the Captain blasted Writer Boy with a stealth time released weapon hidden in a one time friend of Writer Boy, who suggested in an apparent off hand way that Writer Boy write scripts.  Writer Boy fell for the assault and found himself completely distracted from writing novels.

Writer Boy bought screenwriting software and books and figured that there were far fewer screenwriters than novelists.  He was right about that.  He calculated his assumptions about numbers in his head (a dangerous thing for writer boy). He figured that there are far more books published every year than movies made; he was right about that.  Then he figured that there were so many more writers than screenwriters out there.  Again right about that.  And given those two syllogistic facts, it would be easier to sell a script than a novel.  Was Writer Boy right?  Could he learn the truth before Captain Disorder would completely destroy his chance to write a novel or three?  Could he somehow find a way to use the stealth attack to his own advantage?  Could the best pitch in Hollywood be the secret weapon?  Can anyone really sell a screenplay with out having a family member in the industry? Read on and see how Writer Boy learns to fight the good fight and gain odd insights into the process of pitching your script at a pitch event.

THE REVIEW
Pitching — the process where a screenwriter has about three to seven minutes of an initial decision maker’s attention to sell a script or idea — is an art, a skill, a part of the craft.  Pitching, if you are to believe the purveyors of training courses, can be both taught and learned.  Pitching is in essence sales, and sales is part natural inclination and part training.  But is pitching a script the same thing as pitching a new Prius?  In my experience no, not really, scripts aren’t environmentally popular and a Prius is a thing produced in exactly the same way, time and time again.  Scripts are special creatures, a one-time occurrence.  The buyer tends to either not care about it, or hate it, or much less often love it.

Let me describe the three pitch events I have been to.  By the way, they don’t call them events — that is poor salesmanship — they call them Fests. My main experience in pitching is the Screenwriting Expo’s Golden Pitch Festival produced by Creative Screenwriting Magazine.  The Expo isn’t just a pitchfest, it is a gathering of real screenwriters by the ton (those who have 1 or more screen plays in hand and hope to interest others), wannabe writers of where probably even more tons of them (I consider a wannabe someone who has started but hasn’t finished a script and can’t be fairly considered to pitch, because pitching a unfinished first script is an idea only slightly better than oh say, paying you taxes with Monopoly money), and then there are those who are just thinking about screenplays, or like having beers and lattes with people who love the movies, or at least writing them.

The first step is to register for a pitchfest. This process is covered fairly completely at the Expo web site and I won’t go into detail here except to give you this link  (http://www.screenwritingexpo.com/pitch.html) to the Expo’s site. The next step to pitching was done on my home computer.  I was faced with the confusing process of selecting the companies I wanted to pitch to and buying the tickets to do my pitches.  I didn’t have much information to go on when picking the companies for the first Expo. I surfed the internet as much as possible, but at the time there wasn’t much to go on.  So, I hit the sites I could, took the information provided by the Expo and selected 15 to pitch to.  Today there is a significantly greater amount of accessible information about what production companies are seeking which types of screenplays. When the time came to use the system to buy the tickets (every time I attended the Expo) there were serious issues that got in the way of me getting my first choice.  Many of those issues have been managed but the process was very trying.

Finally, I arrived at the Expo with great expectations.  You just can’t pitch if you aren’t positive and I was as positive as possible.  The actual process of pitching was almost designed to remove that hope.  Pitch people herd into the staging area to hear the calls of the next group scheduled to pitch. They peer at boards that list where the company they are pitching to is located in the dozens upon dozens of tables.  As the pitch people get closer to the launching space, you can feel the stress, fear and nerves gathering the necessary energy to produce a really top drawer flop sweat.  It is a veritable bouillabaisse of genetic hope and despair to watch.  The second year I pitched, I thought it would all make a very compelling movie.

I stood in the launch area and watched a hundred rituals of luck and nerve as everyone filed closer to the mound and a chance to throw the perfect pitch.  I call it the launching zone because everyone crowds around and you have a scant few minutes, I mean 5 minutes, to find your table seat, introduce your self, pitch your first script, find out they don’t want that, do half a pitch on your second script and try to get that poor soul trapped in his or her own form of pitch hell to want to give his or her contact information to you, the last person in the world they want at their desk. Add another negative; they know you are a beginner so predisposition in their mind is something like, AAAAAARRRRRGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHH.  The odds are so stacked against you.

The thing is, the folks on the other side of the table desperately want the next great screenplay like they want oxygen, however they have to listen through hundreds of terrible ideas and bad pitches to find that one nugget of Oscar gold.  It is a nightmare for all involved.

Pitching sucks on both sides of the table, but on the production side, at least they have the keys to the castle or at least to the vestibule of the kingdom.  Their greatest need is to find the next great script; their fear is the success of a script they passed.  Lucky for them the chances of passing on the next great script is very small, especially at a pitchfest full of newbies.  For the writer who has spent somewhere between months and years on a quest to birth a fabulous script, those on the other side of the table are the first “No” hurdle.  Once you get the no, you feel like you are dead to that company.

Afterwards, the just finished new pitch pros scoot from the big room and make quick notes to themselves trying to remember the name of the guy they just pitched to (was it Gary or Larry, damn, I can look that up on the internet  — I hope).

So why even do a pitchfest?  For the magical phrase, “Let me give you my personal email, send me your stuff right away and remind me who you were, I get too many pitches to remember.  Can’t wait to hear from you.”  Seconds after that statement you will see the production company person’s eyes glaze over with the knowledge that more pain is walking over as the bell dings for change of pitchers.

My first year I had nine out of ten requests for information; I later learned that was unheard of success. My second time pitching I had twelve out of fifteen.  I pitch well.  Each evening, I and my new pitch and expo buddies hit the parties and drank ourselves funny.  At least we thought we were.  We shared experiences, bonded and shared the essence of being a writer, more specifically, a screenwriter.  We all gloried in those moments, shared plot ideas, helped those who were struggling and generally loving what we do as a hobby and craft.

After more than too much alcohol we all head home do follow ups, send scripts, or some type of synopsis, and eagerly wait for the next step in selling our script.  The thing is, by my measure, it just doesn’t really work.  No, that can’t be, doesn’t work? Well, what are your odds?  Most people do well with between 10% and 40% of their pitches.  Even with those requests for synopsis or scripts practically never ends up in a script being sold.  A review of the press releases for every Expo don’t, as best I can find, tell the story of even one pitched script being produced and put on a screen.  Now clearly I could be wrong, I don’t know everything pitched or made, but I also don’t know anyone who has a check from a pitchfest.

What I do know writers get from the pitchfest are new friends, people who share an interest, and a great group of parties where they get to share their success and loss.  This is where the writer who is pitching gets to take a risk, jump out of the plane, live to tell about it and have an amazing experience in an environment where they are not likely to win, but they still try.  That in itself is worth the price of admission and that is where the real story is and the great short movie could be written.

Next year I will be at the Expo pitchfest yet again, but this time with no pressure, because I am there to make friends, to have fun, and if the planets align maybe sell a script.  I might even try to double up and do the Screenwriting Expo pitchfest as well as the Great American Pitchfest.  Regardless, I know that no matter what doesn’t sell, it is more than worth the price of admission.

And how did Writer Boy fare? Thankfully, the best laid plans of evil people often go awry and Writer Boy was able to use his screenwriting to improve all forms of his work, but, as you can see, for a time, Writer Boy was trapped in the Hollywood moment.