Best pitch gets a script review next week!
While I’m tempted to spend 1500 words chastising Jon Favreau and Disney for spending 10 million dollars on the most poorly produced trailer in the history of Star Wars (and potentially cinema)…
WE’RE HERE TO BE POSITIVE TODAY!
Next week, I want to focus on the query letter. It’s a little talked-about component of screenwriting but an insanely important one. I’ve probably received more query e-mails than anyone else in Hollywood so I consider myself somewhat of an expert on what makes a good one.
I’ll get into the secret sauce of a good query letter next Thursday. But, the skinny of it is this. Most writers overdo it. And, in overdoing it, they expose their writing weaknesses. What you need to remember is that the star of your query is your logline. That’s the only thing that the person receiving your query really cares about. So, you want to make sure that’s featured.
This is how this is going to work.
You’re going to pretend I’m a producer at Scriptshadow Productions. And you’re going to pitch me a REAL SCREENPLAY. That’s it. And whoever has the best query, I will review their script next week.
A couple of caveats to this. Don’t pitch me your Blood & Ink screenplay. We’re saving those scripts for the official contest. But you can pitch me any other script. Also, include an attachment of your screenplay. In a real query, you wouldn’t do this. You would wait for them to request your script. But since I’m going to review the winner on the site, I need the script.
Send all query e-mails to carsonreeves3@gmail.com. You have all the way until Sunday at NOON PACIFIC TIME to query me. You can only send one query.
If you’re not interested in putting your script out there for the world to see but you’d still like to know how to write a good query letter, I offer a query consultation service. It’s 60 bucks and includes three follow-up e-mails, allowing us to make a couple of extra tweaks beyond my initial fixes. If you’re interested in that, e-mail me at carsonreeves1@gmail.com.
Can’t wait to see what you guys have got!
