Screenwriting : pitches welcome via snail mail; mention STAGE 32... by Babz Bitela, President

Personally, I love Save the Cat; after reading dozens of books, taking (very expensive!) workshops, doing McKee's story weekend, Save the Cat gave me my first real breakthrough for finishing a script. I totally agree with Laura that there's no one "correct" structure, though. Aristophanes did pretty well without Blake Snyder. There's some Elizabethan British guy who I heard did some decent work, too, back in the day. On the other hand, if Babz knows what works for her, and the Save the Cat structure is her lingua franca, that seems fair to me.

Yeah, I'm with Laura on the pay aspect. Didn't catch that myself.

@Laura I agree and would take it one step further. The people I'm studying with say that Hollywood hates STC scripts. They recognize them immediately and can predict pretty much what's coming and when. In fact, my gurus claim that structure is entirely dependent on the script itself. Eg. in Juno, the inciting incident was either her getting pregnant, which happened before the first scene, or her finding out she's pregnant, which happens nearly immediately. I began to suspect all the beatmeisters when I tried to analyze scripts and saw how often people in the know didn't even agree on particular beats. My screenwriting has improved drastically in the last year I've been studying with these guys and I can't even imagine following any kind of roadmap anymore. It's more like trailblazing, quite a bit harder, but brings you to more exciting places. As always, just MHO, YMMV.

My current script pitches can be found: http://amyrkelly79.wix.com/amyrkelly#!scripts/c164h

@Sharon: just curious, are you studying with some sort of editor/coverage service, or a workshop, or is it a self-made group? (or none of the above? :-)

Bryan, It's officially a series of classes. I take them online but they're available brick and mortar in LA. I almost hate to tell people about it because it will make the competition much more fierce. :-) Right now my teacher is Talton Wingate, who was trained by Corey Mandell, who taught my Professional Screenwriter's class (first in the series). Corey worked back in the day for Ridley Scott and others who taught him to develop structure but eschew formulas. We meet for a teleconference 3 hours/week. So, you're not just getting homework without feedback. We actually drill on what we learn and it's amazing. The goal is to learn to write scenes with compelling conflict - the first time out. So that your first draft is a solid (not perfect) one. Well, that's the goal in the early series. Now we're getting into writing sequences using the tools we've learned. The next series will be applying it to screenplays. It's a bleep of a lot of work but the rewards are powerful. Corey has a website and podcasts scattered around. When I discovered him it was like a beacon, I knew none of the other systems were working for me. He also helped me address issues around perfection, procrastination, distraction, etc. Feels good to be working rather than talking about working. These guys are like no other, just great.

Thanks for sharing the secret sauce, Sharon! I'm going to check it out... But quiet-like, so as not to attract too much attention :)

You know, you can't buy a chuckle like that, Bryan. Thanks, and keep me posted. I'd love to network with people who use Corey's method. Even my own writing group, the one that I run, wants to stick with the more traditional approaches, i.e., BS2 (oh, my, I never realized just what Blake Snyder's Beat Sheet abbreviates to. Couldn't help myself. Apologies to his followers!) I do believe that reasonable people can agree to disagree on this one, but I sure would like to find some screenwriters who speak my language.

Well my theory is, the more languages, the better. Like I said, Snyder's book really helped me, and even.if it is formulaic, I really needed that formula just to get my bearings. But I think anyone who finds one method and decides they can stop reading, learning, trying new approaches, etc... Well they're just doomed to stagnation. I remember something from McKee, where he says that even the great artists started off just learning the craft, very formulaic stuff, but building from.there. I mean hell, Charlie Kaufman started.as a sitcom writer, right? And, please don't tell my agent that you can't buy my chuckles.

Hi there, wondering what address the pitches should be sent to?

@ Bryan. Yeah, I probably was too hard on Blake Snyder. I read it and even bought the second in the series. There's good stuff in there when you're starting out. I also bought a book claiming to give you 120 movie beats that would even work in short films. That's when I stopped buying books. It really is comforting to have those road maps in the beginning. I remember wanting someone to just tell me what needed to happen where. Mostly because I was afraid of really being creative. I think those books are fine if people get past them, like training wheels. But, when I started working with Corey I wished I hadn't wasted those years with the popular screenplay business. And, it is a lucrative business - but there's no evidence that it actually produces good screenplays or screenwriters. I think the people that make it would have made it in any case. And, now I gotta go and talk to an agent about a chuckle...

Could you provide your snail mail address? Thanks

Do you Rep for TV? I know Blake doesn't have a beat sheet for that, but nobody who has requested my work has been disappointed so far...

nybabz@netzero.net but you MUST MENTION Stage 32 in the subject line for example "I read about you on Stage 32." Thanks.

Wow I will take the bite but professional coverage it is difficult with no income. My script titled Race to the senate is about An Indo-American girl who crusades for identity , immigrants and guns. Pavithra my mc wants to say she is as American as anyone. I love writing issue based scripts and I hope to influence a few people . I personally feel that some of the NRIs can definitely identify with my script.

Padma: pass. hit me with something else.