Interview with Adam Levenberg

Adam Levenberg is a former Hollywood executive (Intuition Productions, One Race Films) who spent years inside the system.

Once outside, he promptly wrote a book called The Starter Screenplay, which gives an executives' view of the factors that influence studio decision-making about spec scripts.

I took the opportunity to ask him a few questions.

---

•  Where were you born, and where did you grow up?

I was born and grew up in Cheltenham and Upper Dublin, which are both suburbs of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

•  Where did you go to school?

I attended USC School of Cinematic Arts and majored in Critical Studies. It’s a great place to study cinema, but I think the reason for the school’s success is that every single student has already made the commitment (most at age 18) to move away from home and live in Los Angeles. Most of my friends from USC are still living in L.A. and working in the entertainment industry.

•  When did you first take an interest in films/stories?

Before I can remember. I have Dr. Seuss’s My Book About Me and for My Favorite Sport, I filled in “Watching.” As a kid, I was completely indiscriminate about what I watched—I just tried to see everything. I probably spent about 5-6 hours per day in front of the television. Weekends were spent watching movies at the theater or on video.
   By the time I hit film school, I was seeing about 200 movies per year. I have an encyclopedic knowledge of Hollywood Cinema from the late 1980s to the present. I don’t watch sports, so when my friends are watching a game, I’m knocking off another film title.

•  What was your first paying job?

At 16, I worked as a dishwasher at Friendly’s, which is a restaurant and ice-cream chain.

•  What was your first job in the movie business?

My first paying entertainment job was producing a show for Trojan Vision, which is the USC television station. It was called Organized Chaos and we tried to make it as wild as possible. I think on the second show the hosts were doing a flavored condom taste test. Nobody was watching, so we tried to be as outrageous as possible just to entertain ourselves.
    My first real industry job was reading scripts for USA Films, which at the time had deals with Alexander Payne and Spike Jonze, and was making films like Traffic (2000), Nurse Betty (2000), and Being John Malkovitch (1999).
    It was interesting to read the projects that great filmmakers would submit and evaluating if the script or book had any potential as a feature film. The first book I did coverage on was submitted by an amazing filmmaker, but I didn’t understand how it could be adapted into a movie. I called in and was told, “Evaluate the material honestly. Don’t be swayed by the name on the cover letter or the names attached. If the book is a pass, it’s his job to explain to how he plans on adapting it into a great screenplay.”

•  What did you learn from working with Vin Diesel?

Vin likes the idea of building worlds and I learned a lot about intellectual property development. That works for an established actor/producer. But for screenwriters, I tend to suggest sticking to the screenplays. There’s nothing wrong with creating some concept art as inspiration for yourself, but if you don’t have representation, just focus on the writing because there’s no artwork that will make someone reconsider a script that doesn’t work. 
   One piece of advice from my book is that you should never worry about sequels or franchise building while you’re writing a spec script. I say this not because it’s a bad idea in theory, but because these attempts (especially from new writers) tend to result in unreadable screenplays. Creating effective setup and payoff in one screenplay is hard enough.

•  Why did you write The Starter Screenplay?

I went from being a production company executive to an independent consultant. Basically, my intention was to do the work of a development executive for multiple companies, make the same amount of money with more freedom to pursue projects I was interested in advancing. 
   Then a friend pointed out that I could allow unrepresented screenwriters to hire me for feedback. I got creative and e-mailed the writers who had queried me in the past. A bunch of them decided to send me their scripts. At the time I didn’t know that there were other companies out there who just sold notes without discussion, which is so much easier to do, but worthless for the writer. When someone hired me, I would read their script, then talk to them for 2-3 hours. I still do that, except now I make notations on the pdf of their screenplay. I do notes after, and then the discussion takes place within 24 hours, so I’m fresh.
    Once I started working with unrepresented screenwriters, I went looking for screenwriting books to recommend. I couldn’t find a single book that shared the perspective on what an executive is looking for, or a book that nudged writers in the direction of simplicity and commercialism, while still getting the hang of the medium. 
   So I wrote it. 
   The book is broken down into two parts—the first is What to Write? The second half is about Interacting with the Industry—how to decode people’s reactions to your material, including what it means if you don’t hear back from queries, or when someone says “I liked your script, it’s a pass.” 

