Getting Your Work Produced as a Film or TV Pilot by Hollywood

The average independently published book sells fewer than 20 copies on a platform like Amazon and there are more than 2 million of these written  each year in North America alone. So the chances you will write the next Hunger Games are probably vanishingly small.

Even less probable are the odds of getting your work made into a film or television pilot by a Hollywood producer/studio. But it does happen. Ink Tip, which is consistently the most productive such service in Hollywood, generated leads in 2012 that resulted in 28 produced films.

My friend, Jim Dobkins of MarJim Books, provided this advice for writers willing to give it a go:

1. go ahead and develop a logline
2. then write a 450-word short synopsis
3. register your manuscript with Writers Guild of America (WGA), West/include the logline and short synopsis with the registration
4. list it with Ink Tip as available for film adaptation rights
5. subscribe to Ink Tip’s weekly preferred newsletter, which every Thursday or Friday lists from 6 to 10 or so “calls” for specific script types
6. join ISA (International Screenwriters Association, it’s free to join) and two or three times weekly check their Writing Gigs listings/this is one way to find producers looking for particular kinds of scripts
7. consider looking for a film rights agent (film agents often check out Ink Tip listings and will approach you via Ink Tip if they are interested in possibly being your film rep)
8. subscribe to the IMDb (International Movie Database); this lists movie producers, directors, acting talent and film company execs in the US and internationally/many of them will allow you to fax a “one-sheet” pitch, which, if it catches their fancy, they will ask to see more.

Catching On

This is a crazy business. You never know what will catch a producer’s interest and what won’t. But it is always worth a try.

Jim
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Jim Dobkins
MarJim Books
dba UCS PRESS