Screenwriting : 13,000 entries in a screeplay contest. Did they read all of them? by WL Wright

I've read for contests in the past (not affiliated with Stage32) that told us we did not have to read past the first 20 pages if it was not good - and trust me, there are plenty that have basic stuff missing - formatting, setting the tone, and establishing character w/ a goal. If the set up isn't there, then they absolve you of having to read to the end. There are also tiers of judges so that the "celebrity judges" only have to read the best of the bunch, and they are reading the entire script.

Anything free will have plenty of submissions. No way companies are hiring more staff.

Imagine Impact fellowships say they use AI software.

Hey Karen since you've read for competitions I am curious how many scripts did they give you to read and over what time period did they give you to read them?

Hey Dan saying that some use a computer program to weed through scripts? I know there is a book site that does that but never heard of a screenplay competition doing that. Do you know which competitions use a program?

Austin competition readers decide how many scripts they can read in a certain time frame and request assignments accordingly. This is not to say some might pore over the first 10-15 pages and skim (or not) the rest. Austin is unpaid. There is a perk for badges after a certain number of point-based reads.

The take away, as stated, if a script is not there in the first 20 pages it's probably going to get a pass.

I believe Imagine uses AI on the applications alone.

Either they hired 13 readers to read 1,000 scripts each or they hired 1,000 readers so each would have to read only 13 scripts. A 90 pages script would take the "reader" what, between 2-3 hours, he/she would have to take notes, what's good in the script, what's not so good...etc. What exactly the decision to anounce the winner is going to be based on? It can't be based on first 10 or 20 pages or the lenght of the screenplay. What's the 1st prize again, oh, it's another copy of Final Draft and don't forget, that comes with the assurance that your screenplay will be turned into a movie before the end of this century.

I don't know anything about that specific Screenwriting Contest, but there have been shady contests in the past that didn't read screenplays - though it had nothing to do with the number of entries... it was because it was a shady contest.

On big contests like Nicholl and Austin, they read the whole screenplay.

On smaller contests they might do some triage and read the first 10 pages of every screenplay, and not continue to read the scripts that are terrible... but read all of the good ones. You can tell after 10 pages if a script is complete crap (often after the first page, probably with some after the first sentence). This is writing and if the first page is terribly written, it's not going to get better. Writers tend to work and rework first sentences, and make sure that their first ten pages are amazing... so a script where the writer didn't care enough to rewrite their first ten pages until they were amazing, probably didn't care enough to make the rest of the script any good. Why keep reading?

Those shady contests are easy to find - Google them and read what people have said about them. Like everything else in the world, search first.

"Imagine Impact fellowships say they use AI software". Okay, that means there's algorithm activated and algorithm is a step-by-step procedure, which defines a set of instructions to be executed in a certain order to get the desired output. So what this algorithm look for? Grammatical errors, formatting, the tone, establishing character, a goal? What about words we're not allowed to use. It can't be formatting or scene order. A good example would be The Usual Suspects screenplay. It starts with the ending just like a lot of screenplays. So, Brian Grazer and Ron Howard can't afford to hire 5 or 10 readers but they sure have enough money to develop an AI software which is running on quantum computer – hardware alone costs at least $10bn, assuming it's even available for public use. Artificial Intelligence software, Really?

I tend to agree with William Martell that film festivals and smaller contest probably read the first 10 pages. If the script blows, that's where the stop. Of course, if you're paying for coverage, it's difficult for someone to not look at the work. I just hooked up with coverfly and they have a record of some contests going back a few years; and it's clear those reader looked at the scripts and scored them. That included ones where I placed and whiffed. Page, Screencraft, Nicholl and several others have reps to protect and I'm doubtful they're not read some part of every script.

I've been a reader/screener & judge for numerous festivals during the past decade+. The simple answer to your question is: No. I was not being paid to provide coverage, just to identify those few worthy of being given serious consideration for the contest. The first thing I did (and all readers do) was to riffle through the script and if it was full of all kinds of basic formatting flaws - it wasn't worth reading so in the dunk tank it went. Those that passed that were at least worthy of a cursory read. Almost all of those hit the dunk tank by page 10 (some much earlier). The very few left were read all the way through and some of them went into the tank too. I was only one reader among half a dozen or more. The contest had a deadline and every other reader was doing the same thing. It was pretty amazing when we all got together to compare notes and realized how close we were in our selections. There were always minor discrepancies to be sure, but we finally settled on win, place or show. Was it 'fair' to all those writers who worked so hard on their terrible scripts - no. But remember, we were not reading to provide notes and coverage to the writers.