Even executives have to unwind. Here's Adam on Space Mountain at Disneyland.

•  You wrote on Twitter that Australian screenwriters are your favorite clients. Why is that?

Professional Hollywood writers are used to being asked tough questions. They know how to separate their ego from the process of getting script notes. This can be an intimidating experience for a new screenwriter. Some get overwhelmed. But Australian writers (or at least the many who have hired me) do great taking constructive criticism in stride and staying upbeat. That’s important because they’re at full creative capacity when the conversation turns to “How can we fix this?”
    After a consult, I usually suggest a specific book on screenwriting (depending on the writer’s current level), run down a bunch of movie titles to see, and pick out some scripts for them, as well as discuss their next step in terms of the script. I ask all clients to let me know how they’re progressing with the work, what they thought of the scripts/book/movies, but only a certain percentage follow through. Australian writers definitely do a better job staying in communication with that feedback. Or again, at least that’s true of the many I’ve worked with thus far.

•  What was the best advice you were given at the start of your career?

At some point in the process, I had a long conversation with Anne Lower, who was working with Save the Cat. She explained how, by Snyder’s third book, he gave up on trying to defend his positions because, ultimately, people will either accept what you write, because they get it, or they won’t. That’s exactly what I needed to hear. I ended up cutting tons of unnecessary material as a result, once I wasn’t concerned with defending my suggestions from the exceptions to the rules. 

•  If you had to suggest just one screenwriting book (not your own) to a newbie writer back in Adelaide, which one would it be?

Blake Snyder’s Save The Cat! is the essential foundation of screenwriting for any newbie. My book covers what types of movies you should write and how to navigate the industry; I intended it as a companion piece to Save The Cat! 
   I think once you know Snyder’s structure backwards and forwards, you’ll need to move on to more complex stuff, such as John Truby’s The Anatomy of Story.
    It's important to note that most screenwriting books contain great points, but bury the important stuff under hundreds of pages. That’s why The Starter Screenplay is sparse and to the point—I talk about what to write and what not to write, from an executive’s perspective. An agent has to sell your script to a producer, and a producer has to sell your script to a studio. If there’s no chance of that happening, why would an agent agree to represent you in the first place?

• What are your ten favorite movies of all time?

I don’t think I could limit it to ten... but off the top of my head:

The Stunt Man (1980)
L.A. Story (1991)
Ruthless People (1986)
Lawrence of Arabia (1962)
The Goonies (1985)
The Big Lebowski (1998)
Vertigo (1958)
JFK (1991)
The Wizard of Oz (1939)
Ravenous (1999)

Last year my favorite movie was The Help. This year, as of November, I've been blown away by Cabin in the Woods, Prometheus, Cloud Atlas, End of Watch, Wreck-It Ralph, Argo, and especially 21 Jump Street, for delivering humor and action alongside profound insight into today’s teen culture.

• What's next for Adam Levenberg?

At the moment, I’m working on some fun projects as a producer, but I’m also launching a podcast, and teaching a screenwriting course on Saturdays at The Director’s Playhouse in Los Angeles. I developed the curriculum myself and it’s going well. We start with beginner and advanced classes in January 2013.

Hire A Hollywood Exec.

First posted:7 December 2012

Book Review: The Starter Screenplay

In a recent interview, Anne Lower recommended several books, including one I’d never heard of before: The Starter Screenplay, by Adam Levenberg. I know Anne gives good advice, so I bought a copy.

