Report from the
2002 Screenwriting Expo
by Charles Deemer (Dec-06-2002)
The 2002 Screenwriting Expo at the L.A. Convention Center (November 17, 18) was
exhilarating and exhausting, fascinating and frustrating. The sponsors (led by Creative Screenwriting magazine)
anticipated 1000 registrations and planned the programs accordingly. Over 2400
pre-registered and another 700 or more showed up to register at the door.
Over 3000 wannabe screenwriters gave visible proof to what everyone knows: it's
hard to find a writer today who is not writing a screenplay.
When
I arrived at the Convention Center around 9am Saturday morning, I was shocked
to find four long lines twisting through the Expo area. A line about 30 yards
long waited for pre-registration materials; another about 50 yards long waited
to register on the spot. The line waiting to buy tickets to the various
lectures and workshops was about 70 yards long. Lectures cost $2, workshops $4
-- but with a registration fee of only $49.95, this event was a real bargain,
which may be why such great numbers attended. Finally, a line over 100 yards
long waited to buy
tickets for Sunday's day-long pitch fest. This was the expensive part of the
weekend. $25 got you a pitch ticket good for no more than 5 minutes
face-to-face with a producer. More about this later.
With so many long lines, the Expo began in crowded confusion, even chaos. Yet I
found few who were upset by the situation. Most seemed to be standing around in
awe, as if to say, My God, there are
a lot of
budding screenwriters in the world!
Many registrants had flown in from as far away as New York and Florida (I met
one group from Tokyo) and were delighted to find opportunities to hear and
pitch to people not available to them at home. Time after time, people told me
what "a great opportunity" the Expo provided. Many of the
screenwriting gurus were there -- Linda Seger, Michael Hauge, John Truby and
others. And non-guru screenwriting teachers like myself were there. I gave two
lectures and presented one workshop.
I
was most fascinated by the pitch fest. That over 1000 people would line up to
pay $25 for the opportunity to make a 5-minute pitch fascinated me but somehow
I felt like weeping. A disturbing question occurred to me: what is the
difference between charging a writer to pitch an idea and charging him a
reading fee to look at a script? But the agent who charges reading fees is not
sanctioned by the WGA! The screenwriting union considers this practice to be
unethical behavior. But where was the WGA with regard to these pitch fees?
But
guess what? I couldn't find anyone who felt ripped off. In fact, people loved
the pitch fest. Listen to some of their stories.
One woman flew in from Las Vegas in order to pitch four scripts her husband had
written. He got sick and couldn't make the trip. An architect by profession,
the woman was used to working with clients and I could imagine her making an
effective pitch.
She
wanted to be first in line to get pitch tickets, so she arrived at the
convention center at 6:30 in the morning. The line already was over 50 yards
long! She ended up waiting in line most of the day -- until 2pm,
over 7 hours in line! -- but got her 4 tickets before they sold out.
I
found her in the hallway, weeping joyously. She looked like someone who'd just
won the lottery. In fact, she just finished her final pitch -- and two of her
husband's scripts had been requested. She couldn't contain her excitement and
joy.
I
met a man who had flown in from Florida, and he looked depressed. He, too, had
waited in line most of the day to get a ticket, but when he made his pitch the
producer told him his idea for an action movie was
a very good idea -- but this company didn't do action movies. He needed to
pitch to a more appropriate producer. Unfortunately, all the pitch tickets were
gone now and besides, he had a plane to catch. I gave the poor fellow a crash
course on pitching by email and sent him on his way with renewed hope.
Hope. This was the name of the game at the Expo. Hope and dreams. So much naive
and innocent optimism (and this is one of the toughest, most ruthless
marketplaces in existence) was a wonder to behold. I
remembered my own screenwriting start when nothing more than a request to read
a script seemed like the first step to fame and fortune, validation at last! In
fact, all screenwriting careers begin with such a
step. Who can't understand that architect's tears of joy?
But
can these wannabes write? I was depressed by how much bad screenwriting I saw
at the Expo -- over-written, over-directed, hard-to-read verbose stories that
seemed to be going nowhere very, very slowly. My sampling was small, to be
sure, so maybe it's unfair to make a generalization. But I didn't see the work
of a natural screenwriter anywhere. People in the business of teaching
screenwriting still have a
lot of work to do.
The
"buzz word" at the Expo was "vertical." More than one
registrant told me that lecture after lecture, workshop after workshop,
emphasized the need to "make your script vertical."
I'll
tell you what this means in my next column.