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Panel highlights: ‘What Gets Producers Excited’
Although it was going head to head with a “Conversation with Ron Howard,” the panel “What Gets Producers Excited” had enough of a draw to fill the Maximilian Room at the Driskill Hotel on Saturday afternoon at 2 p.m. Listening to a 50-year veteran of the film and television world is nice and all, but producers are the ones who help get writers jobs, and this festival is packed with screenwriters looking for a break or a tip on how to get their work on the screen. Practicality, then, trumped entertainment in this instance.
The panel, moderated by Drew Yanno featured producers Jeff Graup (“Obsessed) and Dawn Wolfrom (“The Perfect Man”). Garret Basch, a V.P. at Steve Zaillian’s production company, was scheduled to be on the panel, but was not around when things commenced. He would eventually make a belated and humorous entrance about 15 minutes into the proceeding, and his charming wit helped provide some momentum to the talk.
What follows are some of the highlights of the discussion:
- Wolfrom said that one of the most important elements of any writer’s pitch to her — besides the fact that it relate to her field of interest, specifically comedy - is a writer’s passion for the project and his ability to get her excited about the project. In order for successfully pitch the work, she needed to share the enthusiasm and sell that enthusiasm to the next person in the line of development. The writer is not the only one who hears “no,” the producers must battle the same doubts, so they need to feel excited about a script in order for it to get momentum.
- Graup: “The world of studios is a world of followers.”
- Wolfrom on producers only taking on projects they feel can succeed: “I kind of feel like we’ve got three shots with each of our friends (in the business).”
- Just as Brasch entered the room, the talk turned to foreign distribution and pre-sales of a film. Pre-sales are the money that can be made by selling distribution rights to foreign markets. Graup said that foreign market money used to make up for 40% of revenues but is now responsible for 60%. He said that for this reason, studios and producers are well aware of making a film viable internationally. To wit, he said that anyone would be sorely mistaken if they didn’t think Tarantino casting a German actor to play one of the leads in “Inglourious Basterds” wasn’t partially a product of the fact that studios knew it would make the movie more appealing to German audiences.
Brasch went on to explain how pre-sales are basically the way a studio sells raises the money to make a movie before it is made, by selling foreign distributors on a script, director, actor and budget. He disagreed with Graup somewhat in that he said he believes that pre-sales now account for only 10% of a film’s production budget, whereas it used to be in the neighborhood of 95%. While this part of the conversation may not have had much practical use to screenwriters looking to get their screenplays made, it was very instructive in the ways movies get made. Brasch explained how some firms sole purpose is to use a complex calculus to figure out how much money certain stars, depending on the genre of the film, the star’s status and past performance, can be expected to bring in internationally. As a humorous example, Brasch said that while American audiences and executives may not drool over Richard Gere or Kevin Costner, to foreign movie folks, they represent box office gold. A weird system, indeed. As it relates to the theme of the panel, then, I guess it could be said that foreign money gets producers excited - but less and less so in today’s economic climate.
- Graup, speaking on chasing trends and trying to fit a square peg into a round hole: “Don’t try to do what is hot. Do what you do best … Write what you know … Write with passion … and stop trying to sell stuff. Studios are out of money.” Following up Graup’s sentiment, Brasch said, “Don’t think about whether it is going to sell or not. We’re interested in the things that won’t sell. That’s what we buy.” He named “Half-Nelson,” “District 9,” and “Little Miss Sunshine” as examples of these types of screenplays. I would imagine the words of the two men both scared some of the writers in the room and liberated them.
- Although they admitted it was a harsh reality, all three said that they are rarely inclined to take on a massive majority of most of the scripts they read. They all said that they could tell within the first 10 pages, and often in the first page, if a script was good or not. They also picked up on an instructive theme from the weekend: Writers should pitch a script, but always have several other ideas in their back pocket. One good script or idea only has so much heat; it is important to have multiple ideas. And, as always, the key for writers is to keep writing.
- Discussing query letters, Graup said it was of extreme importance for writers to be diligent and original. He said that writers should spend a month crafting an excellent query letter, as it is the first (and maybe only) opportunity to display their writing prowess and creativity. If you’re just going to sit down and fire off an email query that you spend 10 minutes writing, it’s probably best not to bother.
- Brasch, sincerely with a slight bit of self-aware corniness, said the scripts he looks for are “dramas that will make you laugh and comedies that will make you cry.” So, there’s your answer, folks.
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By steve
October 26, 2009 10:03 PM | Link to this
i wish i was there it sounded like this was a great panel and the festival sounds like a must see nex year. i need to meet these panelist to get in with my new script.