Adam Levenberg is a former Hollywood executive (Intuition Productions, One Race Films), and that is the entire point of his book. There’s no advice on formatting or screenplay structure or character development. The executive mindset—something most of us instinctively mistrust—is obvious throughout. Adam spent years as a Hollywood executive, and he’s still in his early thirties. That shows in his book. It is impatient, direct, and blunt. The tone is that of a youthful executive unwinding over a couple of cold ones with a group of peers.

---

There are three things you need to understand from the outset. The first is that Hollywood executives divide writers into two classes: those who have agents, managers and/or lawyers, and those who are unrepresented.

Get used to seeing references to the “unrepresented writer” because that's the person for whom this book was written.

The second thing is the concept of the “Starter Screenplay.”

• A Starter Screenplay is a script that gives you a shot at breaking into Hollywood.

And what does a starter screenplay look like?

• There is one hero.
• Events take place in present-day reality, preferably in the United States, usually in a neighborhood or contained location.
• The hero is provided a love interest, a ticking clock, a clear-cut goal, and depending on the genre, either life or death or family and career are on the line.
• (It tells a story) that executives want to make and audiences want to see, featuring characters we'd like to be.

The third thing is this: a "movie" is that type of film which consistently makes money for the studio. Sure, there are other types of films—art house, foreign, doco, experimental, and so on—but to be a "movie," a film has to be of a style that has a track record of positive return on investment.

Executives have been studying the patterns of success and failure for a century. This book is a distillation of all that due diligence. It doesn’t tell The Truth, but it presents a version of the executive mindset that will probably decide the future of your next screenplay, should it get that high up in the food chain.

You probably won’t like what you’re about to read, but you’d be a fool to not want to know how they think.

• Over 99% of unrepresented writers do not know how to write a movie.
• Unrepresented writers ... often think any narrative they imagine or construct is a movie because they are writing it in screenplay format.

And that's why they remain unrepresented. The stuff they've been writing doesn't qualify as a "movie" in the eyes of Hollywood executives.

---

You need to read the whole book to get the full picture, but here are a few quotes from The Starter Screenplay to give you a taste of the POV of a Hollywood executive.

• Movies are about heroes trapped in extreme situations. They are forced to do outrageous things and overcome impossible odds to achieve a particular goal.
• Successful movies exploit an audience's desires.
• The cliché "write what you know" inspires countless writers to depict the frustrations of breaking into Hollywood. This is awful advice for screenwriters.
• Stallone ... took a visually dull job (writing behind a desk) and set it inside a boxing ring with people beating the shit out of each other.
• Kiddie movies by unrepresented writers are usually awful. It takes a highly sophisticated expert to entertain kids and adults at the same time.
• If you need more than 115 finalized pages to tell a story, you have not written a movie. Chances are you still have a lot to learn about what a movie actually is. Period.
• Nearly every spec that sells takes place in current day reality.
• Your hero should also be in trouble, behind schedule, and under the gun due to a ticking clock.
• Until you sell a spec, do not juggle the beginning, middle, or end. Keep your movie out of the editing blender and write a linear narrative.
• Heroes are dragged kicking and screaming into their missions.
• Your hero must act. It's never a choice.
• If you've written a thriller where life and death aren't on the line, you have not written a thriller.
• In capers, which are usually heist narratives, freedom is at stake and incarceration is the price of failure.
• Audiences tend to avoid exotic settings. Remember, 50% of Americans have never left the continental United States.
• There is no such thing as a totally new concept.
• Any high school movie needs to feature heroes who are intelligent, speak like adults, and are in the 11th or 12th grade.
• If you can't find two interesting premises inspired by the content of a single random newspaper, you're not thinking hard enough.
• Give your hero a romance, even if they’re already hitched!
• A romance is the best way to prove the hero’s value to the audience. It also makes even the toughest heroes vulnerable and accessible.
• And never forget, your hero must be awesome and memorable. Awesome and memorable. Awesome and memorable. Awesome and memorable...
• Your hero should be 25-40 years old.
• Action movies often show the hero failing at something during the opening sequence. What situation do you think he's placed in during the climax?
• A final sacrifice followed by reward is what makes audiences cry.
• The best villains represent a true threat to our hero.
• We know the hero is going to win, so the only way you’ll convince the audience to suspend disbelief is to make it impossible for us to imagine how the hero can prevail.
• Your hero must achieve their victory by using a specific piece of wisdom, lesson, or action they’ve learned during the events of the movie.
• Screenplays sell if they have a strong concept, a memorable hero, competent execution, and multiple Ideas of Value.
• Ideas of Value are original touches that bring life to your characters, excitement to your action, and creativity to dialogue and situations.
• I'm always amazed when I ask aspiring screenwriters to identify the most memorable moments of their screenplay and they go silent. No wonder they don't get requests—what else are you supposed to list in a one page query letter?
• Before writing a new script, you should read at least ten screenplays of the same genre that have sold in the past year or two.
• Screenwriting is about finding the simplest way to get the point across and a professional can accomplish in one sentence what an amateur may spend pages establishing.
• The best short films hit every beat of a feature.

