Friday Free-For-All: The Joker Blogs webseries

I just discovered this! The Joker Blogs, which is a pretty cool idea for a webseries - featuring the Joker after his capture in The Dark Knight as he undergoes therapy with Dr. Harleen Quinzel.

A clever idea, a built-in audience, and an premise that allows for a low budget. That's pretty much a recipe for web series success.



I'm told subsequent episodes do a solid job of weaving in details from the movie and comic book continuities.

Reader question - How should I use a familial connection to sell a script?

Chris writes in:

Mr. Bitter Script Reader,

Please, Mr. Bitter Script Reader is my father. Just call me Bitter.

After coming across your blog, I quickly consumed all the valuable information you provide. With as much information that you, as well as your guest bloggers, have provided there is still a question I wanted to ask. I understand that it is important to utilize all contacts you may have within the industry, from fellow writers to "gatekeepers" to executives. My concern with this is that I have a family member who is an executive producer who is fairly well know (thus I'll not mention their name) and has worked on numerous projects from television to motion pictures.

I know that should I ever polish my screenplay to a level I feel conforms to a level of a professional, my relative would be more than willing to read what I have created. But I am quite worried that with this person being a direct family member-one of my mother's siblings-they may pass it down the ladder only as a way of saying they tried. I have spoken with them a couple of times and have indicated my interest in this field and it has always been responded to with strong words of encouragement.

Seeing as I've taken the long winded approach to my question, here goes. What advice would you offer given my set of circumstances. Seeing as this may be my "one" opportunity to offer a script that has the highest chances of being sold. Though I know this individual would be more than happy to "read" more of my material at a later date should this one not be of interest, I know that I only have one shot. Additionally, at what point in the polishing of this document should I take the leap and send it to them? I don't want to be still polishing up, re-writing, ten years from now, but again I don't want to make a careless mistake and look like an amateur. Perhaps I should send it to them and ask for advice one what they would change, what they might do differently, or seek general advice pertaining to my document.

Any advice would be extremely appreciated.

Well, this is your uncle you're talking about, so I'm assuming this isn't someone you have a distant relationship with. That'll help a lot if by some chance you turn in something that "isn't quite ready yet." If you show potential, I'd think your uncle would offer encouragement and advice even if your script needs more work. As busy as people in the industry are, I don't think you have only one "at bat" with someone that closely related.

If my cousin or brother sent me a script, unless it was truly, truly terrible, I have a hard time believing I'd completely cut them off from submitting again, or say, "You had your chance."

My advice would be to worry less about giving him something that he can help get sold and instead, look at this as an opportunity to obtain a mentor. You don't mention how long you've been writing or how many scripts you've written, but I sense this isn't something you've become attracted to on a lark.

Are you close with this uncle? Is he aware of your passion for writing? Do you share common tastes in films or movies? You have an opportunity to bond with him on a personal level and really pick his brain. You'll probably get a more candid view of the industry than if this person was someone you happened to meet through your college's alumni group or something like that.

Like, if my uncle was someone like Joss Whedon or John Wells, I'd probably be constantly prodding them with curious questions about their job. I'd be asking them what they thought of the latest big films, which TV shows they watched, what they like to see in television or movie writing. Often people are only too happy to talk about their work or their industry with people who show a genuine interest in it.

Look at this as your opportunity to get a free master class in writing. To see this as just an opportunity to get your script to someone in power is really short-sighted. Sell yourself, not the script. A real mentor is worth his weight in gold.

But how do you know when to lay that script on him? I don't know if there is a firm answer for that. You seem to understand that one shouldn't send out their first draft, or even their second. Do you have other friends who you trust to give you writing feedback? Have you gotten people together for a table read of the script so you can hear it outloud? Have you sent it to professional readers and coverage services so you can get an idea of how it holds up to other professional works.

As far as how to approach him, I think giving it to him with the understanding that you're looking for feedback is an excellent way to go about it. It shows you understand that writing in the industry is rewriting, and that you're not arrogant enough to assume you've hit it out of the park the first time.

You seem to have given it a lot of thought and seem to be aware of a lot of the mistakes that less savvy people might make. I say "go with your gut." When the script is ready - when you've polished it enough so that nothing major in there is bothering you - you'll know.

Good luck. You've got access to a great resource, so you just need to be smart about how you use it.

Reader question - Timetables to becoming a writer's assistant or reader?

