Film Courage: How do executives decide which screenwriters are going to come into pitch?
Writer/Instructor and Script Consultant Shannan E. Johnson (The Professional Pen): This is where the who-you-know part kind of comes in. Going back to executives having to have a mental Rolodex, so their relationships with those agents or managers are how people are allowed to come into pitch or how a screenplay will end up on your desk. If I’m a screenwriter at home who has an idea, nine times out of ten, because there’s always that one, but nine times out of ten you’re going to need some kind of representation to get you through that door and most of that is because you don’t want just anybody able to send something out somewhere because then legally it becomes an issue. Executives are not allowed to read things unless they requested them. Sometimes it may be that that network or studio already has an idea, they already own the IP and they just need a writer to come and write it so they may put their feelers out to their agents and managers friends and say We need this kind of writer who writes this kind of thing and we want them to come in and pitch us their take on this idea. That happens sometimes if it’s the screenwriter’s original idea then it comes from the other way, they go to the agent or manager and they say Hey, I have this idea that I think will be really good for this studio or this production company or this network and then now that agent or manager is going to contact the executive and say Hey, this is what we have over here. Is this something you guys are looking for or interested in listening to? (etcetera). If the executive is like Yeah, come on in, they’ll set up the meeting. A screenwriter should never try to just blindly send their work, not just because it’s…(Watch the video interview on Youtube).
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About Shannan:
After grad school I became a junior creative executive at NBCUniversal at the Syfy Channel. I was there for the rebrand. Remember Sci Fi? Yeah, not really. Anywho, it was my job to help writers and producers take their ideas from pitch to production. I co-exec’d on Alphas, Being Human, Haven, Sanctuary, Warehouse 13, and more Syfy dramedies. This is how I honed my skill in all stages of the screenwriting process…(read more here).
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