---

Some Don’ts for Starter Screenplays:

• Don’t adapt a book 
• Avoid Biopics 
• Don’t mock Hollywood 
• Avoid parodies (write a broad comedy with a solid storyline, instead) 
• Don’t mention 9/11 
• No Native American stories 
• Don’t invent a superhero (normal guys with impressive strength/stamina/survival skills are okay) 
• No musicals (write a Broadway show instead) 
• Skip the family Holocaust story 
• No charity/good cause stories 
• No epics 
• No drug addiction/child abuse/domestic violence 
• No sequels 

---

Ten Tips for Short Filmmakers:

• The best genres to work in are horror, comedy, and musicals.
• Keep it short. Two to five minutes is best, ten minutes maximum.
• Show off! Limit the amount of shots and effects, so every single one can be perfect.
• Stay away from character dramas!
• Create impact! Make the audience jump out of their seats or laugh out loud. Do something shocking.
• Don’t act in your own short if your primary goal is to be a writer/director.
• Break out of the studio rules! Serve whatever audience you want to.
• Keep it simple and film a contained sequence with an immediate problem that evokes intense emotion, such as humiliation, terror, or excitement.
• You are filming an amazing short, not an advertisement for a feature.
• What makes YOU special as a filmmaker? Make sure this is on display. Play it up. This could be your last shot.

---

This review of The Starter Screenplay barely touches the surface of the book, but it should give you a fair idea of what to expect. Highly recommended for any screenwriter who is pursuing the Sale-to-Hollywood route. 

First posted:  3 September 2012

The Official Screenwriting Podcast

Adam Levenberg is a former production company executive, a script consultant, and the author of The Starter Screenplay. He is also the host of the Official Screenwriting Podcast.

Back when I was commuting to and from the office every day, I would have loved the podcast approach. These days I prefer a paperback, which I can dog-ear and highlight and, when appropriate, hurl across the room. At the same time, I am increasingly the innocent victim of middle-aged spread. This is clearly a genetic defect, with some environmental factors contributing, but everyone is telling me to get more exercise. Harrumph!

So I've embraced stationary cycling. Yes, the exercise bike. Half an hour of vigorous pedaling increases my rate of respiration, meaning my body converts more oxygen to carbon dioxide, meaning I am single-handedly boosting global warming. (Not as much as Al Gore's private jet, but to some degree nonetheless.) Still, it's worth it, just to not have to listen to so much well-intentioned advice. Instead, I listen to podcasts. Like Adam's.

He releases a new episode every two weeks or so. Some of his early ones were less polished than they are now. They were recorded in a single take, and lack music and clever editing. I like them. Adam doesn't. The thing I like is that they reveal the man thinking on his feet. And, in the end, the way his mind works is his greatest asset.

