Have you ever considered giving yourself script coverage? Have you ever considered reading your own script and providing script coverage for it? Lo, and yea, and verily, the benefits can be massive, not just for the script itself, but for a screenwriter’s long-term ability to distance herself from her own work.
Sitting down to do your screenplay rewrite? Awesome! Do you have some notes to go on? No? Alas, script notes are valuable, right? Getting anybody to read your spec script is often a bit of a challenge, but trying to get script notes on it can be twice as hard. Folks like me and my team … Read more
Telling a screenwriter that his script needs work isn’t easy. There are three immutable laws that govern screenwriting writ large: 1) Everybody has a script 2) Everybody is a critic 3) Some screenwriters aren’t quite good at handling honest feedback As screenwriters, we’ve all done “friend reads,” right? Me, despite doing script notes for a … Read more
Ah, your screenplay is finished. That “Save as PDF” command is just dying for you to click it. Getting your script out there is you’ve been working years toward. It’s that final moment when you can say “I’m finished with this screenplay. Time to move on to the next one.” But how do you know when … Read more
A screenwriter’s ego can be her greatest asset or her greatest liability. But are most screenwriters thinking about their screenplay, and how it will entertain an audience, or how it will provide jobs for hundreds of film industry folks, or how it will make money for the studio, or how it will leave a mark … Read more
A great script reader requires five elemental traits: A Script Reader Must Have The Eyes and Ears of a Filmmaker First and foremost, the great script reader must be highly adept in the language of cinema. And not only on the written page, but in all aspects of production, post-production, pre-production, and everything in between. … Read more
How you react to critical feedback on your script defines you as a screenwriter. It’s that simple. To be fair, there is such a thing as good critical feedback and such a thing as bad critical feedback, but a smart screenwriter will be ready to use either variety of feedback to their advantage. My company … Read more
Are your screenplay pages too long? Sure, you’re a good screenwriter, but are your script’s scenes filled with too much description? Does your dialogue take forever to slog through? Are you simply using too many words? It happens to the best of us! Take my easy five-question screenwriter quiz to see if your script pages … Read more
With every script that comes in and piles up here at Screenplay Readers, I can’t help but wonder how many new screenwriters know how stacked the deck is against them. And I also wonder how many of them know how essential it is to know that in order to get a script sold and represented. … Read more
If you’ve written a script, open up your script right now and turn to any page in the script. Read the scene. Then answer these questions below. Run every scene of your screenplay through these five questions, systematically, to find out if it can be improved: 1) Is the scene even necessary? If yes, go … Read more
I’ve been reading scripts and providing coverage for over a decade now, and I’ve seen a few screenwriters come and go without really maximizing their script coverage experience. So I thought I’d share a few quick tips. If you opt for paid script coverage from a service like mine, Screenplay Readers, here are few ways you … Read more