Posts Tagged ‘writing’

Golden Age of Television

Opportunity, access and acclaim.

We’re looking to find the next generation of tv writers, get them a polished range of samples and get the repped. Our prizes are focused on professional development, and include close, personal help getting onto the first step of the ladder.

Grand Prize

For both Spec Scripts & Pilots/Movie of the Week:

• Winner of each category receives $1000.
• All winners and finalists may receive consideration by established production companies and agencies.
• Telephone consult and full script development with Just Effing’s Julie Gray.
• A free studio coverage from Just Effing.com.

Short Script Grand Prize

For any script of 20 pages or fewer:

• Winner receives $500.
• All winners and finalists may receive consideration by established production companies and agencies.
• Telephone consult and full script development with Just Effing’s Julie Gray.
• Free studio coverage from Just Effing.com.

Silver Screenwriting

It’s About Winning. SRSLY.

We’ve put together everything you need to succeed in Hollywood. From flights & accomodation, to meetings with A Listers and producers to a nice fat wad of cash – our prizes are the opportunity of a lifetime to live a real writer’s life in Los Angeles in the heart of the movie industry.

Enter your feature script by June 1st, 2010 and you’ll have a chance to win:

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GRAND PRIZE

• MacBook Air
• Round trip flight to Los Angeles
• Lunch with SHANE BLACK
• A one-on-one conversation via Skype with Chris Sparling, writer of red hot Sundance feature BURIED, starring Ryan Reynolds
• 3 nights accommodations
• A meeting with Kristen Campo, CE, Fuse Entertainment
• A day of meetings with 2 managers
• $3,000  in cash
• Pilar Alessandra’s online workbook
• A free 30 minute phone consult with Karl Iglesias
• A copy of Save the Cat Goes to the Movies PLUS the Save the Cat software package

PLUS: one-on-one script consult with Julie Gray, Founder of The Script Department!

SECOND PRIZE

• TSD Story Notes with Julie Gray
• $500 gift certificate to The Writer’s Store
• Two manager reads of your work
• Two production company reads.
• $1,000 in cash
• A copy of Save the Cat Goes to the Movies

PLUS: one-on-one script consult with Julie Gray, Founder of The Script Department!

THIRD PRIZE

• Free 3 Reader Service from the Script Department
• $250 gift certificate from the Writer’s Store
• “What comes next” phone consultation with Julie Gray
• Two manager reads of your work
• Two production company reads.
• $750 in cash
• A copy of Save the Cat Goes to the Movies

PLUS: one-on-one script consult with Julie Gray, Founder of The Script Department!

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In addition, the Top Ten Finalists will all receive an invaluable, free one year subscription to It’s On the Grid, a cash value of over $3,000!

The regular deadline for the Silver Screenwriting Competition looms; in fact, it’s this Saturday, May 15th. Suddenly scripts are pouring in at an alarming rate. Did writers wait til the last minute? Yes, of course. Did the competition deadline spur meeting deadlines and goals? Yes, absolutely. Which is one of the benefits to entering a competition – you feel compelled to finish your script and turn it in on time.

Years ago, I stayed at home and wrote from there. I got a few things published but overall I worked very, very slowly. The days were so wide open and so available to me – as was TV, folding laundry and checking my email – but ironically, I didn’t get that much writing done.

Now, because my time is so crunched, boy howdy, when I DO write? I power write. I get right down to business. Because my template is tighter; I don’t have the hours and days to fritter away because there’s too much else to do.

Writers need some kind of structure. Whether it’s writing at the same time of day or in the same space. We need to set goals and stick to them. If our writing is a moving target, then the achieving of a finished product becomes impossible and ultimately a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Don’t tweak too much and don’t be too attached to the outcome. Send in your best work and then let it go and get back to work on the NEXT project.

Always
Be
Writing!

You know you do it. You compulsively tweak your script. A little here a little there, you can’t leave it alone. You go back through the pages and change dialogue. And change it back. And fix an action line. And fix it back. But then the real trouble begins. You tweak something on page thirty-two which necessitates changing something on page seventeen. And page forty-nine. Now you’re done. Time to send that script off to a competition, consultant, friend – whoever. But wait – one more tweak r-i-g-h-t here…

When does a writer know when to leave well enough alone? Make sure that every time you open your script you have an actual goal in mind. Maybe you are in the midst of adding new scenes, aka actually completing your script. Maybe you just got some notes and you’re addressing the pertinent sequences. Maybe you’re just rereading it one last time and OH LOOK there’s something to tweak.

The problem with tweaking ad infinitum is that you can’t see the forest for the trees. Yes, tweaking can improve your pages, but if you do it compulsively, sort of like chewing a fingernail, you can actually damage your script and/or just be wasting your valuable time. Because your time is very valuable, as a screenwriter. Anyone can go back through and rearrange punctuation, but what actually improved and shifted in your last session with your script?

So before you open your script for the day, ask yourself: what is the goal of this writing session? Am I tweaking here and there but ultimately getting the work done? Or am I stalled out in tweak-mode? In many ways, tweaking is the way screenwriters justify to themselves that they are working on the script so lay off! But – it’s a little lie they tell themselves because they aren’t actually being productive at all.