SCREENWRITING EXPO

At top, Leigh Whannell (“Saw”), below, from left, Oliver Stone,
Shane Salerno, Stuart Gordon and David Ayer

OCTOBER 19-22
Los Angeles
The Mariott LAX and The Renaissance Mountura LAX

EXPO 5 PREVIEW

A screenplay can be seen as more than just a blueprint for a film. It’s more like the framework. Take it away and the whole thing collapses. When dealing with lower budgets there’s no big name celebrities or million-dollar special effects to distract viewers, so the framework needs to be even sturdier. With that in mind each and ever script should be its possible best long before cameras begin rolling. The good news is writing is just like anything else. If you suck at it now, you can improve and grow into a decent scribe. In order to get better though, you have to put in work and continuously try to make improvements. Part of that entails exposing yourself to available knowledge, being open to new ideas and putting yourself out there to be judged. So where do filmmakers go to do such a thing? The Screenwriting Expo.

From the beginner full of great movie ideas who has trouble starting, to the writer that’s never sold despite a number of solid scripts and the independent filmmaker who simply wants to improve his craft, the Expo is designed to help. Sponsored by Creative Screenwriting, the magazine called the best on the subject by the L.A. Times, the Expo is now in its fifth year and will be a four-day event in Los Angeles this October. It seems promising to be bigger and better than ever with over 300 seminars, workshops and panel discussions.

Having attended the Screenwriting Expo two years ago, I fully endorse it and think it is a wonderful event for those involved in filmmaking in anyway. You can learn so much more from events like this than you can from any book you will ever read. The whole thing is also a hell of a lot of fun from a movie geek perspective as well. The Expo offers classes taught by industry professionals and critically acclaimed film school professors, along with top notch guest speakers and informative panel discussions.

William Goldman

In 2004, a couple of the highlighted speakers I got a chance to hear were “the master” William Goldman and the man Detour Magazine voted one of “Hollywood’s true shapers of pop culture” Shane Salerno. For those that don’t know their names, Goldman has had 29 screenplays produced including “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid,” “Marathon Man,” “Misery,” “All the President’s Men,” the original “The Stepford Wives” and “The Princess Bride.” Author of “Adventures in the Screen Trade,” Goldman also has won numerous awards, including two Oscars. Salerno, 32, is one of the hottest young writers working, having written or co-written “Armageddon,” “Shaft,” “Alien vs. Predator” and “Ghost Rider.” He’s been involved with four #1 films in the past seven years and the average domestic gross of his action-adventure scripts is $117,394,118 a movie according to ShowbizData.com. Just being in the same room with either of these guys makes you feel like some good is rubbing off. Both speakers will be back at the Expo this year. As a guest of honor, Goldman will make two appearances October 22 at 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. Salerno will be a featured speaker October 19. One of the things I really enjoy in hearing them speak is they both admit they bust their ass, but they also feel they’ve been extremely lucky. They’ve even gone as far as saying breaking into the industry today is a lot harder when they both did it as an estimated 70,000 screenplays are currently written each year. But as it has always been said, the cream of the crop rises to the top.

“I just hope these people stay persistent because sometimes it’s six or eight scripts before they have that great script,” Salerno told Filmmakers.com at Expo 3. “All the people they admire went through these things and had adversity. Oliver Stone wrote 10 scripts before he wrote ‘Platoon’ which got him all of his first jobs which got him ‘Midnight Express’ and then he waited 10 years to get ‘Platoon’ made.”

Speaking of Oliver Stone, the “Natural Born Killers” director will be probably the most anticipated guest of honor this year. The three-time Oscar winner will appear October 20th at 6 p.m. Other speakers and teachers include Ed Solomon (“Levity”), Chris Gore (Film Threat), David Ayer (“Training Day”), Ron Shusett (“Alien”), Pixar’s Andrew Stanton (“Finding Nemo”) and Brad Bird (“The Incredibles”).