There are endless books and articles dealing with all and any aspect of screenwriting/ filmmaking. This blog links to more than eighty other screenwriting/filmmaking blogs, and I could expand that by quite a few more if I wanted to be comprehensive. The bulk of those are published by screenwriters. How many come from former production company executives?

The point is, those people think differently to most of the rest of us. They are so well drilled in the Hollywood success formula that they think along different paths. You might not like those paths, you probably despise executives, but they play a big part in the overall scene. They also have insights into how scripts work that are worth considering. At the absolute minimum, you can get to know your enemy.

Try starting with the current episode: Character Introductions & Pitchfest Wrapup. (You can find it through that link, or on his website or on iTunes.) This is the episode Adam made after he moderated the Great American Pitchfest panel with Ryan Engle, Shane Black, and Alvaro Rodriguez, all people who know a bit about storytelling.

Or you could start with one of the early podcasts, such as Writing Great Loglines. (You can find it through that link, or on his website or on iTunes). That's one of the untidy episodes, but I got a lot out of it.

You have an opportunity to learn a little about how an executive thinks, for free. Why wouldn't you take advantage of that?

Interview with Adam Levenberg

Adam Levenberg is a former Hollywood executive (Intuition Productions, One Race Films) who spent years inside the system.

Once outside, he promptly wrote a book called The Starter Screenplay, which gives an executives' view of the factors that influence studio decision-making about spec scripts.

I took the opportunity recently to ask him a few questions.
________________________________________________________________________

•  Where were you born, and where did you grow up?

I was born and grew up in Cheltenham and Upper Dublin, which are both suburbs of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

•  Where did you go to school?

I attended USC School of Cinematic Arts and majored in Critical Studies. It’s a great place to study cinema, but I think the reason for the school’s success is that every single student has already made the commitment (most at age 18) to move away from home and live in Los Angeles. Most of my friends from USC are still living in L.A. and working in the entertainment industry.

•  When did you first take an interest in films/stories?

Before I can remember. I have Dr. Seuss’s My Book About Me and for My Favorite Sport, I filled in “Watching.” As a kid, I was completely indiscriminate about what I watched—I just tried to see everything. I probably spent about 5-6 hours per day in front of the television. Weekends were spent watching movies at the theater or on video.
   By the time I hit film school, I was seeing about 200 movies per year. I have an encyclopedic knowledge of Hollywood Cinema from the late 1980s to the present. I don’t watch sports, so when my friends are watching a game, I’m knocking off another film title.

•  What was your first paying job?

At 16, I worked as a dishwasher at Friendly’s, which is a restaurant and ice-cream chain.

•  What was your first job in the movie business?

My first paying entertainment job was producing a show for Trojan Vision, which is the USC television station. It was called Organized Chaos and we tried to make it as wild as possible. I think on the second show the hosts were doing a flavored condom taste test. Nobody was watching, so we tried to be as outrageous as possible just to entertain ourselves.
    My first real industry job was reading scripts for USA Films, which at the time had deals with Alexander Payne and Spike Jonze, and was making films like Traffic (2000), Nurse Betty (2000), and Being John Malkovitch (1999).
    It was interesting to read the projects that great filmmakers would submit and evaluating if the script or book had any potential as a feature film. The first book I did coverage on was submitted by an amazing filmmaker, but I didn’t understand how it could be adapted into a movie. I called in and was told, “Evaluate the material honestly. Don’t be swayed by the name on the cover letter or the names attached. If the book is a pass, it’s his job to explain to how he plans on adapting it into a great screenplay.”

•  What did you learn from working with Vin Diesel?

