The Anthology of Codology kevinlehane.com

This post is for all my disparate and desperate writers out there.

Last year I went to Hollywood, West Hollywood to be exact and for as long as my visa would let me I worked at some big name production companies. I was there during the writers strike and I hope to get back there again. However, since this is a community all about sharing I thought I’d share what I learned.

You can make it.

The quality of writing in Hollywood is no better than what you’re working on now. I can say that, as I know that you cannot possible produce anything as bad as what I was forced to read day in, day out, as officially sanctioned submissions from agents. Seriously, I used to believe that writers were regularly screwed by idiot studio execs and producers, but it’s not the case. If you had to work with what most writers give you, you’d try and improve it too . . . but no one can. Crap+1 is still crap.

That’s the good news.

The bad news is you never will make it. Not unless you know people in the business.

Sending your scripts off to productions companies is a waste of time, as is sending them off to agents. It’s impossible to break-in without connections, and you cannot accumulate any connections without having some favours you can call upon. You earn those favours by working your ass off as anything but a writer.

Ultimately, if you do not know anyone in the business you have to leave where ever you are now and move closer to where stuff is happening — be it Dublin, London, Toronto, Sydney, NY or LA — and get a job as a reader or assistant at some prodco or agency. These jobs are not impossible to get, but they are essential. They’ll be paying you barely enough to survive on, (in LA it was $6 an hour, with gurranteed unpaid overtime) but it’s the only surefire way to get yourself seriously considered by those who produce scripts.

Hollywood is a very small community. Everyone knows everyone else. Thus, people are very paranoid about what they can and will say and it’s hard to grab a foothold and make friends, real friends. But it’s a town built on referrals. This system is adopted by every major filmmaking community around the world, and it works. Not well. But somehow it just about works.

I always believed good writers get found, but no one is looking for good writers — no matter what you hear. The system is designed to block out any and all without a recommendation to support them. Getting a job earns you that recommendation and no matter how good you are on the page, you will never turn pro without getting read.

You have to get connected.

I hope this is good news to some, and motivation to others, but know that you have what it takes to become a professional writer — you just need who it takes. And you can make that happen too. So don’t give up.

Also, Hollywood is a fantastic community to work in, but it’s not the be-all and end-all of things. It’s overrated.