Panels this year will include “Independent Financing and Distribution,” “The Craft of Horror,” “Writing the Low Budget Independent Film,” “Writing and Producing the Creative Documentary” and discussions on “Latino,” “Teen” and “Urban” markets and a slew of other things.

One of the new things that should be pretty cool are the addition of “master classes.” These include “Writing the Hollywood Screenplay,” “Writing the Masterpiece,” Selling the Hollywood Screenplay,” “Directing Your Screenplay,” “Producing Your Screenplay” “Writing the Comedy Screenplay” and “Writing Televison.” The one I’m most looking forward to is “Writing the Horror Screenplay.” It will feature classes taught by the likes of John Fasano (“Darkness Falls”), Stuart Gordon (“Re-Animator”), super genre fans Stephen Susco (“The Grudge”) and Leigh Whannell (“Saw”). Yes, Adam of “Saw” will be unchained along with Susco, who I also saw at Expo 3 and recommend, discussing “The Future of Horror” with other special guests to be determined. What sucks about this session, however, is Stone will be speaking at the same time.

Regular registration for the event is $74.95. That gets you access Oct. 20-22 to all the panels, the guest of honors, entry to a trade show offering discounts of at least 10 percent on every product and a one-year subscription to Creative Screenwriting. The seminars cost an extra $4 each. New this year is a gold pass that includes priority registration for all events, including seminars, as well as guest of honor luncheons ($30) and networking parties ($15). The Expo’s opening day Oct. 19 is a special gold pass event. Besides Salerno’s appearance, WGA west president Patrick Verrone will be the keynote speaker.

For those uninterested in the educational aspect, there’s the networking side. There will be over 1,500 agents, managers, development executives and their assistants in attendance. Got an idea for a movie that’s never been done? Sixty production companies and studio executives will be on hand to hear pitches. For $25 you get yourself five minutes to pimp that concept to one company. For those that are really full of it, buy five pitches for $100. Is it money well spent? Well you never know. Just keep in mind, big time talker Joe Eszterhas once got a million dollars for a little movie called “Showgirls.”

Work good under pressure? Enter the “Creative Screenwriting Open Tournament.” The live writing competition will feature up to 1,000 writers from across the country and is a three-day contest. It’s $8 to enter and works like this, in round one you have 90 minutes to write a two-to-three page scene based on specific guidelines. The top ten percent of the writers from that round will then advance to round two. The next day, new guidelines have the writers at work on another scene. The top ten advance to the final round and write a four-to-five page scene which includes at least one lengthy monologue. The judges will select the best three scenes from those for a playoff with actors performing them at the closing ceremonies on October 22 at 4 p.m. The audience will make the final vote. A grand prize winner will be awarded $5,000, attendance to the Action/Cult Filmmaking Seminar and consideration for representation by agent David Freedman.

Already have a polished script? The Expo 5 Screenwriting Competition offers $100,000 in total cash and prizes, with a $20,000 grand prize and four genre awards of $2,500. Dabel Brothers Production - Ernst, Les, Pascal, and David – will also be turning one of the competition’s scripts into a comic book miniseries/graphic novel with a budget of over $50,000. The short screenplay contest offers a $1,000 top prize and the production of two scripts. Onwaecan Productions is committing a $11,000 budget to produce one of the shorts. Get moving on these entries as the “last minute” deadline is August 7 with a $55 entry for features and a $25 fee for shorts.

With that number of screenplays written every year why are there so many crummy movies made? The simple fact is a lot of the scripts suck. Have no fear the Expo can help. Wouldn’t it have been nice if Jenny McCarthy, who won a Razzie for her screenplay “Dirty Love,” had attended the year before and picked up a few pointers on tightening up her script? Of course there are also a number of potential masterpieces being penned as well, but only 2,100 of the screenplays written annually get any attention from Hollywood. The Expo can help here as well. You can either sneak in the back door, drop your script on some executives desk, hope he doesn’t kick it straight into his stack of recycles and then call the police to file a restraining order or simply attend Screenwriting Expo 5 and do your stalking in a more legal fashion.

- CCF, July 2006