David asks:

If I'm looking to seriously break into the industry (which I am), I already know I pretty much need to move and live in LA. My question is: what are the odds or realistic time tables of landing a job as a reader or in an agency or as a writer's assistant where I can make the connections needed while honing my craft and continue writing my own specs?

Well, this post covers my path to being a reader, so that's what I can offer as far as first-hand experience. It was just about two years before I became a reader, though by then I'd already been a development assistant and I had been reading for a good while before that too.

To add to the "how do I become a reader" end of things, I'll direct you to this post from me and this post from Amanda the Aspiring Writer. The gist is that you really don't want to pursue being a reader. With the way things have shifted the last few years, it's practically a dead end. Trust me, you'll still read plenty if you pursue work as a production assistant, office assistant, agency assistant or executive assistant. (That and the position of reader is becoming a rapidly disappearing one.)

Why should you pursue those? Two works: desk experience. I don't think I've seen many job postings of late that haven't made a point of saying they want the applicants to have a year or more of experience on a desk. If you want to climb the ladder that way, aim for the desk. If you soak up that experience, you'll likely also make the contacts that can set you up when writers' assistant positions need filling.

It's hard to give an accurate guess these days. With the job market in the state it's in, there's a lot of competition out there. I've heard of job postings for assistants receiving submissions in excess of 300! Not only that, companies are cutting back, meaning that staffs are smaller and there are fewer opportunities to move up.

But let's try to come up with a middle of the road estimate:

Start with 3-6 months doing internships. After that, let's add another year for production assistant work. Odds are that could be two or even three years if you're really unlucky. Eventually a slot opens up at an executive/agent's desk in the company where you work. Figure at least a year on that desk before you can take advantage of that to go elsewhere. More than likely, you'll end up doing more time there. I've got a friend who took an executive assistant position intending to only be there a year and he's ended up staying on through his third year.

So the "you were damn lucky" estimate probably comes out to just under two and a half years. I wouldn't count having that kind of luck. I'd say four or five years is probably the more realistic way to go before you get enough experience and make enough contacts to get that writers' assistant job.

But everyone moves at their own pace. There's no set timetable. It tends to be a combination of ability meeting opportunity.

Tuesday Talkback - Most obvious studio tinkering

I can still remember the first time I was abundantly aware that a feature film must have been released with an ending other than the one the shooting draft was commissioned with. The offender in question was Conspiracy Theory, a 1997 release starring Mel Gibson as a taxi driver who's obsessed with conspiracy theories. His other fixation - a State Department official played by Julia Roberts. He tries to convince her that NASA is going to pull off a presidential assassination by causing an earthquake.

Well, some government baddies led by Patrick Stewart come after Gibson's character, and Gibson and Roberts are led to believe that it's in response to the conspiracy theories presented in Gibson's latest newsletter. When they check the subscription list, everyone but one subscriber has been killed. This leads to a lot of running and chasing, and I admit I don't remember the rest of the film that well.

What I do remember is that the movie was striving for a dark and almost ambiguous tone that it never quite hit. Even at the time, I mostly blamed Gibson, thinking that someone a little off-kilter and unbalanced would have been better. I'd seen Steve Buschemi play such a character in a relatively recent episode of Homicide and figured he'd have been a better fit for the film's attempted weirdness. Gibson's performance is less Cohen Brothers-quirky and more "USA Original Series - Characters welcome" quirky.

Anyway, I've drifted from my point, which is that near the end of the film, Gibson's character is shot and seems to bleed to death right in front of Roberts and medics rush to his aide. Later, we see Roberts visit Jerry's grave... and then she walks away and the film cuts to Gibson and two agents in a van, watching her. There's some hamfisted dialogue about how she has to think he's dead and he's going to help them bring down the remaining players in the conspriacy. There's even a silly feel-good moment involving the three men singing along to a Frankie Valli song featured earlier in the film. This is followed by a coda where Roberts' character finds an object that belongs to Gibson on her horse's saddle.

So everyone's happy - Gibson's alive, Roberts knows he's alive, and we go out on a high note.

I remember walking out of that film thinking "Bullshit! He should have died!" What's more, it really felt like the movie was intended to end with that beat of her at his grave. The two reveals of "Gibson lives" and "She knows" seemed tacked on for an audience that wanted to walk out with a "Happy ending."

