Perhaps most important, what if you don’t even have 60 seconds, and you have to pitch your story in an instant?
With some modification, the process I’ve outlined will apply to all these situations.
The 10-Second Pitch
As soon as you begin telling people that you’ve written a book or screenplay, the question you’ll get over and over is, “What’s it about?”
If you hear these words sitting across from a buyer, you know it’s an invitation to begin your pitch. But if you’re at a party, or if you meet an agent in the hotel lobby at a writers conference, or in almost any situation not specifically designed for pitching, the person asking doesn’t want a sales pitch, and he doesn’t want to listen for a full minute or more while you try to persuade him to read your story. He doesn’t want you to persuade him to do anything. He’s just curious and polite.
This doesn’t mean you don’t want to be prepared with the most powerful description of your story possible. A great 10-second “pitch” will pique people’s interest, will often get them asking questions, and might sometimes get your story read.
So as soon as your story is ready to talk about, spend time preparing this short description so it’s as emotionally compelling as possible.
Begin with the same list of ten key story elements, then pare it down to the three or four most powerful. In most cases, this means focusing on Hero, Desire and Conflict, plus the one additional element that makes the story unique.
Let’s say you were writing the screenplay Kingdom of Heaven. You might say, “Well, I’ve always loved the stories of the Crusades. So I’m writing about a single young knight who saves an entire city during a huge battle between the Christian and Muslim armies.”
Obviously — at least I hope it’s obvious by now — this would not be a good pitch. It doesn’t pull us into the story, or tell us enough about the hero, or mention the love story, or even reveal which side he’s on.
But if you only have ten seconds or so, it has enough conflict and emotion to stimulate further discussion if the person you’re addressing is interested. It reveals the basic setting, the hero, his visible desire and the major conflict. And the opening adds one other element — your passion for the story (or at least for the historical backdrop).
If you were the author or screenwriter of Brokeback Mountain and someone said “What are you writing?” you might answer, “Actually, it’s a classic, tragic love story set in the early sixties, about two people who meet in the harsh Wyoming wilderness and want nothing more than to be together, but who can’t, because they’re both men.”
This single sentence does nothing to convey the power, or complexity, or passion of the novella or the screenplay or the film. But by beginning with the setup, genre, heroes and desire, this short pitch at least creates expectations that are shattered when the conflict is revealed, and this surprise will stimulate interest in the specific elements of the story.
Here are some additional principles and suggestions for preparing a 10-second pitch:
Don’t reveal your story until you’re ready. Your stories are your creations, and an idea revealed too soon is like a child taken from the womb prematurely. It isn’t strong enough to withstand the harsh elements of the outside world. If you are in the early stages of formulating your story (unless you’re working with a consultant, or in a class designed specifically to help you develop it), keep it to yourself.
If someone asks you what you’re working on, be vague: “I’ve got a lot of ideas right now and I haven’t picked one yet”or “I’m just getting started and I’m not really ready to talk about it.” If you prefer, just make up some idea you never plan to write, or tell people you’re still working on your last script, which you actually finished a month before. Otherwise they might offer suggestions or criticism which will overwhelm or depress you.
A 10-second pitch is not a log line. Though they obviously have much in common — brevity, hero, desire, conflict — a pitch is verbal, and should be more casual, and presented with more passion and emotion. A log line might read, “The lives of a dozen strangers all intertwine — sometimes violently and sometimes courageously — against a backdrop of crime and racism in Los Angeles.” But if you asked Paul Haggis and Bobby Moresco what their screenplay Crash was about, and they answered with that sentence, you’d think they were robots — or that they were reading their log line.
Empty lead-ins are okay. It’s pretty awkward to jump right into your prepared pitch without sounding like you just pulled it out of a can. That’s why the two short pitches above began, “Well, I’ve always …” and “Actually, it’s. … You need some meaningless segue to maintain the sense that this is a conversation, not a speech.
“What if?“ can be just as powerful as in a full pitch. Revealing how you came up with an idea can be an effective lead-in even when you’ve only got ten seconds. Suppose you’d written The 40-Year Old Virgin. When asked about your new script, you might answer, “You know how there have been a bunch of comedies like American Pie or Fast Times at Ridgemont High, about high school kids losing their virginity? Well, what if the virgin was a 40-year old man?”
Pitch Meetings
At the other end of the pitching spectrum is the full pitch meeting, which is at least 15 minutes long, and can sometimes last an hour or more (not because you came in with a one-hour pitch, but because of your interaction with the buyers).
As I said in the introduction, this book doesn’t focus on pitch meetings; there are several other books on the market that go into great detail about what to do when you have so much time with a buyer. And pitch meetings rarely occur in the book world — your proposal will speak for itself. But if you’re a screenwriter, I do have some thoughts and suggestions about applying the principles of the 60-second pitch to its longer counterpart.
