... and a long, long way there were agents and studios and lots of writers that mostly always got work. Movies, TV shows, anything. This is about writers and agents and producers and production companies.
You could easily find an agency with a reasonably good script. Okay, they weren't the best, but they were agents. Some were solo, others had 2 or 3 (including a secretary) followed by the "mid-agency" and finally the big agency.
But that's coming up. I'm going to repeat a little bit about writers and agents, but add some new material as well.
I didn't have an agent when I wrote and directed Ghostkeeper and since I was in the heartland, there were no agents and the big cities had agents but didn't know who I was and not really caring either.
So why do writers look for agents?
First of all, it's status. Does that mean you get agents who will send your screenplays to production companies where mostly get read by the lowest people in the office. Why? Because an agent doesn't want to have to read bad screenplays. He/she's got meetings to take. So your great screenplay will read your story.
There are some issues with this as the reader may be really good and tells the agent to read it. Or they can say it's "been done before". Or "not very good". And the worst one - they hate your script because it's better than the one they're writing.
Since most of the "readers" work for nearly nothing, except in the big agencies, you will be lucky if you get one of those, they will remember you and when they get to a bigger agency they might even call you in.
So what's the best way to get your screenplay seen? Or at least some way? Or how about finding the agent's home and hang out until the police arrest you?
It used to be not that hard in the "old days", as in 1980. But that was before "The end of TV movies" for an example.
Next: Friday
