Producing : Producers, would you take on this project? by Aleksandr Rozhnov

As a producer in my own mind - the concept sounds excellent. Have you run the numbers?

Honestly, I haven’t calculated the budget down to the last cent, as that’s not my expertise. However, overall, I believe it will be relatively low, because this is a small-scale, intimate series, with the main action taking place in a courtroom. Essentially, it’s mostly one location, so it won’t require a large budget.

You know, budgets should be calculated by financiers. My job as a screenwriter is to write a story that as many viewers as possible would watch and enjoy. That’s all I focus on. I believe this kind of series would attract a large audience because it’s genuinely interesting. There are fictional court cases that probably would never happen in real life, but this lawyer handles them. People will simply be curious to see how the trial ends and what decision he makes. I think that would be very engaging. A little later, I want to fully develop this project, including the pilot episode.

I apologize, for some reason it says I don’t have access, probably because I’m not in your region. Could you just tell me in words what he wrote and what he thinks about the series? Just do it on your side, and I can simply copy the feedback and paste it. Please do this. Thank you for reviewing!

Claude doesn't seem to be up to date on what streamers and other producers pay, or don't pay, and how, at this time.

Tom is claude writing scripts for you?

Well, first of all, no one is writing scripts for me — I write my own scripts.

As for everything that has been said, here’s my take. I will begin working on this project only after I finish my current series, Swallowed. Once that’s completed, I’ll move on to this one.

There are a lot of questions here. For example, the AI suggests seven seasons with ten episodes each — that’s seventy episodes. I don’t want the show to eventually slip into complete absurdity, because finding seventy compelling, unusual, and still believable cases is extremely difficult. Possible — but difficult.

I also don’t fully agree with the budget estimates. The AI suggests several million dollars for a single location. In my opinion, that’s excessive.

So yes, artificial intelligence is helpful, but ultimately decisions should be made by a human, not by AI.

Still, thank you very much for your feedback. It was genuinely useful and reinforced my belief that I will write this project — just a little later.

Thanks again, everyone.

Tom is at the forefront of this new tech.

You know, I’d like to share a bit of my situation.

I have serious problems with my eyes — I’ve had retinal detachments — and I can’t look at a screen or read letters anymore. So I’ve adapted my writing process. I dictate my scripts to GPT-chat exactly as I think them. I always ask it: “write it word for word, don’t add anything.” And it does — mistakes included. After that, I find someone who can read it back to me, and I edit by ear.

I’ve also tried another way: giving GPT ideas and asking it to write the script. And honestly, it produced absolute nonsense. I truly believe only a human can feel where a script needs quiet, where it needs action, where comedy should shift to drama, and where the emotional heartbeat of the story lies. No artificial intelligence can genuinely feel that.

Yes, AI can polish some rough edges — but only on the technical side. Creating a story that resonates with viewers, that carries emotional depth and real human insight — that’s something AI simply cannot do, and probably won’t be able to. Because storytelling doesn’t come only from the brain; it comes from the heart. And AI doesn’t have one.

By the way, Tom, I have a logline for the series SWALLOWED in my “Loglines” section. Would it be possible for you and Cloud to do the same kind of review?

I’d really like to know whether a series like this could fit the American market or the streaming platforms. If you could simply tell me, in your own words, whether it works or not, it would help me a lot.

If you can do that, I’d really appreciate it. Thank you.

By the way, about dialogue. I also believe that artificial intelligence is not capable of truly replicating a human being. AI invents dialogue, but it does not hear it.

I write the way Quentin Tarantino describes his process — I simply record my characters. They speak for themselves. I just follow them and write down what they say. This is something AI cannot do.

It can imitate patterns, assemble phrases, and try to sound “natural,” but it can’t capture the real energy or spontaneous rhythm of a living person. True dialogue comes from intuition, emotion, and the inner lives of the characters. That’s something only a human writer can feel, and I don’t think any AI will ever fully understand it.

Thank you so much, this has given me hope. I’m currently working on the pilot for this series, and I want to make it really amazing and promote it further. Thank you very much.

TOM SCHAEFER For one thing, Tom the negative pickup and advance on MG, which your ai seems to think is a thing, is no longer. Negative pickups generally haven't been around for two decades. Advances on MGs are not a thing for indie film for several years and MGs themselves are drying up. All those together no longer cover full production costs for many, if not most, independent productions. If you are budgeting a studio production, it's not only inaccurate, it's irrelevant. As far as everything else... only in Claude's world can you design, pitch and sell a series at this scale. So IMO Claude has never made a film or worked as a producer in the real world, and doesn't seem to have training data from real producers.

You know, Claude has one great feature — he gives hope. I will finish the pilot and start promoting the series. Will I be able to promote it? Or not? I don’t know. If I can, you will find out. If I can’t, it means I made mistakes that Claude didn’t account for, and he can be taught what isn’t right here, here, and here. That’s all. But still, thank you very much.

