Attended a course hosted by the fabled Adrian Mead on Saturday and I’m pleased to report it did what it said on the tin.

Now I have a bigger, cleverer range of tools that I can use to scale the screenwriting career mountain.

And I also have a much better idea of how hard the climb is going to be.

Still, much better than slowly circling the mountain crablike a mere 50 feet off the ground, which is what I’ve been doing so far.

I met up with David Bishop, Lucy Vee, Michelle Goode, Kai Savage and other luminaries such as Alexandra Denye (who is shortlisted for the Alfred Bradley Bursary Award this week – good luck, Alexandra) and Kulvinder Gill. Plus a whole bunch of other writers who are all chipping away at their personal coalfaces. Hi everyone.

Hi especially to all those people who said “Laurence Timms? Don’t I know you from somewhere? Don’t you write a blog or something?”

I’m not going to regurgitate everything that I learned there. The ever-efficient Michelle and Lucy have already done that in spades.

What I will do, though, is share my new goals. We did some work on goal-setting in the course. Here is the fruit of my endeavours.

Short Term – One Week

• Re-read Making It as a Screenwriter
• Revisit my unfinished feature script, Yummy Mummy
• Stop planning and start writing Magick, the script I’m lining up for RP this year

Medium Term – Three Months

• Have a target shortlist of agents
• Have polished drafts of Bailiffs, Bones and Magick done and dusted
• Have a revised version of Yummy Mummy planned out

Long Term – One Year

• Have a polished draft of Yummy Mummy done
• Have a television credit to my name
• Make myself irresistible to agents

These objectives are meant to be entirely within my control. Achieving them should not depend on anyone else’s say-so. Clearly the last two absolutely do.

But writing for television is what I’m all about, so it’s damn well going on there as an objective. Otherwise this is all just so much farting in hurricanes.

As for getting an agent…yeah, I know it is not utterly utterly necessary, but at the same time there’s a shedload of stuff agents do that I don’t want to be doing myself. Mainly because they do it a lot better and more persistently.

Bottom line: be prepared for a lot of hard work. Heh, that’s never bothered me. In fact, the only thing that scares me is doing a lot of hard work on the wrong thing. That ain’t going to happen now.

If you read this far down this blog entry you’ve got to the good stuff. Well done. Now I’m going to give you the 37 most important things that I discovered yesterday. Use them wisely, young padawan.

The 37 Steps to Screenwriting Success.