Vin likes the idea of building worlds and I learned a lot about intellectual property development. That works for an established actor/producer. But for screenwriters, I tend to suggest sticking to the screenplays. There’s nothing wrong with creating some concept art as inspiration for yourself, but if you don’t have representation, just focus on the writing because there’s no artwork that will make someone reconsider a script that doesn’t work. 
   One piece of advice from my book is that you should never worry about sequels or franchise building while you’re writing a spec script. I say this not because it’s a bad idea in theory, but because these attempts (especially from new writers) tend to result in unreadable screenplays. Creating effective setup and payoff in one screenplay is hard enough.

•  Why did you write The Starter Screenplay?

I went from being a production company executive to an independent consultant. Basically, my intention was to do the work of a development executive for multiple companies, make the same amount of money with more freedom to pursue projects I was interested in advancing. 
   Then a friend pointed out that I could allow unrepresented screenwriters to hire me for feedback. I got creative and e-mailed the writers who had queried me in the past. A bunch of them decided to send me their scripts. At the time I didn’t know that there were other companies out there who just sold notes without discussion, which is so much easier to do, but worthless for the writer. When someone hired me, I would read their script, then talk to them for 2-3 hours. I still do that, except now I make notations on the pdf of their screenplay. I do notes after, and then the discussion takes place within 24 hours, so I’m fresh.
    Once I started working with unrepresented screenwriters, I went looking for screenwriting books to recommend. I couldn’t find a single book that shared the perspective on what an executive is looking for, or a book that nudged writers in the direction of simplicity and commercialism, while still getting the hang of the medium. 
   So I wrote it. 
   The book is broken down into two parts—the first is What to Write? The second half is about Interacting with the Industry—how to decode people’s reactions to your material, including what it means if you don’t hear back from queries, or when someone says “I liked your script, it’s a pass.” 

Even executives have to unwind. Here's Adam on Space Mountain at Disneyland.

•  You wrote on Twitter that Australian screenwriters are your favorite clients. Why is that?

Professional Hollywood writers are used to being asked tough questions. They know how to separate their ego from the process of getting script notes. This can be an intimidating experience for a new screenwriter. Some get overwhelmed. But Australian writers (or at least the many who have hired me) do great taking constructive criticism in stride and staying upbeat. That’s important because they’re at full creative capacity when the conversation turns to “How can we fix this?”
    After a consult, I usually suggest a specific book on screenwriting (depending on the writer’s current level), run down a bunch of movie titles to see, and pick out some scripts for them, as well as discuss their next step in terms of the script. I ask all clients to let me know how they’re progressing with the work, what they thought of the scripts/book/movies, but only a certain percentage follow through. Australian writers definitely do a better job staying in communication with that feedback. Or again, at least that’s true of the many I’ve worked with thus far.

•  What was the best advice you were given at the start of your career?

At some point in the process, I had a long conversation with Anne Lower, who was working with Save the Cat. She explained how, by Snyder’s third book, he gave up on trying to defend his positions because, ultimately, people will either accept what you write, because they get it, or they won’t. That’s exactly what I needed to hear. I ended up cutting tons of unnecessary material as a result, once I wasn’t concerned with defending my suggestions from the exceptions to the rules. 

•  If you had to suggest just one screenwriting book (not your own) to a newbie writer back in Adelaide, which one would it be?

Blake Snyder’s Save The Cat! is the essential foundation of screenwriting for any newbie. My book covers what types of movies you should write and how to navigate the industry; I intended it as a companion piece to Save The Cat! 
   I think once you know Snyder’s structure backwards and forwards, you’ll need to move on to more complex stuff, such as John Truby’s The Anatomy of Story.
    It's important to note that most screenwriting books contain great points, but bury the important stuff under hundreds of pages. That’s why The Starter Screenplay is sparse and to the point—I talk about what to write and what not to write, from an executive’s perspective. An agent has to sell your script to a producer, and a producer has to sell your script to a studio. If there’s no chance of that happening, why would an agent agree to represent you in the first place?

• What are your ten favorite movies of all time?