Aleksandr Rozhnov You should have hope. But you should also, IMO, not be encouraged to put your emotions and efforts into things that distract you from your task, which is, as you said, finishing the pilot. You should be encouraged to take concrete, positive steps which can yield results - so that you don't crash and burn. Making your vision into reality is not about fantasy numbers, it's about taking realistic steps that you can take today and be proud of. Your next task AFTER completing the script, in the real world, which would actually do you and your project good, would be to identify specific studios and producers who might be interested in your work. Or decide at that point to produce it and get it to an audience yourself. I encourage you to do either.

Thank you very much, of course, but both options have their pitfalls. I don’t know which producers might be specifically interested in this kind of project. That’s why, yes, I will be looking for producers who are at least somehow connected to streaming platforms or major studios, but I don’t personally know such people.

And producing the project myself, considering there’s computer graphics involved, would cost a lot of money, which I practically don’t have, so I won’t be able to do it on my own.

The only thing I can really focus on right now is the pilot and make it as high-quality as possible. I already have the synopsis, treatment, and character bible ready. I will also create a pitch deck and start looking for investors who might be interested in this project. That’s all I can do.

But even if I make mistakes in promoting it or stumble somewhere, it won’t upset me much, because I’m a screenwriter first and I love writing stories. Maybe I’ll find someone who wants to help me promote my stories — meaning I’ll write, and they’ll handle the selling. We’ll see, but something will definitely work out. I believe in that.

"Eat the meat and spit out the bones" ...

TOM SCHAEFER My comment was to Aleksandr and he certainly seemed to understand it. But to be clear, budgets, projections, etc. made in reference to scripts that are not done yet, and therefore haven't been assessed yet, are by definition, fantasy numbers. That's easy enough to understand, no?

Friends, let me put it this way. Everything an AI calculates, I consider very approximate. I even believe that the real budget for a series like this can only be calculated by a financier from a company like Netflix or HBO. Because even someone who has spent their whole life making low-budget films or sitcoms cannot calculate this budget — they’ve simply never dealt with a series of this format and scale. They don’t know all the hidden pitfalls, how CGI is budgeted, and everything that comes with it.

Yes, we — or an AI — can give an approximate estimate of what it might cost. But the exact number, in my opinion, can only be given by a financier from the streaming platform or studio that has already produced something similar.

The same applies to revenue. Only people who have worked with the financial performance of series at this scale, and who know exactly where and how such projects make money, can calculate real profit projections. Neither AI nor people who have only worked on different types of films or shows can give accurate revenue numbers.

Write the TV Series Pilot. Stop telling people about it.

Yes, honestly, I don’t really talk much. I’m not revealing what the pilot is about. I just said that I’m writing a pilot. About two-thirds of the first draft is already done. After that, I’ll refine it and make revisions. If it’s not appropriate to talk about writing a script on a site for screenwriters, I won’t do it anymore. My apologies.

I would call the series "LOOPHOLES" short and sweet :)

TOM SCHAEFER I am an industry person. I head the IPG and Diamond Shadow Producitons and the figures are part of my daily job for many years. It's a good exercise but it's not relevant, ballpark figures are no use to an actual production. I am not intending anything negative here.

Shadow, since you mentioned that you head production companies, I have a question for you. When a screenwriter comes to you with a project — a film or a series, it doesn’t matter — what do you expect from them?

Do you ask whether they can calculate the budget and estimate the cost? Or do you primarily ask for the script, and the budgeting is something your team handles later?

I’m genuinely curious how you approach this when evaluating new material.

Aleksandr Rozhnov There are two situations here: 1. a writer looking to interest us in producing their work, or 2. a writer-producer or writer-director who wants us to co-produce or wants to produce him or herself with us doing the production supervision.

For the first - a writer looking for us to produce, the writer's idea of budget or production design is never relevant. Budget, packaging, etc. is a producer's job, not a writer's job. The ONLY thing we want to see at first instance is the log line and a brief synopsis. We don't care about coverage, awards, budget, visuals, images, POCs, trailers or anything else. The log line and synopsis will let us determine if we think the idea is marketable, and if it is something we could be interested in doing. If we are interested then, and only then, will we request the script (and series bible if there is one). We don't care what anyone else thinks about it so we don't want to see any other commentary. We make our own decisions on that. If the script is good, we would go from there. We particularly don't want to see coverage, and I say that because almost without exception coverage is done by people who have never sold a script and we would never trust it or let it determine if we should read a script. (There are reasons larger might use coverage, but we disagree with its utility)

For the second situation, where a person wants to produce themselves either wholly or as a co-production, the same process follows. We are not interested in budget ideas until we are satisfied the script is good. When we like the script, we will request the budget prepared, but again it is almost irrelevant - if we are to produce or act as supervising producers, we have to do the entire process ourselves anyway. We cannot rely on anything that was prepared before. If there is a POC, we will be interested, but when we watch it we will be assessing the filmmaking skills of the producer, not the property itself, for which we refer only to the script.

That's our process and in spite of the fact that the culture wants writers to create POCs and spend money on learning how to do pitch decks, and how to pitch with dog-and-pony shows, I don't know of any producer who doesn't do more or less the same thing. You might send them a pitch deck or POC, but they don't need it and if the log line or synopsis is not interesting, then nothing else in the deck is relevant. Especially a budget.

