Screwed
Remember the co-op? Remember how I described it as part-sales-pitch, part-new-age-feel-goodery? I had an uneasy feeling about it from, let’s say, day three. Basically, after Big-Shot Producer’s initial pitch — which made it sound pretty good — he began ladling on the creepy gravy until I felt very uncomfortable about the whole prospect. I wanted to know what happened to the mild but very much existent promises that some crazy group of foreign investors would read Dying Proof and have a response in three weeks or less. I wanted to know what happened to the co-op concept of getting 20-30 (maybe even up to 50) individual pieces of feedback on my script.
Instead, what little information I did receive — which reached a standstill by mid-April — consisted of nothing but impersonal marketing-speak. Gone was the producer who encouraged me despite his reservations about my pitch-black sense of humor. In his place stood a pod person. I didn’t like where this was headed.
Now, it’s not unusual for a screenwriter — especially one near the bottom of the food chain — to be ignored by Big-Shot Producers for months at a time. I believe the reading turnaround for successful screenwriters is about eight weeks, so my having to wait six months, while frustrating, isn’t unusual. I continued my usual pattern of calling and/or e-mailing at least once a week, but I continued to get stonewalled; again, frustrating, but you sort of get used to it. On the one hand, there’s the principle that I should wait for them to call me; on the other, I’m nobody. I have to remind them that I exist.
Finally, last week, I received an e-mail from the Big-Shot Producer. He apologized all over himself and made two excuses: (1) server crash on the co-op’s files, (2) he’s busy producing movies. That old chestnut! I didn’t really believe him about the server crash, but I suppose it’s meaningful that he’d go out of his way to lie to me. Then again, considering what happened, I suppose it’s not that meaningful.
What he offered, in the e-mail, is what he perceived as an olive branch. Not that he needed one — this was just more sales pitch. See, before communication dropped off between us completely, this co-op sounded less like a free exchange of ideas among working professionals and more like a scam, under the guise of a distance-learning class, designed to screw novice writers out of money they likely don’t have, guaranteeing some sort of foolproof method to succeed as a screenwriter. It only lacked two components: a fee, and a money-back guarantee. So I just kept waiting for the other shoe to drop.
And so it did. Big-Shot Producer offered, as a “gift,” to send me “a few assignments” from the co-op. I had no clue what he meant about assignments — I’d read the marketing-speak he’d sent and spent far too much time trying to parse it for any sign of humanity or hostile intent, so I got that it was supposed to be like a “class,” but I thought the “class” was: “Read other people’s shitty scripts, cover them, and receive periodic inspirational e-mails.”
Yet, referring to them as “assignments” — not scripts or coverage or anything — confused me. Was this more semantic mumbo-jumbo, or did he really believe giving me homework assignments was a gift?
With reservations, I told him to send the assignments. My curiosity had gotten the better of me. Besides, I have the craftiest known safety net to avoid getting bilked out of money: I don’t have any. So the joke’s on him!
He did send me an assignment, which was long and tedious and involved reading an inspirational speech (good guess!) and answering a variety of lit 101 questions about how it applies to my “career,” followed by a request to sum up my autobiography in between five and 10 pages. The fuck?
Oh, he also included the long-promised, never-delivered coverage on Dying Proof. Remember that whole “20 or 30 (maybe up to 50!)” thing? I got one person’s coverage, and not to sound too harsh, but it wasn’t exactly constructive. The reader clearly didn’t like the script, which I guess is helpful in itself, but everything the reader wrote in response felt like they’d read McKee’s Story for the first time ever just before reading my script, and because it’s not a textbook example of his methodology, it’s the worst thing ever.
I hope that doesn’t come across as defensive. I don’t think Dying Proof is a great script, and in fact Preity read it and also disliked it quite severely. I was pretty frustrated with her take, but receiving the coverage from this other person crystallized the difference: she gave me valuable, valid feedback. Preity may have said a few things I disagreed with in terms of the storyline and structure, but she did give me a couple of ideas that are worth their weight in gold — in fact, I’m planning a rewrite based solely on those few suggestions, because they’ll make Dying Proof that much better.
However, it didn’t come across like the reader, who seemed to hate the genre more than the story or characters, had anything constructive to say. It’s basic, basic, basic “I learned this in fifth grade” argumentative structuring: topic sentence tells what’s wrong, rest of the paragraph explains why they feel that way. Even if they don’t give notes on how to improve it, which I usually do, explaining why they disliked something helps me figure out how to fix it on my own. Knowing only what without the why doesn’t help anything.
So yeah, I’m planning another draft of Dying Proof, but I had hoped I’d have a wide range of feedback to look at, so I could gauge how a wide cross-section of people feel about the story. Instead, I get some useless advice from one anonymous person.
What else did Big-Shot Producer include in the e-mail? Oh right, a brochure for the co-op, which is so professional it only contains one egregious misspelling in the first sentence (“amateur” is spelled “armature”…yeah, I wish I could make up something like that). I paged through the brochure to understand what I was truly in for, and then I hit the pricetag: $4500 for the basic course, $6500 for the advanced course, $15,000 for the “professional” course. Bear in mind these prices are only for the first four weeks. I half-expected a “…plus 99¢ for each additional minute” disclaimer at the bottom of the page.
Granted, Big-Shot Producer has not, as of yet, hit me up for money, but I know it’s only a matter of time. He’s giving me the “free” assignments not as a “gift,” but in the same way a new drug dealer always gives his prospective client an initial free hit. If Marked for Death is accurate at all, taking one puff of marijuana will lead teens to immediately try crack. The free assignment is designed to get me hooked on the crack of the paid course.
Even if I could afford it: look, I’m both dumb and gullible, but I had one lesson drilled into my head repeatedly by everyone I’ve ever met associated with the film industry: do not give anyone money. People asking for money for anything — especially something as tenuous as a “surefire” way to make a living as a screenwriter — are full of shit unless they’re booking the Whisky, in which case they just need you to sell some tickets, come onnnnn. Just don’t do it, contrary to the teachings of Nike.
I’m honestly pretty insulted. Not so much by the wasted time, the endless aggravation, and the general obnoxiousness of stringing me along for a few years only to offer me up as a ritual sacrifice for his own, private moneymaking enterprise — no, what really gets my goat is that he clearly thinks I’m dumb enough to fall for this. I have another friend who has done rewrite work — unpaid, but still — for Big-Shot Producer. He’s never heard of the co-op, of “assignments,” of anything.
Preity suggested I string Big-Shot Producer along, doing the assignments until he starts asking me for money, then give him my tale of woe and beg him to give me a job. I don’t know. It seems like a lot of effort for, potentially, nothing in return.
Posted by Stan on June 30, 2008 10:34 AM | Permalink | Career-Based Rambling | Digg It
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