Reader Question: Do any screenplay competitions take comedies seriously?

Question via email from Joey (jmclarke22):

1. What, if any, major screenwriting competitions take comedies seriously? It seems to most comedies are at a disadvantage in screenwriting comps.
2. Secondly, does the Black List take them seriously? I do not believe I’ve seen one of the featured scripts be a comedy yet. Am I right on that?

I think there’s some truth to your observation, Joey. For example, I just perused the 2013 annual Black List and only found these comedy scripts:

Fully Wrecked, written by Jake Morse and Scott Wolman: “A talking car with a foul mouth is resurrected from the 1980s and teams up with his former partner’s son.”

The Politician, written by Matthew Bass and Theodore Bressman: “A disgraced politician goes on the lam from the FBI and gets kidnapped by a crazy constituent.”

Make A Wish, written by Zach Frankel: “A 14-year-old boy with terminal cancer has one last wish — to lose his virginity — and convinces his reluctant football star Make-A-Wish partner to help him score.”

Beauty Queen, written by Anniel Neal: “An unhappy wife embarks on a Las Vegas road trip with her best friend to compete in a beauty pageant.”

Dude, written by Olivia Milch: “Four female best friends try to get through the last semester of high school before going their separate ways.”

Last Minute Maids, written by Leo Nichols: “Two pals form a company for people who want to hide indiscretions from their loved ones after they’ve died.”

I may have missed some, but even if there are a couple more, since there were 78 scripts on the annual Black List for 2013, comedy as a genre clocking in around 10% is not a resoundingly strong number by any stretch of the imagination.

Of the 2013 Nicholl winning scripts, one out of 5 was a comedy:

Joe Banks, written by Patti Jones: “The son of a Nobel Prize–winning novelist via a genius sperm bank is determined to follow in his father’s footsteps, but suddenly finds himself on a wild odyssey with his real father, a drinking, man’s-man, lothario author of airport novels who was stripped of his own Nobel after a sex scandal.”

That comes out to 20%.

So looking at two of the top ‘competitions’ — Black List and Nicholl — comedy does seem to have some trouble gaining traction. Of course, to provide a more definitive analysis, someone would have to go through, say, the last 5 years or so of both winner lists. Any takers?

The fact is, at least in terms of awards — and I guess you could say both the Black List and Nicholl fall into that category — comedy has had a tough time gaining respect, especially the Oscars. I believe the last comedy to win Best Picture was Annie Hall way back in 1977.

Why is this the case? There are a bunch of theories floating around, but I suspect it’s a combination of (A) comedies by definition don’t take things seriously, (B) people who don’t write or produce comedies don’t typically understand how hard it is to do comedy, and © comedies typically don’t have the sort of aesthetic or narrative ‘heft’ of a drama, thriller, science fiction, etc.

That said, comedy is still a major player among genres when it comes to project acquisitions, development and movie production. For decades, it was the #1 genre in terms of spec script sales, only in the last 2 years dethroned by action and thriller. Plus physical comedy as featured in movies like The Heat and Neighbors continue to demonstrate strong ROI based on low to low-mid production budgets and strong box office.

So if you write comedy great. There is always room for a great comedy spec script. If you’re concerned about submitting the script to a comedy-friendly competition, there is the Austin Screenplay competition — which has a special comedy category — Tracking-b, and the Black List website. But the ultimate contest is with reps and buyers. And for that, you need a killer story concept, strong logline and even stronger script.

GITS readers, what are your thoughts? Other avenues for comedy spec scripts? If you have any suggestions, please head to comments.

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