Small to medium sized Producers (in the Hollywood food chain) are ALWAYS looking for a great script that could make money. They have their next level connections to people who have the money to make movies. And there are a lot of production companies like this who ARE indeed open to reviewing scripts.

However, they ALSO receive a lot of pitches, so you still have to stand out and have a strong script. 

Think about it… If you have a script that places in the Top 25% of a contest, there are still a lot of other scripts at that same level. So to get the attention of even a smaller producer, you not only need to write a great pitch, but then if you can establish some credibility points that help them believe you will deliver on the promise of your logline or pitch letter, that will improve your chances. And that is where establishing crediblility comes in.

If your biggest challenge is writing a great script, the second biggest challenge is getting a legitimate producer to read your script to see if they might want to take it on to try to raise the money to produce it. 

So what needs to happen?  Let me lay it out for you.

You first have to get the producer interested in your story with your pitch and, in fact, you want to get them — not just interested but preferably — excited about reading it. Otherwise even if they’re “kind of” interested in your pitch they may put it on the backburner once they hang up the phone or return your email but never get around to reading it.

Because of this natural default result, you need to do whatever you can to make sure your pitch is as interesting, intriguing or exciting as it can possibly — while still accurately reflecting the script.  

Then we want to solidify that crediblity with extra points, so to speak, in the rest of your pitch or your letter.

One of the best ways to get those extra points is to establish credibility as much as you can, in spite of the fact you may not have too many credits, or maybe not any.  In this article, that’s what we’re going to look at what are some ways you can put some credibility points on the board to add to the producer’s confidence that it will be worthwhile to read your script — assuming he’s already at least somewhat interested in your script:

What are some things that can help you establish credibility as a screenwriter?

First, it’s important to understand that credibility is not black-and-white, but instead, it’s a continuum.

If you’ve already had a script produced, that gives you some credibility — and depending on the success of the film… the bigger the budget, the bigger the star or director, the bigger the box office, the more credibility it would give you. And the more recent the better, the longer away since that happened, you lose points, so to speak….

Chances are, you probably haven’t had a big successful movie produced, so we’re going to look at other ways to try to establish some basic credibility.

Again, please note that we are talking about establishing credibility is on the continuum… not that you have it or you don’t… the idea is to score a few points here and there so the producer gets a sense that they will not be wasting their time if they agree to read your script.

One of the best things to help you in this area is to make sure you DON’T do the things that detract from your credibility and make you look clueless.

There’s nothing wrong with being new — if you are there’s nothing you can do to change that… However, you can still learn as much as you can so you don’t seem clueless. That’s where several of these tips are coming from.

1. Come across as literate in your email query letter.

If your email query letter has a bunch of typos and bad grammar in it, you immediately lose some points. I’m not saying that one little typo will blow all of your credibility — it won’t —  but I am saying that your query letter has to show that you can compose sentences well and that you know proper grammar. This is very basic… but believe it or not, many writers are bad at basic grammar and spelling. But the best of those are smart enough to get an editor to review their work because they understand this point!

2. Format your script properly.

Of course the same thing applies to your script itself. Your script should look like a script is expected to look and it should follow standard formatting rules. It should have proper margins within a given range and it should not contain a bunch of typos.

When a query letter or script has lots of errors, it suggests you either don’t know proper grammar or you just haven’t put enough work into it. Or maybe you’re sitting down and just spitting out script after script without working on any of them.  This is the simplest part to get right because these are superficial elements. There’s no excuse for getting this part wrong. If you do, it is simply an Unforced Error that will immediately detract from your idea and make you lose some points in the producer’s eyes.

3. Don’t say things that make you sound naive.

I can’t tell you how writers I’ve heard say, “This is the biggest thing since [fill in the title of any extremely successful film you want].”

When a writer says that, it immediately stamps “amateur” right onto their forehead. It screams “newbie” who really doesn’t know what they’re doing and is probably so clueless they will be difficult to work with. I can tell you this is true from the sheer fact that I have worked with a few writers like this, and even when they are paying me to advise them they don’t listen!