Those tools - pitch decks, budgets, schedules - are producer functions and they are relevant when you are speaking directly to funders, whether those are investors or other financiers. This presupposes you are to be the producer. These items are irrelevant to pitching a script. I know me saying that is going to annoy some people, but it's true.

Shadow, I would say I agree with you 100%, but unfortunately I have to tell you that I agree with you 200%. Everything you said is absolutely true, and I see it exactly the same way.

If you're a screenwriter and you don’t have the money to produce your own films, then how you calculate budgets or how you break down the “potential” of your project is completely irrelevant. The only things that matter are the logline, the synopsis, and the script. And if those truly deserve attention, then the financiers will calculate what it will cost and how much they can earn from it. There is no other way.

When screenwriters start trying to learn budgeting or production breakdowns, I believe that’s simply wrong. A screenwriter should be learning how to write, how to create stories, how to build characters, how to create unique worlds — that is the job of a screenwriter, not calculating budgets.

Thank you again, Shadow.

Aleksandr Rozhnov Thank you very much. It is frustrating to see sometimes how much writers are sucked into spending and how many distracting activities they are drawn into, when all they really have to do is write, network with producers and pitch their scripts.

Shadow, I completely agree with you. You are absolutely right. A screenwriter’s job is to write, connect with producers, and pitch their scripts. But I also want to share how I see it. I believe a screenwriter should be able to show a producer why their film can be profitable.

To do that, the writer must clearly present the theme their film explores. Audiences watch films because they want to engage with a theme, try to understand it, and take something meaningful from it. And the more universal the theme is, the larger the audience the film can reach — and the bigger its box office potential becomes.

I don’t think a writer should simply say, “My script is great, it has a lot of action, and Brad Pitt or a dream cast could star in it, so it will make money.” No. A writer should first be able to say: “This is the theme of my story, and this is how it is explored.” When that is clear, both the writer and the producer can understand who will watch the film, what audience it speaks to, and how much it can potentially earn.

That’s how I see it.

It's interesting that Claude "feels the need" to flatter people - that is the true art of the great con.

David Taylor I had to program Gemini to stop using pandering language, and answer only and exactly the question asked without tangents or superfluous information or using ambiguous language. It's a setting that I have to put back most in every session.

“What is truth?” retorted Pilate.

"knowledge itself is power", Sir Francis Bacon

The most interesting thing… Maybe I’m wrong, but I don’t think so.

Artificial intelligence forms its answers based on open sources across the internet. Which means that if it tells something untrue, that falsehood originally came from people. And just like with people, sometimes you have to say, “Let’s stick to the point,” because it can start giving you everything at once. Many people also love to talk too much.

Aleksandr Rozhnov We use AI daily in many tasks, including deep research. So far as "generative" AI is concerned - textual generation and image or video generation, you are correct to a point. All will generate results based on their training materials. So the old phrase "garbage in, garbage out" is more than appropriate. Generative literary AI is, by definition, going to be no better than average - if you generate a script or story, it's because it's been done many times before and it is likely actually plagiarized completely. Image and Video however, though trained on a set of imagery, can work with your own reference materials - in other words your own internally produced photos, images, videos, etc. This is the true power of generative AI and it a game changer for us at Diamond Shadow Productions.

But not all LLMs are trained on publicly available data. Especially in the image and video category, many are created on proprietary or partial proprietary materials. However, everyone who uses AI has experienced the phenomenon of the outright lie and bizarre fantasy answers. These are termed "AI hallucinations" though we can call them completely made up ideas. However, aside from the more or less novelty use of ChatGPT which most people will do, deep research can be done by these tools. They don't just scrape the web and give you an answer, they will do directed and very thorough research and analyze data as you instruct them, and will produce reliable results. well cited and notated with authorities you can verify. The key is that you need to be familiar with the area of research or you may not be able to assess the accuracy of results and conclusions. We used it to track 30 years of declining profits in independent and studio film, for example, and it came back with a full analysis of major studio accounting practices that prove film is structured to lose money in that system regardless of actual revenues. (If you are a major studio it doesn't matter because the losses are due to charges between your divisions or subs. If you are in independent, you are screwed because the studios just keep your money).

I completely agree with you here. If you use AI purely for entertainment, then yes — it will give you whatever it wants. But if you ask the right questions and set the right parameters, it will provide the right information.

For example, when I write scripts, I use GPT chats to type my text because I have very poor vision — I’ve had retinal detachments, and I simply can’t type normally. But when I tell it to write something word-for-word, it does exactly that. And for certain elements, it finds information quickly — and correctly.

Just recently, while working on the latest series synopsis, I asked it for the best law school in France, and it gave me the answer instantly. That saved me a huge amount of time researching it manually. And that’s exactly the type of information it delivers.

So yes — AI is an incredibly useful tool.

So yes - the budget information generated is obviously approximate. The budget part while instructive was never the key takeaway that "some" think it is. The real takeaway is all of the other information given such as IP value and learning about the way deals are "typically" structured, the story bible, logline and other key elements, comps. The budget information is a minor. If that's all you got from it you successfully missed my point.