1. Success as a screenwriter is in your hands. Nobody else is going to do it for you. Get up off your arse. Work hard.
2. Keep writing. Don’t be afraid of rejection. You will get rejected, many times.
3. Improve constantly. Seek feedback. Learn from your mistakes.
4. Anyone who picks up your script is going to ask themselves “Why should I read this:?” Don’t give them any reason not to.
5. Don’t, whatever you do, ever ever let anyone see a script with speellling or grammer mistakes in it.
6. If you are sending your stuff to the same small list of mainstream contacts over and over again and you’re getting nowhere, then find some new targets.
7. The film and television business is not just the US and the UK. There are film agencies and production companies throughout Europe. Find them. Ask them if they’re looking for scripts written in English. You might be surprised.
8. Try to do things that other screenwriters are not doing. Have an alternative plan. Research. Be creative.
9. This is a referral business. Producers and script editors are very unlikely to read unsolicited scripts that appear out of the blue. Get recommended.
10. Don’t be an arsehole. To anyone. If you are, it’ll be noted and you’ll be marked out. As an arsehole. In a small industry. That works on recommendations. Think about it, sunshine.
11. Be indirect. Don’t doorstep big producers. Get in touch with up and coming DoPs who want to direct. Find people who are into the same stuff that you’re writing. Cultivate relationships. Offer short scripts for filming.
12. If you’re writing for film, get yourself to festivals like Cannes, Berlin, Galway Film Fleadh. Plan ahead, organise meetings, beg for five minutes with people. Be in the minority of writers who get out of their pits and deliberately put themselves in front of people.
13. Learn how to network. It’s not as hard as it looks. Get in quick, say hi, ask for a little time, don’t pitch. Even give the impression of being busy. Everyone is fascinated by people who appear to be busy.
14. After meetings, send a thankyou postcard just to cement the relationship. Even if the meeting ended in a ‘no thanks’.
15. Repeat after me. What do agents want? Product they can sell and writers who are ready. Is your product sellable? Are you a one-script wonder or a goldmine? Are you prepared to work hard, be presentable, turn up on time and not be a wacko? Tick these boxes and agents will pay attention to you. Eventually.
16. Get onside with Agent’s Assistants. They do all the hard script reading work. Not just the slush pile, but all the submissions from writers who are already on the books. They work long hours, evenings and weekends. And yeah, guess what? They often become agents themselves. That assistant you were dead polite to on the phone last year? She’s an agent at ICM now. Hmm. How about that? Wonder if she remembers you?
17. Agents will ask you this: “What kind of work do you want to do?” Have a well-thought-out answer prepared. “Get paid millions for my first draft blockbuster feature script” is not a well-thought-out answer.
18. Script Editors are worthwhile contacts. Their responsibilities often include finding new writers for their shows. That could be you, eh? Identify the script editors that work on the shows you’d love to write for.
19. Script Editors generally don’t take unsolicited scripts. They don’t have time to deal with a slush pile. Get a strong referral or get an agent.
20. Write yourself one big balls script that you know will never be made. It’ll be massive, shiny, expensive, cast of thousands. Make it utterly brilliant. Unfeasibly expensive, yet brilliant. Could be a feature, could be a series, could be a one-off. Make it good. Showcase your craft. Think big. It’s your calling card.
21. Don’t screw up meetings by being a nutter, being unprepared or putting an early draft script on the table. You only get one chance. Make it count.
22. Do something that makes you stand out from the crowd as a writer. Collaborate. Make a short. Sell yourself. Think about what you have to offer, what you know that nobody else knows. Be a runner on set. Cultivate contacts. Go to courses, enter competitions.
23. Think of yourself as a one person business. Always ask yourself why anyone should pay you to write rather than all the other writers.
24. There’s only one of you. You haven’t been cloned. Therefore you have a unique viewpoint. Sell that.
25. Make sure you have a strong spec script library: a low budget short or feature script that could be made collaboratively; a factual-based drama with unique perspective; an adaptation (avoid rights issues by creating a contemporary version of an ancient myth); a script aimed at younger age groups (hard to do well, but a lucrative market); a broad appeal feel-good family feature.
26. Diversify your writing. Theatre. Online. Games. Radio. Research, ask, investigate. There are hundreds of theatres, theatre groups, commercial websites, webshows, games producers, radio stations, radio production companies. Someone, somewhere, needs something writing.
27. Learn how to pitch.
28. Contextualise your pitch. Don’t just describe your script in stark terms. Sell the sizzle, talk up the brilliance, make it your own by talking about the experiences that led you to write it.
29. Make sure you demonstrate that you are the only person who can write this script, that you are the only person who knows this subject in sufficient depth to deliver the goods.
30. When pitching, you will be asked these questions: “Why do we need this story now?” “What can we make this story say about the world?” Have an answer. Think yourself into their shoes.
31. Put energy into your pitch. Believe in your story. Maintain clarity.
32. If it’s a formal pitch meeting rather than an ad hoc chat, use visual props to leave a lasting impression: mood boards, handouts, posters with character names. Do not suggest actor names. Do not use actor photos or even stock photos of people in your pitch. You are not the casting executive.
33. Stop emailing people. Pick up the phone. Emails can be deleted. A voice on the phone is harder to ignore.
34. Be polite and gracious.
35. Be persistent.
36. Do your research.
37. Be tenacious.