BPS 009: How Marketable is Your Film Idea or Screenplay?

Alex Ferrari 0:00
So Paul Castro, the writer of August Rush, and I have put together a course called The million dollar business of screenwriting. Now I'm going to give you a one of the lessons that he teaches in this course called is your screenplay marketable? What is the marketability of your screenplay. So I wanted to give you a kind of a sneak peek of the course in this podcast and listen to one of these amazing lectures that Paul does in this in this course. Now, this is not just for screenwriters, this is also for directors, producers, filmmakers, who have ideas that they might want to get flushed out, or a movie that they're about to start, definitely listen to what Paul says, because it might save you years of your life, let alone 1000s and 1000s, or even, maybe even millions of dollars, depending on the level you're at. And at the end of the episode, I'll give you a special link to get the course at a substantial discount. So sit back and get ready to get your mind blown.

Paul Castro 4:04
I wanted to talk to you about the marketability of your idea. So writers we all have a peppering of all sorts of ideas, bombarding our psyche and our soul often, and most of the time every day, at least for me and many of my friends. So how do you choose an idea? Well, I think it's important to take your top three ideas, and be really honest with yourself, is it marketable? Right, because there are ideas out there that are real. Something that's interesting to me may not be interesting to the world. So I wrote a script about a fugu chef one time the Japanese puffer blowfish, which is the poisonous fish and I love this story, and it got some traction but nobody ever bought it. And the writing experience was a value for sure. But I could have spent those eight weeks to 12 weeks to eventually six months working on something that was much more marketable. So what makes a marketable screen Play that's going to put you in the best possible position to sell it. So these days, it is a true story. For some reason Hollywood and actors, movie stars like to play something that actually happened. So how do you acquire that? Well, you acquire it from source material, what is source material from a magazine, a book, an article, something you've seen in the news. Now, you may be saying, Hey, Paul, that's great. But I'm a new screenwriter, how am I going to acquire that? Well, from my experience, I have seen that book authors are a lot more accessible and open than say, trying to get to a movie star. So if you approached a book author knows I said, he or she not the agent, because agents are wonderful, but they're the gatekeepers. They're trying to protect that person. And they're trying to get them paid, understandably, so. But if you approach a book author, and show your passion for the material, have a plan for how you're going to adapt it from book to the big screen. And oh, by the way, you're going to do this for free, as long as that he or she gives you a free option. And if the material once you're done with it is at a level of vibrancy and at a high frequency of quality, that that person says yes, this is what this is my book on screen, in a screenplay form that can eventually make it to the big screen. Yeah, I would love to say you did a great job. If they agree to that, then you go forward as a team to sell the entire project and it cost you time and sweat equity, that can be done. And most writers are a bit trepidatious and shy and circumspect in going that route. Because they feel like well, what value do I have to add? Well, I'm here to tell you, you have a lot, you're a creative, right? That's invaluable. And if you're going to be brave enough to approach this person, and coming from a good place, you're not trying to rip anyone off, you're trying to add value with your talent and creativity, you can acquire some wonderful stories, right? So the market is very friendly towards a true story. Something that's current, is it. Like these days, you hear a lot of stories about autism, which is a very important subject. All right, if there's something that is relevant to the science world as far as as a curable disease, something that has an energy beyond just a true story. All right, an Olympic hopeful, who blah, blah, blah, fill in the blank. Maybe there's something in your hometown, some somebody that nobody even knew about this person. And you could bring that story to fruition through a screenplay where there's a will there's a relative, and there's also a way. So I would encourage you to start looking for true stories, something from source material, if there's a book that you saw when you were you read when you were a little kid, and why isn't this ever been a movie, then that's a voice a little God wink that's telling you to pursue it. So your job now is to spend the next I'm sorry, not one hour, two hours, going to Google going to your Rolodex going to your hometown, going through all your resources to identify a true story that you can bring to fruition through the craft of screenwriting. So you have two hours, make sure you hit the restroom, get some water and get some amens whatever you do, and get prepared because two hours and you're going to on Vale the gym that you were meant to write through a true story from source material. Okay, in 321 Write it

Alex Ferrari 9:01
I'll tell you what I learned a ton from Paul while I was working with him on this course. I mean, he goes over things like how to workshop your screenplay, which I had never heard of this whole technique of how he actually workshops have screenplays, so he can get feedback and make it better it's it's pretty pretty awesome. How to submit to an agent how to get the your screenplay to an agent pitching how to read a room not read a person but actually read a room which is amazing how to write different kinds of screenplays from 30 minutes, sitcoms to one hour dramas, residuals, a W GA, writing assignments and so on. I mean, it's it's a pretty dense course on the business of screenwriting and how to actually make a living being a screenwriter, but again, a lot of the concepts and things that Paul talks about for screenwriters can easily be translated to filmmakers. So definitely a course to take a listen to and as promised I am going to give you a discount code. So all you have to do is go to indie film, hustle, calm, forward slash, screenwriting 25 That's indie film hustle.com, forward slash screenwriting 25. And you'll get the course for 25 bucks. I mean, that is a absolute steal. I'm not not even playing around. It's so dense. And there's some more preview. When you go to that link, you'll see a few more lessons, you can kind of preview and take a listen to. Well, well worth it, guys. So I hope you got a lot out of this episode. And if you want the link again, just head over to the show notes at Indie film hustle.com, forward slash BPS 009. And if you haven't already, please head over to screenwriting podcast.com. And leave us an honest review on the show. It really helps the show out a lot and gets this information out to as many screenwriters as possible. And as always, keep on writing, no matter what. I'll talk to you soon.