How To Pitch Your Screenplay – The Clever Way

There was a post in the forum today that sparked off a train of thought.

“All in all, pitching is a very personal thing. Whenever I send out a letter I remember Maya Angelou’s quote about people forgetting what you say and do, but remembering how you make them feel. The goal is to make the readers feel good about themselves (oddly enough). If this is script that reinforces their past work and efforts or speaks to a deeply felt belief or goal, and your query sheds light on that fact they will want to read the script. That is why it becomes important to know who you are pitching to and why.”

Thanks, Keviny, great quote. That is a very effective state of mind: When you pitch you are selling something. Like all great sales people you must know your market, you must know your prey.

I want to expand this with some practical advice.

This is all stuff I do, or know I should do, before I go for that crucial first meeting.

At its crudest I don’t even bother going to meet Ken Loach if my story is all about how Margaret Thatcher, that poor misunderstood victim, was actually the best thing that ever happened to the UK. (Or whatever. You know what I mean.)

When I’m sure at least we’ve got a chance for a meeting of minds I get more subtle and I follow these terribly effective steps:

EASY and COMPULSORY: Do prior research, IMDB them, and WATCH WHAT THEY’VE MADE ALREADY! Don’t worry so much about the specifics of the genres, but look for deep themes that recur in their work. What are their politics? What is their sense of humour? What tone do they tend to work around? If they’ve committed to writers with these themes and angles before, odds they find them resonant, and that doesn’t go away. (You just have to make sure you can move the debate on a step in what you are saying.)

HARD: Then see if you can up pick any gossip about shows or movies they have worked on recently that haven’t seen the light of day. What are they about? They may be bored and reaching out for new territory.

VERY HARD: but actually like gold if you can find it – look for recent events in their life – divorces, babies, financial instability, moving house, deaths, affairs, bouts of AA, changes of religious faith, trips abroad, new hobbies, etc – anything that might indicate, (to the very Machiavellian) where some new sensitivity or receptiveness might currently lie.

Your basic job is to see whether you can show yourself to be in the same ballpark – and, crucially, as Kevin mentions in the forum post, have some new light to shine on the area. (If you don’t have the new light, or can’t reach between you in the meeting, you’ll bore them even worse than if you hadn’t tried, so it can be a high risk strategy.)

Don’t sell yourself out, don’t be crass, above all don’t damage your own story because that only leads to worse grief in the end than not getting the job – but do be clever: do see if you can you gently angle your pitch so it chimes with something they’ll like.

Realistically you can’t do this terribly effectively for 90% of the people you pitch to because you can’t get close enough – and then when when you do find out stuff about someone it’s possible you don’t have the right project in your portfolio so you should just soldier on and impress them with your dazzling brilliance anyway – but if you can find common ground before the meeting it’s a VERY effective pitching aid.

Common sense really – in an ideal world, you’d always be giving them something you know they’ll like.

And of course, if you then follow up by sending them a writing spec that is undercooked you have just wasted a  golden chance. Please make sure your screenplay is as good as it possibly be before you let it out the door.

If you’re not sure how to do that, then you’d be crazy not to look at the Screenwriting Goldmine method. It’s a simple, step-by-step guide to how you write a great screenplay. Download your copy now. It  works.

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