I don’t think I could limit it to ten... but off the top of my head:

The Stunt Man (1980)
L.A. Story (1991)
Ruthless People (1986)
Lawrence of Arabia (1962)
The Goonies (1985)
The Big Lebowski (1998)
Vertigo (1958)
JFK (1991)
The Wizard of Oz (1939)
Ravenous (1999)

Last year my favorite movie was The Help. This year, as of November, I've been blown away by Cabin in the Woods, Prometheus, Cloud Atlas, End of Watch, Wreck-It Ralph, Argo, and especially 21 Jump Street, for delivering humor and action alongside profound insight into today’s teen culture.

• What's next for Adam Levenberg?

At the moment, I’m working on some fun projects as a producer, but I’m also launching a podcast, and teaching a screenwriting course on Saturdays at The Director’s Playhouse in Los Angeles. I developed the curriculum myself and it’s going well. We start with beginner and advanced classes in January 2013.

Hire A Hollywood Exec.Com

Book Review: The Starter Screenplay

In a recent interview, Anne Lower recommended several books, including one I’d never heard of before: The Starter Screenplay, by Adam Levenberg. I know Anne gives good advice, so I bought a copy.

Adam Levenberg is a former Hollywood executive (Intuition Productions, One Race Films), and that is the entire point of his book. There’s no advice on formatting or screenplay structure or character development. The executive mindset—something most of us instinctively mistrust—is obvious throughout. Adam spent years as a Hollywood executive, and he’s still in his early thirties. That shows in his book. It is impatient, direct, and blunt. The tone is that of a youthful executive unwinding over a couple of cold ones with a group of peers.
________________________________________________________________________

There are three things you need to understand from the outset. The first is that Hollywood executives divide writers into two classes: those who have agents, managers and/or lawyers, and those who are unrepresented.

Get used to seeing references to the “unrepresented writer” because that's the person for whom this book was written.

The second thing is the concept of the “Starter Screenplay.”

• A Starter Screenplay is a script that gives you a shot at breaking into Hollywood.

And what does a starter screenplay look like?

• There is one hero.
• Events take place in present-day reality, preferably in the United States, usually in a neighborhood or contained location.
• The hero is provided a love interest, a ticking clock, a clear-cut goal, and depending on the genre, either life or death or family and career are on the line.
• (It tells a story) that executives want to make and audiences want to see, featuring characters we'd like to be.

The third thing is this: a "movie" is that type of film which consistently makes money for the studio. Sure, there are other types of films—art house, foreign, doco, experimental, and so on—but to be a "movie," a film has to be of a style that has a track record of positive return on investment.

Executives have been studying the patterns of success and failure for a century. This book is a distillation of all that due diligence. It doesn’t tell The Truth, but it presents a version of the executive mindset that will probably decide the future of your next screenplay, should it get that high up in the food chain.

You probably won’t like what you’re about to read, but you’d be a fool to not want to know how they think.

• Over 99% of unrepresented writers do not know how to write a movie.
• Unrepresented writers ... often think any narrative they imagine or construct is a movie because they are writing it in screenplay format.

And that's why they remain unrepresented. The stuff they've been writing doesn't qualify as a "movie" in the eyes of Hollywood executives.
________________________________________________________________________

You need to read the whole book to get the full picture, but here are a few quotes from The Starter Screenplay to give you a taste of the POV of a Hollywood executive.

