The Good, the Bad and the Ugly or How Not to Listen to the Haters

by Rachel Miller on February 15, 2011

Our first Tom Sawyer Entertainment movie, HAPPYTHANKYOUMOREPLEASE, is coming out March 4th. We have been getting a lot of great response but there has also been some negative reviews and comments.

And sometimes reading these negative comments can really hurt — especially as many of them come from people who haven’t even seen the movie.

I’ve noticed that, with the advent of the comment section on online sites, every time there is an announcement it seems that the first responses are always from people who want the project to fail.

Now there are a lot of hateful people in the world.  There are people who are angry and bitter because their careers have never taken off.  And these people would rather take swipes at your project than work on their own. Or they are just angry people who like to be negative because they find negativity fun.

But you can’t listen to the haters. In fact, I know an actor who doesn’t read anything about herself (good or bad) because she doesn’t want to fall victim to what other people are saying about her.

You just have to believe in your material and your project — and trust the good responses will outweigh the bad.

Ignore the noise and focus on making your project great!

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What “Top Chef” and the Entertainment Industry Have in Common: Everything

by Rachel Miller on January 25, 2011

“Top Chef” is my favorite show currently on TV. The drama, the stakes, the personalities — everything comes together in this show to make for great TV. In fact, I don’t cook and yet I am obsessed with the show (which is a mark of just how good the show is).

Recently I realized that “Top Chef” has more in common with the entertainment industry than you would believe and thought this idea was worth sharing.

It’s a Marathon Not a Sprint

As “Top Chef” Contestant Richard Blais says: “Cooking is a marathon and (Marcel) put together a team of sprinters.” Or as my client told me once: “It took me 10 years to be an overnight sensation.”

The entertainment business, just like cooking, is a marathon and not a sprint. If you want to make it, you have to be committed for the long haul. You cannot just expect to sell your first project and become famous.

I Can’t See You in This Dish

Many of the contestants on “Top Chef” have gone home because the judges could not see the individual chef’s contribution in the dish.

This is the same with writing. No matter what project, genre or format you are working on, the reader should be able to see you in the project. Or what we like to say to our clients: “If we ripped off the cover page and sent it to an executive, they would still be able to know it is your writing because your originality shows through.”

Familiar with a Twist

The most common theme of contests who win a challenge on “Top Chef” is that they won because they took something familiar and put an unexpected twist on it. The most famous example is Carla’s peas (I still don’t know what she did to make them so magical).

And as with cooking, so as in entertainment, where people want something that they have seen before and are familiar with but with an expected twist. For example, the movie CLUELESS was an updated story of Jane Austen’s novel “Emma.” People were very familiar with the story but CLUELESS had a twist (i.e., a modern update).

The result was a box office bonanza and a character, Cher, who popped off the screen and into our zeitgeist.

A great dish is all about inspiration — and inspiration can come from anywhere. Whether you’re cooking or writing or acting or directing, be open to the world and to new experiences because you never know where or when the muse will hit you.

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Getting on the the Black List – Be Original!

by Rachel Miller on December 28, 2010

Recently, the 2010 Black List came out for best unproduced scripts of the year and, excitedly, a script of a client of ours is on the Black List. This is great news and we have gotten a lot of query responses as a result.

Since I have written about queries before, I thought I would talk generally about the future of entertainment and how this relates to queries.

Entertainment is drastically changing and no one really knows what is going to work. In fact, if you look at the movies that have failed to meet expectations just in the last weeks (“The Tourist,” “Morning Glory,” “Little Fockers,” “How Do You Know,” “Gulliver’s Travels), all these movies had huge stars but pretty unoriginal plots — and audiences didn’t want to go see these movies.

What is working are original, character-driven movies that tell great stories — “King’s Speech” being the latest example in the movie theaters and almost all the Black List nominees are very original ideas.

Thus, since no one knows anything — be creative and daring. Write original material that is fresh, exciting and has believable characters.

Don’t send me a query or a script about an idea that has been done over and over again (because I have read them all). Send me a query for a great, fresh idea.

This is the time to be original!

And for more information you can get my special report on writing a great script!

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What to Do When You Are in the Middle of Nowhere and Want to Break into the Entertainment Business

by Rachel Miller on December 10, 2010

A friend asked me to talk to a student at the University of Tennessee. The student was feeling outside of the entertainment Industry and wanted to know how she could break in or if she needed to transfer schools.

When I told her some ideas I realized that these same ideas apply to everyone — writer, director, actor, college student — who doesn’t live in NYC or LA. In other words, if you are a writer/director in Idaho, don’t feel like you are stuck — you can still get your script out there.

Here are my suggestions:

- Enter film contests: Everyone in Hollywood tracks the big film contests (for more info on contests click here). Even if you are a writer/director in Idaho, if you submit and place will, execs in Hollywood will reach out to you.

- Call your school’s alumni office: Every alumni office keeps track of alumni and where they are working/living. It doesn’t matter how many years ago you graduated college — if you call the alumni office, often you will be put in touch with alumni in the field in which you want to work.

- Contact your state/city film commission: Every state and also major cities have a film commission office. Since these commissions keep track of all the productions happening in their area of responsibility, these commissions will often put you in touch with productions shooting in the area. (You might have to volunteer for a day or two but that is a small price to pay to get into a shooting production.)

- Come to LA for the summer: Couch surf if you have to, but find a way to come to LA for an internship. If you are looking to find an internship when you are not in LA/NYC, all you have to do is do some research on the companies that you want to work at. Google these companies and see if you can submit your resume electronically (for most of them you can).

- Do a virtual internship: If you can’t go out to LA/NYC for a summer — think about a virtual internship. We have had several of these and almost always had a good experience. A virtual intern is someone who doesn’t work in the office but we will send him/her projects or scripts to read electronically. You can read and do the projects around your own schedule and you will still be in touch with producers in Hollywood.

The only issue with a virtual internship is that, since you are not in the office every day, you will really have to do a great job on the projects that are given to you. You cannot half-ass it and expect people to want to help you afterwards.

Just remember, even if you aren’t in Los Angeles or New York City — you can still break into the industry! Think outside the box and hustle!

For more on internships, see my special report here and, if you have other suggestions for how to think outside the box, post these in the comments below!

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How to Survive in This Hollywood Town: Be Prepared for Any Contingency

by Rachel Miller on December 3, 2010

I just got some news from an agent that has the potential to create some havoc on a project. But instead of panicking, the agent and I came up with a plan that we are immediately putting into action.

And this brings up a very good point if you want to succeed in this town:

You have to be prepared for anything to happen  — because anything can and will.

Your actor could drop out, the money could drop out, a tsunami could hit where you are supposed to be shooting, a volcano could erupt making it impossible to fly and get to set, a new head of a studio could come in and want to do a new slate of films, a competing project could come out at the same time, and the list goes on and on.

This is why that for everything you should have an A,B, and C plan so, if something does happen, you can be prepared for it.

And even if you are still in development and working on a project — what happens if a script very similar to yours goes out?

If you are prepared and have a plan, then you will not be thrown for a loop!

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