I was a judge for the New York Midnight Screenwriting Challenge.

http://www.nycmidnight.com/competitions/sc/judges.htm

I was paid a small fee and read every script they gave me and provided free feedback. I still have all the files, notes and scripts. Dang! I'm organized.

I've been mentoring newbies for a while now. And I can tell you that many of them vomit words onto a page, think its gold and submit it to a contest without so much as a second read. Since, for some strange reason, people seem to believe that screenwriting is an easy "get rich quick" scheme. I tell them not to waste their time and money. Re-read and edit your script as if you were an English teacher. If you can't then you should hire someone who can but eventually you'll have to learn how.

A contest reader with a pile of 1,000 scripts will check the first 10 pages, see a ton of errors and toss it immediately in favor of the next script. If you read any article by contest judges, they say that over half of contest submissions are total garbage. And half of the less than half are really sub-par. The semi, quarter and final rounds are where they actually start panning for gold.

13,000 X $0.00 = $0.00.

("The latest, the TSL free screenplay competition ...")

I read for Austin Film Festival, and I make it a point to read the entire scripts. As painful as it could be sometimes...

But with that said, TSL was a little fishy to me too. I feel like they just cast a net, and whoever paid for their coverage service, got the real consideration for their script...

Page had over 8000 scripts but no one here mentions it even though I did. Maybe it's easier to rationalize it around the free concept in the TSL contest. I read all the readers who responded here and I'm glad you all did as I have to say it seems like the whole thing isn't worth it, just like that professor said.

Actually WL, last year I did a study of the number of entries that the top 10 screenplay contests received. And not surprisingly the more prestigious the contest, the more entries it received. And yes, the Page received over 8K scripts but if you think about it how many of those entries were even worth reading? People who've just finished their first script ever in life get on Stage32 and ask what is the best contest they can enter. Every newbie who can put two words together shoots for the gold, whether they are ready for it or not.

I agree with Anthony. Most people do improve with practice so the more screenplays you have under your belt the better your odds of winning or placing high enough to matter. Personally, I never have entered them because I didn’t think it was worth it. However, if someone needs something to stick in their query letters or whatever winning or placing in a well-respected contest might help get you more reads and the more reads you get the more contacts you can make.

There are many script writers that never won a single contest and went off to pitch and got those same screenplays that didn't win put into production. There are also an abundance of stories of scripts rejected that got made that ended up very successful. So those scripts that are rejected can't and aren't all garbage because if that was true those stories wouldn't exist or they would be much rarer instead of common. I still believe the professor is right, most aren't even read at all.

WL I'd say you're pretty much correct...so what's your point?

Little Miss Sunshine never won a single award when it was a spec ... and then it won an Oscar.

TSL only reads your first 15, I believe.

TSLs first round in only the first 3-5 pages. Second round is down to 2000-3000 scripts. But its free so you can't expect much. Page on the other hand probably generated over half a million in revenues so I am hoping they paid people to read every entry. Who knows!

I was fortunate to place in the TLC quarterfinals for my feature, In Defense of Innocence.

The bottom line is - unless coverage is provided or you progress - you usually have no way of knowing that they even opened your script, no matter what the competition is. That’s a lot of trust these companies ask of you.

Hi WL, do you have a link to that video featuring the professor?

No, I don't believe anyone read all thirteen thousand entries. (I don't believe any screenwriting competition received 13,000 submissions, let alone read that many in their entirety even with a large panel of judges.) Assuming and accepting that every page of a screenplay represents a minute of film, a short screenplay can run up to 40 pages in length. If we were to assume an average length of 20 pages, that would amount to 260K pages. If we were to figure a book of 300 pages, that would represent 866 books. This is for a short screenplay competition. If we are talking a feature-length script, we are then talking an average length of 90 pages. That would equal 3,900 books of 300 pages. No, I don't believe they read that many scripts.

What's more, do you really think that there are that many screenwriters in the world who are competing in one contest?

David, in years past i have read for modest festivals that had received well over 7K accepted entries so 13K wouldn't surprise me. Obviously I didn't read them all - there were many readers. Based on what I've noticed recently it wouldn't surprise me that there are thay many screenwriters trying to enter the top tier festivals (G. Nichol for one). But I really don't know.