Monday, March 28, 2011

If Your Name's Not On The List...

'Unsolicited scripts are not welcome.'

Surely the person who made that decision should be stripped naked, rubbed down with sandpaper, smeared in lemon juice and beaten to death with their own underpants just for daring to slam a door in the face of your awesome talent? How very dare they, how very dare they indeed!

OK STOP! *slaps you in the face with a week old halibut*

Unsolicited scripts are not welcome for several reasons; it may be you've sent your script to a small production company and therefore they don't have the staff to read unsolicited work, they may have decided it's easier to let agents do their work for them rather than hire readers because they want to save their money for chocolate digestives instead of the plain ones with their tea, or maybe they just prefer to spend their time on Facebook, Twitter or Googling their own name every five minutes to see if they've moved up the listing. Whatever the case there is still a way of getting them to read your work without resorting to kidnap and nipple clamps.

If they have an email address send them a short, very polite email telling them you are aware of their submissions policy, that you don't have an agent, but you were wondering if they would kindly read a one page outline of your project. Most recipients will ignore you, some may even laugh in your face, some might take out restraining orders and some will reiterate their submission policy *just* to make it clear to someone as stupid as you. But there may just be one producer who emails you back and says, 'oh go on then'. Think of it from their point of view, they would rather read a one page outline than miss out on the script of the century.

If you don't try then why bother writing your script in the first place?

If you don't ask, you don't get.

2 comments:

Adaddinsane said...

As someone who's had to read unsolicited "work" in the past I completely understand why they do it (really, most of it is utter drivel, reading it is damaging to your calm).

Still bloody annoying though - however I have indeed used the method of "ask them to solicit it, then".

So I don't whine. I send a query email. It works.

Mind you there is one company I have experienced where any attempt to communicate is met with the sound of a stone falling into a bottomless well.*

I know why they do it. One of the people in charge is extremely well known.

Still bloody annoying though.

* a roaring silence**.

** Look, Ma, an oxymoron.

Dominic Carver said...

Yeah, I've submitted to that place too. My stuff is always sent back unread, which only makes me more determined.