Why not ask them how they do it? Hey, successful screenwriter dude, what are your habits? What works for you? Enlighten me.

Why not screenwriting? Someone is doing it right-many are, in fact. Modeling what works is the philosophy at the heart of every master–apprentice craft. The difference between successful screenwriters and unsuccessful screenwriters is that successful screenwriters do all the things that unsuccessful ones want to do but can’t do or don’t know how to do. Winners have simply formed the habit of doing things losers don’t like to do. You can’t just be a fly-by-night hack, dreaming of the big score. In order to write a great script, you have to be a real screenwriter because, like an aged wine, it takes time and hard work to develop the necessary craft to write great scripts.

One hasn’t become a writer until one has distilled writing into a habit, and that habit has been forced into an obsession. (A spec script is a screenplay written without pay, on speculation that it will sell to a producer or get representation by an agent.) Aspiring screenwriters are willing to pay anything to get that magic key that will open the door to a spec sale that will instantly change their lives. There’s a multimillion-dollar business devoted entirely to giving outdated prescriptions, rules, and formulas to aspiring screenwriters-in an industry that frowns on formulas. But think about this: Everyone can recognize a funny joke, but can everyone create one that’s as funny and has never been told before? Sure, everyone goes to the movies and knows when they’re good or bad, and everyone has access to a computer with which to write their screenplay. It may sound harsh, but the sad truth is that more than half of the scripts currently making the rounds in Hollywood were written by writers who have no business being screenwriters. It’s the temperament of aspiring writers-their traits, skills, talents, and habits-that keeps them from writing great screenplays.

If you want something you’ve never had, you have to do something you’ve never done! Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.ĭespite the old adage attributed to William Goldman, Nobody knows anything, there’s one thing every studio executive knows for sure: It all starts with a great script.īut most scripts are terrible, mediocre, by the numbers, or almost good, which means that in order to feed the industry’s ravenous appetite, executives are desperately looking for great material.

Silver Dollar by Alan Trustman