Have you ever cold called an actual movie star’s agent? I have.
I was thinking the other day, about my SP. I have the entire movie playing out in my claustrophobic closet of a head, over and over and over. I could make the BEST MOVIE, if I was in charge of everything. I can pick the actors, the directors, the costume designers (okay, my aunt is a costume designer), my manager (Uncle Dan are you listening?), everybody. But… alas, I’m not in charge of everything.
So, next best thing… start moving the Universe in my direction. Hey! Why NOT!? I cold called this certain 12-year-old actresses agent. Conversation went something like this…
“Hi, I’m Susanne Sanstra and I’m new to Screenwriting. I just finished my first movie and your client would be PERFECT for the lead role.”
“Samantha, did you say?”
“Susanne.”
“Lady, this isn’t the way things are done.”
Laughing, “I’m sure of that. Look, I just wanted to tell you, that it’s posted on Inktip.com”
“Do you have financing for this movie?”
“No.”
“Well that’s what you need first.”
“I just thought you could look at the logline, if you’re interested, the script is posted there too.”
“Its against the law for us to accept unsolicited manuscripts.”
"I KNOW!” laughing again… “that’s why I posted it to Inktip. Have you ever heard of Inktip?”
“No, me personally, no.”
“Well, it’s a place for new writers, like myself, to post our work. Then you can look at it without any liability.”
"You signed a waiver?”
"YES!”
“Okay, well like I said, we really don’t get involved until you at least have financing.”
“Right, so you can’t look at the logline at least?”
“No. Sorry.”
Too cheerfully, “Okay, well thanks so much for your time.”
Hang up the phone… “WELL SHIT!”
That didn’t work out so well. So the next time, I decided to send a very well worded email to the next agent, asking them to check out Inktip. They responded in a couple of minutes…
“Thanks, we’ll take a look and let you know.”
That may have been the easiest way to blow me off by Blackberry, but hey, it’s better than just, NO!
I will not surrender!! Look the only one that's going to make something happen, is me. So the agents, producers and managers may laugh over the “crazy drunk mom” that cold called them, but I don’t care. All I need is one.
1 comment:
Cold calling is never fun IMHO, but a better choice might have been to pitch your logline upfront instead of yourself.
Post a Comment