August 28, 2009: Think Like An Agent's Asst.
Here’s a valuable exercise for all aspiring screenwriters. Make pretend you’re an agent’s assistant. Give yourself a homework assignment of reading 30 scripts one weekend. Find 30 unproduced feature scripts either online or any way you can and task yourself with going through all of them. Then do the same thing the following weekend. And the weekend after.



 Not so excited about reading ninety scripts in three weekends? Neither are the agents’ assistants. The good news is that you don’t have to read them in their entirety. If you get to page 10 and the script stinks, doesn’t feel like something that would sell or the writing doesn’t appeal to you, just put it aside and move on to the next. But be sure to take note of why the script doesn’t appeal to you. And when you get to a script that does engage you, figure out why. Pay attention to the scripts you get excited to read and the ones you dread starting. Maybe it’s the title or title page. Maybe it’s the genre or heavy blocks of description. Whatever it is, just be cognizant of it. The agents’ assistants surely feel the same way.



You’ll start to get a sense of what’s appealing to agents and their assistants and what isn’t. Their time, just like yours, is valuable. If you’ve got 90 scripts to get through (and more are on their way) and the script doesn’t grab you by page 10 (or sooner), you’re gonna move on to the next. And so will assistants, agents, managers and producers. This is why the first few pages of a screenplay are so important. There’s just too many screenplays to get through.



This really can be a valuable exercise, but you have to actually do it. You have to get through those 30 scripts a weekend. If you start to see the reading process through an assistant’s eyes it will definitely inform your writing and submission process. Good luck getting through your first 30 scripts!