The Business of Screenwriting

Over the last year or so, people have forwarded to me or I’ve stumbled upon numerous screenwriting blogs. Many of them are excellent resources and I’ve included my favorites in the blogrolls. I encourage you to visit them as you’ll find everything from movie analysis and screenwriting theory to first person accounts of the joys and travails of writing.

It should be apparent to anyone who follows this blog that I enjoy posting about movie analysis, screenwriting theories, and the mystery of the writing process, too. However, one area I focus on — in part because I have found a dearth of resources on it on the Web — is the business of screenwriting. For if you are fortunate enough to write and sell a spec script, there are certain things you need to know both to protect yourself and maximize your chances at turning screenwriting into a career. Basic things like:

* Know who the buyers (studios) are

* Familiarize yourself with top to mid-level agencies and management companies

* Track the buying marketplace

* Be aware of studio business trends

* Learn the broadstrokes of Hollywood’s film history

* Know how to get hold of recent selling spec scripts

* Push yourself to generate lots of — and hopefully some great — story concepts

* Write everyday

There’s another reason I put this information on my blog: Hopefully none of you will make the mistakes that I did in Hwood. When K-9 sold, other than having seen thousands of movies in my lifetime, I knew next to nothing about the movie business. If I knew then what I know now, I would have done many, many things differently.

So a question: When I post the most recent spec script and pitch sales, analzye the spec script market, provide background on movie studios, give my opinion on movie business trends, and so on, is this at all relevant to where you are as a writer? Would you like to see more of it? Less of it?

Charlton Heston famously said, “The problem with movies as art is that it’s a business.” Thus, another way to frame my question is how important is it to you to develop your understanding of the business side of screenwriting?

Comment Archive