does anyone know how you might go about sending an original screenplay written by yourself? Or lets say you wanted to send it to Paul Thomas Anderson in the limited chance that he might read it. Any ideas?

first get it copywrited by the WGA. Its not going to be easy to get someone like PTA to read it. But aim high. Getting an agent is the first step to getting scripts read. Most production companies won't read scripts unless there is an agent representing them, this is because if they have a similar movie in production, you can claim they stole the idea and make trouble for them. Most agents won't take you on unless you have several scripts. So keep writing. What I'd recommend is find out who represents PTA, and then ask his asssistant if you can write him a cover letter and send a script. You're not going to get the agent to read it, but the assistants of today are the agents of tomorrow. So its a good angle to get representation by going that route. Also its probably a good idea to find out what PTA's production company is. The question I'd ask yourself though is "Could I do this without PTA?"

Excuse me if this is scatterbrained I'm going to the airport in 10 minutes.

Btw, I don't know if you were planning to do this, but the "poor man's copyright" (sending a sealed envelope with the script inside to yourself) doesn't count for anything. Just an fyi.

no that's pretty good thanks. And PTA just left his agent of like 10 years and now I don't know where he is at.

Well do you know just how long ago it happened? And where did you get this information in the first place? Because, just like where you can call the Screen Actors Guild to find out which agents reps a particular actor (they allow you three queries per call), you could call the Directors Guild of America to ask about Anderson.

But windedsailer hit on most everything already. Agencies won't even touch unsolicited scripts. The old adage is certainly true, "who you know", but every once in a great while you can get lucky. Can I ask, do you have any aspirations to direct, or just to write? Because if you did, I'd recommend not only having multiple screenplays finished, but also do everything you possibly can to produce your own short film. Scrape whatever resources you can together, money, equipment, your friends... and make your own short film (actually I'd recommend something like that even if you solely want to write). Yes, even though the Hollywood of today is overrun by sequels and remakes, a good way for a total nobody (especially outside of LA) to get noticed is to have an original story to tell. And the shorter the better. You want people to not mind sitting down to watch your whole tape in one setting, 4-6 minutes max.

I consider myself extremely lucky, during the 5 years I lived in LA, two of them I spent working in the production company of Paul Verhoeven and his producing partner Alan Marshall (oscar nominated for "Midnight Express"), and it was a very small operation so I worked closely with them. Alan's more or less now retired, but he's still a name producer to whom I can slide something that I write to see what he thinks.

Good luck


(of course you could always also pick a really obscure Stephen King short story to adapt, write to him and ask to buy the rights -- Frank Darabont bought the rights for "Shawshank" off him for like $5 I think )

I have a film reel going on in my head on how my stories will unfold in front of a camera. Problem is I wouldn't know where to start with resources or on how to operate as a director. So, for right now I'm just sticking to writing. And I'm only working on my first script. But I'm pretty damn confident about it. It sure is original I know that. But if it takes a few then I don't know haha. We'll see.

My greatest ambition is to be an actor. I'm taking the Matt Damon-Ben Affleck approach right now. It all kind of sucks when you live in Wisconsin.

Do you have any friends or family that own a mini-DV? I mean even if you don't, I gotta think there's some kinda shop, whether big chain or corner place from which you'd be able to rent. And don't worry about "knowing how to direct". A quality and original story always trumps craftsmanship. And editing can be done on your computer. God knows there's plenty of well respected sites for short films to showcase (you're kidding yourself if you don't think that powerful and influential Hollywood people have spent some time browsing the likes of ifilm.com, etc).

But yea one of the biggest things I can pass along is to maintain patience and perserverance(sp?) 99.9999 times out of a 100 it ain't gonna happen overnight. And hey good filmmakers and storytellers come from all across the globe, LA definitely don't have a monopoly on that