Elephant Bucks. Sheldon Bull
in your area that offers film courses, there's a decent chance that someone is teaching TV writing. Depending on how far you are from Los Angeles or New York, you may not find a writing teacher who has actually written for TV, but that's okay. The important thing is to start writing. If someone fills your head with a lot of misinformation, you now have this book to set you straight.
If there's a TV writing course at your local community college or university extension, take it. What can it hurt? Maybe the teacher has never been any closer to Hollywood than you have, but if he or she knows anything at all about how to construct a story and write dialogue — and if someone is teaching a writing class, they better know all this stuff really well — he or she can probably help you cobble together a spec script. (You can help the teacher by giving him or her a copy of this book.)
If you find that you are by far the best writer in your writing class…In fact, if your teacher says that you are the most talented pupil he or she has ever taught. If your classmates are blown away by how good your stuff is. If peers keep taking you aside and saying, “Man, you ought to go for this. You're great!”. Then go for it! That's what I did!
Writing spec scripts is the best way to demonstrate to people in Hollywood that you have the talent and the skill they are looking for.
It's the shortest route to getting your Lucky Break!
THE JOY OF KNOWING WHAT YOU'RE DOING!
If you've already written for a sketch show like Saturday Night Live, or you've sold a screenplay, or your father is the president of CBS, you might get a job as a sitcom writer without ever writing a spec episode. But then what?
Let's say that, based on your brilliant work as a sketch writer at MAD TV, or because of a very witty play you have running in the East Village, or because your mother's cousin runs Paramount Studios, you get hired to write a freelance episode of Two and a Half Men or you land a story editor job at My Name Is Earl. You've never written an episode of a sitcom in your life, but now you have to write one for real, and you have to write it today!
Are you going to be ready? Are you going to know what you're doing?
A friend of mine was plucked from a graduate playwriting program at a famous university and given a staff job on a sitcom in Los Angeles. TV producers or executives will do this occasionally. They want a fresh voice, so they'll hire a writer from a different medium and stick them on a sitcom. This award-winning playwright had never written a sitcom script in his life. I remember his first few weeks in the business. He didn't say much in the writers' room because he didn't have any experience with sitcom. The Show Runner got impatient with him. It wasn't his fault! The guy was a playwright, for Heaven's sake! Now, this person is very smart and very talented, and eventually had a successful career as a TV writer and producer. But he got off to a rocky start!
These days nobody can afford to get off to a rocky start. There are too many writers and not enough shows. You have to hit the ground running.
Sitcom staffs are not training grounds. No producer has time to teach you how to write for sitcom. He or she is too busy trying to keep the show on the air. So whether you have some professional experience or not, writing some spec sitcom scripts is worth your time. It provides you with the joy of knowing what you're doing!
ONE-TRICK PONY
When I was producing Coach for ABC, we hired two young neophytes based on a stupendous spec Cheers that they had written. Well, we found out later that they had been rewriting that Cheers for two years! We gave them two weeks to write their episode of Coach. The Coach script that they delivered was something less than stupendous. These guys were one-trick ponies. All they had in them was that one great Cheers. They never got another shot with us.
Writing a number of spec scripts for different sitcoms gives you the confidence and experience you'll need when your Lucky Break arrives. You won't be branded as a one-trick pony!
“WHAT ELSE HAVE YOU GOT?”
Let's say, just for argument, that you have written a fantastic spec episode of According to Jim. Let's also say that you already have an agent, Lance Lexus, at ICM. Let's say that Lance is so full of confidence in you that he places a call to the producer of the brand new NBC sitcom, Fly Me to the Moon. Lance sells his brains out hawking you to this producer. The producer says, “Okay. Send me over something to read.” And Lance says, “Great! She's got this fall-down-on-the-floor hilarious According to Jim that everyone here at ICM is just blowing their minds about and.” The producer cuts Lance off right there and says, “Nah. Don't send me a ‘Jim.' It's a good show, but I never watch it,” or “I've read a million of those already. What else have you got?”
If Lance gulps and says, “Well…um…nothing,” then the call is over and your opportunity is lost. Your Lucky Break is blown!
Many producers will want to read more than one spec script before they hire you. They don't want to get burned by a one-trick pony. Producers have different likes and dislikes. You never know which spec script is going to thrill them. The more choices you offer to a producer, the greater your chances of having your stuff read. Having your stuff read is the key to getting your Lucky Break!
When they ask, “What else have you got?” you say, “These five other great scripts right here!”
READY TO ROLL!
Compiling a portfolio of solid spec scripts gets you ready to roll! You've gathered experience and gained confidence from writing spec scripts for different types of sitcoms, and you have choices to offer when a producer asks, “What else have you got?”
My spec scripts got me my initial job in Hollywood. The first producer who hired me read more than one of my spec scripts before he gave me the job. My solid spec sitcom scripts also gave me a strong foundation of writing experience so that I could start contributing on the first day. I avoided a rocky start AND I knew what I was doing when it came time to write my first professional script. But guess what? Landing my first job wasn't the end of my spec scripts. My solid spec scripts also got me my second job, my third job, and my FOURTH job!
You know why?
CALLING CARDS THAT KEEP ON CALLING!
My first job as a sitcom writer was on a series that got cancelled very quickly. I was literally only there for a few weeks. Like most new sitcoms, this series didn't quite work. When we went on the air, the initial ratings were lousy, and the network pulled the plug after only eight episodes. In fact, this series got cancelled while we were actually shooting a show. I'd been in the business for less than three months, and already I was out of work!
I wrote only one script for that series. I was very lucky to get that one script. But was I going to be able to use that one script to get my second job? As it turned out, I wasn't. I was to discover that my very first professional script was worthless in terms of advancing my embryonic career. Producers on other shows weren't interested in reading it because the series had been cancelled so quickly. So to get me my second job, my newly acquired agent sent out my college spec scripts, the same ones that I used to get the first job.
It was those same solid spec scripts that got me my second job!
Then guess what?
The second job didn't last very long either. The producer who hired me for my second job had a huge fight with the executive producer and quit on my first day at work. I'm not kidding! I was working with this producer on a story idea on my first morning there. The producer walked into the executive producer's office to ask a question. The producer and the executive producer got into a huge argument that I could hear through the walls. After about ten minutes of yelling, the producer came back, cleaned out his desk and left. The now former producer was the guy who believed in me, and he was walking out the door before anyone had even given me an office or a desk. The production company shut the show down for a few days and brought in new producers. The new producers