It completely ruined the film for me, and to this day I haven't watched it again (hence the hazily-recalled recap above.) Several years later I saw a Richard Donner interview that referenced the reshot ending and had my suspicions confirmed.

This ever happen to you?

Reader question - Snail-Mailed queries vs. Emailed queries

I'm still kinda zonked from Comic-Con, so I'm just going to take an easy question today. Greg asks:

I'm about to send out query letters to a bunch of production companies, so I've collected all their contact details. But I'm wondering if I should send these letters out via e-mail or regular mail. E-mail would certainly save on paper, ink and stamps, but physically mailing letters seems much more professional. What do you think?

A few years ago, you might have been right about physically mailing the letters being more professional, but I think these days they're accepted as a legitimate way of querying people. I used to do the physical mailings but I actually got more read requests off my last spate of email queries. Perhaps I just had a better pitch with this later one, but I'd like to think that since it takes little time to open and read an email, maybe that makes it easier for a recipient to give it a quick glace. A letter from a dubious sender might sit on a desk for weeks, unopened.

One thing I would stress with an email query is to be very concise. It takes so little effort for someone to press "DELETE." Be brief. Pitch your idea succinctly and don't ramble. Don't tell your life story - just get them interested in reading your script.

I've heard anecdotally from enough people who had luck with e-queries that I'm inclined to believe it's no less likely to succeed than actual mailed queries.

Friday Free-for-All: Comic-Con edition - Slave Leia PSA

It's that wonderful time of year again when all of the faithful flock to Nerd Mecca - San Diego Comic Con. Over the past eight years of so, I've watched it go from being a fun event where I could easily attend a lot of panels to an overcrowded exercise in herding people across the floor like cattle.

Last year I didn't get into a single panel, and the year before that I didn't have much better luck. It's a shame because that used to be my favorite part. Checking out the exhibition hall is fun too, but often the booths are so crowded that you can barely see anything.

What does that leave? Checking out the costumes. As a retailer friend of my father's told him during his first visit to Comic-Con (yes, my parents have been to SDCC. TWICE!) "You'll see so much fucking eye candy this week!" And it's true - there are a lot of elaborate, well-made costumes as well as a bevvy of scantily-clad women. Slave Leias are to Comic-Con what pumpkins are to Halloween. They also are excellent words to have on your blog during Comic Con week if you want to goose your search engine hits. (Additional good words to draw in those hits: Joss Whedon, Team Edward, and "How bad is the line at Hall H")

Fortunately for those suffering Leia fatigue, Chuck star Zachary Levi and his Nerd Machine have produced this Slave Leia PSA with The Big Bang Theory's Kaley Cuoco. (Don't get your hopes up guys... she doesn't appear in the outfit.)



If anyone else has some good Comic-Con related shorts, please post them in comments.

Reader question - "What sort of deal should I make with an independent filmmaker for my script?"

Liz asks:

I've been talking to two independent directors about writing scripts they can produce themselves. I don't think they'll be able to pay me, which I can live with since it will add something to my resume. Have you ever worked with that sort of thing? What kind of agreement should I make concerning things like copyright, future profits, etc?

Wow.... you might have stumped the band on this one. I've never worked with something like this, though I'm sure it happens all the time.

My legal knowledge in this area is murky. I think the important thing to do is copyright the script. The form and the instructions to do that are available online HERE.

As far as future profits, I admit I wouldn't know where to start with this. I think that you might want to look at some standard WGA contracts and see about using some of those deal points as a starting point. The Independent/Low Budget signatory information is here.

I think whatever agreement you hammer out, it might be smart to get a percentage of the gross (not net!) Even just a single point could be worth a lot if you end up writing something that turns out to be the next Paranormal Activity. True, the odds of that are long, but you have to think that when the filmmakers were shooting Paranormal Activity, no one on that set ever imagined it would make nearly $200 million worldwide.

Yeah, how would you like to own even half a percent of that?!

Beyond that, I have to admit I'm rather ignorant of some of the finer aspects of these buisness deals. Rather than giving bad advice, I think I'll yield the floor to anyone who might have more practical knowledge of such things.

UPDATE: Also if you decide to seek legal representation (always a good idea if the deal is moving forward), this post from Go Into the Story about getting an entertainment lawyer over a regular lawyer might be of interest to you. Just remember, Scott and I aren't lawyers - in case you happened to skim this post and missed the two instances where I said I'm not an expert in this field.