• Movies are about heroes trapped in extreme situations. They are forced to do outrageous things and overcome impossible odds to achieve a particular goal.
• Successful movies exploit an audience's desires.
• The cliché "write what you know" inspires countless writers to depict the frustrations of breaking into Hollywood. This is awful advice for screenwriters.
• Stallone ... took a visually dull job (writing behind a desk) and set it inside a boxing ring with people beating the shit out of each other.
• Kiddie movies by unrepresented writers are usually awful. It takes a highly sophisticated expert to entertain kids and adults at the same time.
• If you need more than 115 finalized pages to tell a story, you have not written a movie. Chances are you still have a lot to learn about what a movie actually is. Period.
• Nearly every spec that sells takes place in current day reality.
• Your hero should also be in trouble, behind schedule, and under the gun due to a ticking clock.
• Until you sell a spec, do not juggle the beginning, middle, or end. Keep your movie out of the editing blender and write a linear narrative.
• Heroes are dragged kicking and screaming into their missions.
• Your hero must act. It's never a choice.
• If you've written a thriller where life and death aren't on the line, you have not written a thriller.
• In capers, which are usually heist narratives, freedom is at stake and incarceration is the price of failure.
• Audiences tend to avoid exotic settings. Remember, 50% of Americans have never left the continental United States.
• There is no such thing as a totally new concept.
• Any high school movie needs to feature heroes who are intelligent, speak like adults, and are in the 11th or 12th grade.
• If you can't find two interesting premises inspired by the content of a single random newspaper, you're not thinking hard enough.
• Give your hero a romance, even if they’re already hitched!
• A romance is the best way to prove the hero’s value to the audience. It also makes even the toughest heroes vulnerable and accessible.
• And never forget, your hero must be awesome and memorable. Awesome and memorable. Awesome and memorable. Awesome and memorable...
• Your hero should be 25-40 years old.
• Action movies often show the hero failing at something during the opening sequence. What situation do you think he's placed in during the climax?
• A final sacrifice followed by reward is what makes audiences cry.
• The best villains represent a true threat to our hero.
• We know the hero is going to win, so the only way you’ll convince the audience to suspend disbelief is to make it impossible for us to imagine how the hero can prevail.
• Your hero must achieve their victory by using a specific piece of wisdom, lesson, or action they’ve learned during the events of the movie.
• Screenplays sell if they have a strong concept, a memorable hero, competent execution, and multiple Ideas of Value.
• Ideas of Value are original touches that bring life to your characters, excitement to your action, and creativity to dialogue and situations.
• I'm always amazed when I ask aspiring screenwriters to identify the most memorable moments of their screenplay and they go silent. No wonder they don't get requests—what else are you supposed to list in a one page query letter?
• Before writing a new script, you should read at least ten screenplays of the same genre that have sold in the past year or two.
• Screenwriting is about finding the simplest way to get the point across and a professional can accomplish in one sentence what an amateur may spend pages establishing.
• The best short films hit every beat of a feature.

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Some Don’ts for Starter Screenplays:

• Don’t adapt a book 
• Avoid Biopics 
• Don’t mock Hollywood 
• Avoid parodies (write a broad comedy with a solid storyline, instead) 
• Don’t mention 9/11 
• No Native American stories 
• Don’t invent a superhero (normal guys with impressive strength/stamina/survival skills are okay) 
• No musicals (write a Broadway show instead) 
• Skip the family Holocaust story 
• No charity/good cause stories 
• No epics 
• No drug addiction/child abuse/domestic violence 
• No sequels 

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Ten Tips for Short Filmmakers:

• The best genres to work in are horror, comedy, and musicals.
• Keep it short. Two to five minutes is best, ten minutes maximum.
• Show off! Limit the amount of shots and effects, so every single one can be perfect.
• Stay away from character dramas!
• Create impact! Make the audience jump out of their seats or laugh out loud. Do something shocking.
• Don’t act in your own short if your primary goal is to be a writer/director.
• Break out of the studio rules! Serve whatever audience you want to.
• Keep it simple and film a contained sequence with an immediate problem that evokes intense emotion, such as humiliation, terror, or excitement.
• You are filming an amazing short, not an advertisement for a feature.
• What makes YOU special as a filmmaker? Make sure this is on display. Play it up. This could be your last shot.

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This review of The Starter Screenplay barely touches the surface of the book, but it should give you a fair idea of what to expect. Highly recommended for any screenwriter who is pursuing the Sale-to-Hollywood route.