Use the 10 key elements to prepare your long pitch. No matter how long your presentation, you want to focus on the most emotional elements of your story. And with the time afforded you in a pitch meeting, you should be able to incorporate all ten items on the list in Chapter 1 (with the possible exception of character arc and deeper issues, if those don’t apply).
Open with your short pitch. Just as at a conference or on the telephone, the 60-second pitch can access your passion, draw the buyer into the story and leave her wanting more, which you will then provide in the full pitch.
Opening with a one-minute pitch also gives the buyer a clear idea of exactly what she’s about to hear, so she doesn’t spend half the meeting trying to figure out the genre, or where the story is headed. And a short pitch doesn’t give away the ending, so she’ll still be anticipating how the story might turn out.
Sometimes when you begin this way, a buyer will say, “Oh, I didn’t realize this was a heist movie. We already have two of those in development, and I’m afraid we won’t be interested, no matter how good the story is.” Having your carefully prepared, 45-minute pitch shut down after two minutes might sound horribly depressing. But wouldn’t you prefer to find out right away — rather than after you’ve been there an hour — that the entire meeting is pointless?
And of course, a meeting is never really pointless — you can still establish rapport and impress buyers with your passion and professionalism, which will make them eager to hear your next project.
Announce your progress. Unlike a telephone pitch, in a pitch meeting you are trying to tell your story, with enough details and beats to show that the concept is thoroughly developed. But because this makes your pitch so long, you want to announce the key turning points when you reach them, so the buyer will know just how far into the story you’ve gone, and how much is left. Phrases like “At the end of Act 1…” or “Right at the midpoint of the movie…” are welcome.
When I worked in development, I once sat through a pitch that seemed endless. Finally, when the writer got to what I thought must be the climax, he announced, “And then at page 10. …” Not a successful meeting, I’m afraid.
Don’t try to tell your whole story. I know that a pitch meeting is designed to reveal the full story for your screenplay, but that doesn’t mean you talk about every scene. Brevity is always valued in Hollywood, and hitting the major beats of story and character is far more important than describing every single scene.
A buyer wants to know that you’ve worked everything out in a compelling way, that the story is commercial and that the character arcs, themes and emotions will come through clearly. If he wants to hear all the dialogue and experience all the action and characters, he’ll wait and read the screenplay.
Pitching Episodic Television
I’m a little reluctant to talk about this, because if you’re trying to launch your career as a TV writer, you won’t do it by creating an original sitcom or one-hour series. With very rare exceptions, the episodic series that make it to the screen are created by well established producers — screenwriters who have worked their way up the ladder from spec writer to assignment writer to staff writer to producer to executive producer, and even to show runner. So unless you’ve made that journey, I strongly suggest — and so does every other agent or TV writer I’ve ever encountered — that you keep writing sample episodes of current, successful series, until you actually get paid to write one.
In spite of the fact that this advice is given again and again and again, writers keep thinking they’re the exceptions. And maybe you are. Maybe you have a published novel that’s been successful, and they’re letting you pitch the series as a means of acquiring the rights. Maybe you have a friend who is established, and has said he’ll partner up with you if you come up with a good idea. Maybe somebody’s even come along who just says, “I don’t care if you’ve got a track record. If it’s a good story, I’m interested.”
If so, be sure your material is well protected, and be aware they may just want to buy the idea from you, leaving you with very little cash, and no credit at all. If you still want to take your shot, use all the same pitching principles I’ve outlined, modified to meet the needs of a series.
In episodic series, what’s most important is that:
The arena is enticing. It can be a law firm, a crime scene unit, a dysfunctional family, an office, an apartment building, a neighborhood, a mysterious island or a town after an alien invasion. But it must be intriguing or inviting in some way, and it must present lots of opportunities for conflict.
The characters are compelling. The people who populate your story must be interesting, empathetic and varied enough that audiences will want to see them week after week.
The conflict is emotionally involving. The obstacles the characters face must be great enough that it will be possible to come up with a hundred episodes if the show’s a success.
When hearing an idea for a new television series, buyers want to know exactly where it will fit on the TV schedule: which network; which time slot; which demographic. So use successful antecedents. If there’s anything resembling a clone factory in Hollywood, it’s the world of episodic television. (Or is it just a coincidence that when CSI: Crime Scene Investigation premiered, it was the only show on television portraying forensic science — or reenacting crimes in flashback as evidence was found — and two seasons later there were about 85 shows doing the same thing?)
Follow your overall description of the series with a pitch of the pilot: the episode that will establish empathy with the characters and reveal how they got into the situation they’ll remain in for the rest of time.