No one — and I mean NO ONE — can accurately predict what film will be a runaway hit, and that goes a thousand times over for a new writer.  Of course, those in the business who have experience have a better track record than many others, but there’s no guarantee on a given movie that it will be successful.

So if you as a newbie say anything to this effect, instead of adding points to your credibility, it actually subtracts a LOT of points because not only is it naive but it is also arrogant and annoying! So…. there you go. Big hint!

4. Do mention your experience with the subject matter you’re writing on.

If you are a professional on the topic you’ve written about, mention it! If you know the inside scoop and you’ve added interesting details in your script, definitely establish your street cred in the subject matter.

If you’ve been a detective working on cold cases and you have wrote a composite story of three of the most interesting cases you’ve ever seen, that could establish credibility.

If your story is about a love affair that develops as two climbers meet while training to climb Mount Everest and you trained for that at one point, then there you go. Or if you are a research scientist in an odd area that your script is inspired by, meniton it.

The idea is to add something else in the letter that gives YOU and YOUR SCRIPT that extra little “uummph” that makes it really interesting or adds credibility.

5. Being a writer in some other medium is not enough to establish credibility as a screenwriter. Unless you are a very successful novelist selling the rights to your story.

If you won a poetry contest in high school… good for you. Congratulations. But don’t mention it in your letter. It’s great that you have been writing for a long time, but mentioning your high school accolades in poetry-writing actually detracts from your credibility because it would show that you don’t realize that writing poetry is an entirely different skill.

On the other hand, by all means, if you are a famous poet like Maya Angelou was — it implies you are a professional storyteller — then you definitely mention it, but for different reasons. For that matter, if you are famous for almost anything, then that would most likely be worth mentioning in your letter because there’s some story to tell, even if you were a criminal who has now gone straight.

6. Anything that makes you sound like an especially interesting human being may catch their attention.

Even though you are a writer making up stories, if a producer is interested in your story to begin with, any one of them worth their salt is going to be interested in knowing who YOU are… what makes you tick… how you came up with the idea.

If they LOVE your story, they’re really going to want to know WHO YOU ARE because they’re intrigued. But let’s say they like your script but are a bit on the fence about it — that’s where something about you can pushes them over the edge and make them much more interested.

Is there something that people naturally tend to find very interesting about you — whether you do or not? Some odd thing that has a backstory built in? If that’s the case, it automatically suggests you have a “story” to tell, and that could be something you touch on in your letter — especially if you can tie it into your script. But even if it’s not tied into your story, it could still be that extra thing that grabs the producer’s attention and holds it… or pushes them over the edge to make them believe your script will ALSO be interesting.

7. Other things that confirm that you have some degree of writing skill.

The fact is, most people — by definition — do not have anything that really jumps out as being super unique, and that’s fine. 

In that case, you might mention small things that add a little bit of “validation” or affirmation that you know how to write a script.

For example, if you won or placed in the Top 10 of a well-known screenwriting contest, that suggests you know how to write.  That would be worthwhile to mention because it shows you have been vetted in some way. It’s not that winning a contest or ranking highly means you’ll sell the script to them, but it’s the kind of thing that might add just enough uumph to push them over the edge and agree to read the script if they already kind of liked the idea.

Your goal is to have them love your pitch, have them believe you will deliver on what you are promising in your pitch, and to get them excited about reading your script as soon as they can. ~~ Melody Jackson, Ph.D.

But I would only mention that you ranked very highly in screenwriting contest if it was Top 10. If you placed in the Top 25% in a contest that gets 6000 submissions, that means you’re in the Top 1500… You should feel good about it, but the producer will be much more interested in the Top 600… and really even the Top 50 or Top 100. So be careful how you use a statistic because of the negative implication it also holds. The key is to use statistics like everyone else does and simply state it however it works in your favor!

For any and all of this…

You should relate to credibility as being on a continuum, a sliding scale. If you have something that can help, you should only mention one or two things beyond your pitch to push you over the edge to try to get those brownie points that help them say “YES, I’D LIKE TO READ IT!”

If you do the right things I mentioned above and avoid doing the wrong things… you’ll already be on the right track and you will have your best chance for moving up that NEXT STEP in the Hollywood Ladder!