Focus on the central character of the series in your pilot, even if eventually all the main characters will be heroes of some of the episodes. And make sure your pitch reveals the characters’ inner conflicts and the deeper themes the show will explore.
Series characters don’t have arcs the way novel and movie characters do, because their flaws and weaknesses will recur in different ways week after week.
For ten years, every episode of Friends touched on the same theme: the struggle to move from dependence on family and friends to self-reliance and responsibility. Repeatedly the series got humor and emotion out of Monica’s competitiveness and obsession with neatness, or Chandler’s low self esteem and defensive humor, or Joey’s womanizing and level of intelligence.
And no matter what drove a particular story line of The West Wing, every episode portrayed the conflict between idealism and political pragmatism — in addition to whatever inner conflicts each character consistently revealed. These are the kinds of qualities you must convey when you pitch a series concept.
If you are making your way up the episodic television ladder, it’s far more likely that you’ll be invited to pitch an episode for an existing series. This opportunity arises after the staff writers and producers of a series have seen one or two of your sample episodic scripts — usually for competing shows — and they like your writing enough to want to meet with you.
This is a pitch meeting, not a 60-second pitch, since no producer would ever listen to ideas for an existing show over the phone or at a pitch fest. But again, many of the same principles apply, with modification.
When pitching an episode, you don’t need to introduce, or create empathy for, the hero, since the audience already knows that character. Just don’t come up with an episode where an outside character enters the regular characters’ lives and then drives the story. TV series are always about the stars.
Focus on one or more of the regular characters’ desires and conflicts. These will be different each week, and getting the job depends a great deal on how original and funny — or dramatic — your idea is. Before you develop the idea, go to www.tv.com to see descriptions of every previous episode in the show’s history. Then create one that hasn’t been done before.
Whatever the hero’s goal in your pitch, it must be consistent with the character that has already been established, and should grow out of traits and flaws we’re already familiar with. Over the course of a series, things do change: characters die, get married, get their own spin-offs. But don’t let life-changing events occur to the regular characters in your episode. The buyer wants to know that you understand the rules of the series, and will maintain the status quo.
Some story elements, like the setup and the antecedents, won’t apply to a TV series pitch. But you still want to establish rapport with the buyers, and you’ll still convey your passion, both for the series and for your original episode.
Pitching Everything Else
What if you want to make a deal for a reality show, or a game show, or a talk show, or a documentary, or a nonfiction book, or a self-help book, or a music video, or a grand opera, or a school play? It really doesn’t matter — everything’s built on story. Just use the process I’ve outlined as a jumping off point, then modify it to convey the emotional power of your project.
If it’s a documentary or nonfiction book, focus on the individuals who will be at the center of the story. I bet even Michael Moore would agree that much of the power of Fahrenheit 911 came from his portrayal of a conservative, patriotic mother whose son died in battle, and how the tragedy shifted her consciousness. If you were pitching that project, it’s the kind of detail you’d want to include along with all the larger political and moral issues the film raises.
The same holds true if it’s a historical book or documentary. Obviously biographies require you to pitch those elements of the subjects’ lives that make them empathetic and convey their greatest conflicts and highest achievements. But even the most sweeping, far-reaching historical subjects rely on individual stories. If you can personalize the grandness of your book or film in this way, your pitch will be stronger, and the likelihood of a deal much greater.
Imagine beginning your pitch like this: “As you probably know, the greatest loss of American life in battle wasn’t Iraq, or Vietnam, or even World War II; it was the Civil War. But in the midst of one of the bloodiest battles of that horrific conflict, a young officer who knew he would probably die the next day created one of the most be
autiful love letters ever written. After another battle, a Confederate woman whose husband was away at war turned her plantation into a hospital, and saved the lives of more than eight hundred men. I want to do a 14-hour television documentary that reveals 50 more unheard stories like these, along with all the political, social and historical forces that led to one of the defining events in our nation’s history.”
I’m sure Ken Burns had a better pitch than that when he raised financing for The Civil War. He may not have had to pitch it at all — I mean, he is Ken Burns. But it’s not hard to imagine that a pitch like that would pique a buyer’s interest, and make her ask for more.
Even if your documentary doesn’t have a human being in sight — if it’s a nature film like March of the Penguins — you can still anthropomorphize your subjects enough to give a sense of the conflicts they face, and the connection to them we will feel. The essential principles of story remain the same.
And if your book is an instructional or self-help book, get the manuscript or proposal read by focusing on the people it will benefit, rather than the specific steps it outlines to achieve wealth, or health, or happiness, or beauty, or a perfect golf swing. Every instructional book ever written was created to solve a problem: lack of knowledge; lack of skill; a need for inspiration; a desire to have something more. But problems mean conflict, and conflict elicits emotion, and emotion creates connection, and connection means sales.
Selling Your Story in 60 Seconds Page 12