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Hale

PERFORMING ARTS / FILM & VIDEO / SCREENWRITING $26.95 USA / $35.95 CAN

H e at h e r
Hale

“Let your plans be dark and


impenetrable as night, and when you
move, fall like a thunderbolt.”
—Sun Tzu, The Art of War

AMONG THE GREAT CHALLENGES for modern media-makers is getting


someone to read your script, watch your film, or glance at your TV format.

STORY Selling
But how do you get them to close a deal? Veteran and aspiring creators
will find the answers here.

Whatever you’re pitching, the principles are universal. It’s the strategies
and assets employed that vary widely. This book details them all, their
construction and applications, in ways that will improve your visibility
and success.

“Heather Hale’s brilliant book isn’t simply helpful to


marketing your screenplay or film project; it’s essential.”
—Michael Hauge, Selling Your Story in 60 Seconds

Story
“Heather’s book thoroughly covers the critical
information you need to fund or sell your film.”
—Carole Dean, The Art of Film Funding

“Story Selling provides the development,


marketing, and pitching tools that take a writer
beyond the script and into the marketplace.” How to Develop, Market, and Pitch

—Pilar Alessandra, The Coffee Break Screenwriter

S e l l i n g
Your Film & TV Projects

HEATHER HALE is a film and television writer, director, producer, and


consultant with over 60 hours of credits that have won Emmys, Ace and
Telly awards. She wrote the 5.5 million-dollar Lifetime Original Movie
The Courage to Love (2000) and co-wrote, produced, and directed the
million-dollar thriller Absolute Killers (2011).

How to Develop, Market, and Pitch


MICHAEL WIESE PRODUCTIONS | MWP.COM
Your Film & TV Projects
Published by Michael Wiese Productions
12400 Ventura Blvd. #1111
Studio City, CA 91604
(818) 379-8799, (818) 986-3408 (FAX)
[email protected]
www.mwp.com

Cover design by Johnny Ink. www.johnnyink.com


Interior design by William Morosi
Copyediting by David Wright
Printed by McNaughton & Gunn

Manufactured in the United States of America


Copyright © 2019 by Heather Hale
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means
without permission in writing from the author, except for the ­inclusion of brief quota-
tions in a review.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Hale, Heather, author.


Title: Storyselling : how to develop, market and pitch film & TV projects /
by Heather Hale.
Description: Studio City, CA : Michael Wiese Productions, [2019]
Identifiers: LCCN 2018057724 | ISBN 9781615932818
Subjects: LCSH: Motion pictures--Marketing. | Television programs--Marketing.
Classification: LCC PN1995.9.M29 H353 2019 | DDC 384/.80688--dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018057724

Printed on Recycled Stock


Contents

Acknowledgments �������������������������������������������������������������������������xi

Preface ���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� xiii


Storytellers can change the world.�������������������������������������������������xiv

Introduction �������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 1
The Develop ∞ Market ∞ Pitch Continuum������������������������������������ 5
Mise en Place Š Mise en Scène ������������������������������������������������������������ 6

Primary Marketing Development �������������������� 9


Comps = Your Project’s Provenance ������������������������������������������������ 11
Creative Comps ���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 12
But. . . What Do You Actually Do with Creative Comps? ��������14
Studying TV Creative Comps������������������������������������������������������������������14
Marketing Comps ������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 17
The Infamous Cross������������������������������������������������������������������������������������19
People Who Liked This Also Liked...���������������������������������������������� 20
Financial Comps �������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 25
“And . . . ACTION! ” Template to Begin Your Comp List������������ 27

Core Development & Marketing


Components ���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 29
The Crucial Logline ������������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 33
Logline Job Description������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 34
WIIFM?������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 35
Unique Selling Point����������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 36
Logline Construction������������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 39

v
vi STORYSELLING • HALE

The 6 Qs = The Spine of Your Logline����������������������������������������������� 40


Essential Logline Elements ��������������������������������������������������������������������41
Title ���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 41
Tagline ���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 43
Genre�������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 44
Refine Your Genre Beyond “Just” Drama���������������������������������� 45
Main Characters �������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 47
Character Names ���������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 48
Character Flaws������������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 48
Occupation and Role��������������������������������������������������������������������������� 49
Action Heroes vs. Thriller Protagonists ������������������������������������ 50
Catalyst & Inciting Incident���������������������������������������������������������������� 51
Goal�������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 52
Stakes���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 53
Nouns & Verbs ������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 54
The Power of Irony���������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 54
Kill Your Darling Clichés���������������������������������������������������������������������� 55
Logline Recipes ������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 56
“And . . . ACTION! ” Logline Starting Place Worksheet ������������ 57
“And . . . ACTION! ” Logline Brainstorming Exercises�������������� 58
Summary�������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 63
“And . . . ACTION! ” Write Your Summary���������������������������������������� 64
Synopsis �������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 66
But. . . Can’t I Just Use the Coverage Synopsis?����������������������������� 67
“And . . . ACTION! ” Write Your Synopsis ���������������������������������������� 69
One Sheet������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 69
“And . . . ACTION! ” Pull Together Your One Sheet �������������������� 70
Query Letters �������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 72
“And . . . ACTION! ” Draft Your Customizable Master
Query Letter �������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 73
Why Them? Why You? Why Now?��������������������������������������������������������74

Basic Development & Marketing


Materials ���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 77
Beat Outline������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 79
Treatment ���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 80
Development Treatments��������������������������������������������������������������������������� 83
Marketing Treatments���������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 84
C ontents vii

Minimalistic Treatment��������������������������������������������������������������������������� 84
Extended Treatment ��������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 85
Movie of the Week 7-Act Structure�������������������������������������������������� 86
Game Show Treatments������������������������������������������������������������������������ 86
Documentary Treatments�������������������������������������������������������������������� 87
Treatment Tips������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 88
Scriptment���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 89
Script �������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 90
Selling vs. Shooting Scripts ���������������������������������������������������������������������� 91

Advanced Marketing & Development


Deliverables ���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 93
Pitch Package �������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 95
An Excellent Answer to “What else have you got on this. . .?”96
Pitch Package Elements������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 96
Pitch Package Construction���������������������������������������������������������������������� 98
Pitch Deck ������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 101
Look Books, Mood Boards & EPKs ���������������������������������������������������� 102
TV Series Bible���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 105
Marketing vs. Development vs. Writers’ Room Bibles���������������� 106
Scripted Marketing Bible�������������������������������������������������������������������������� 107
What’s the Story Engine? ����������������������������������������������������������������������107
Sitcoms�������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 108
Procedurals ���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 108
Scripted Bible Guts������������������������������������������������������������������������������������109
TV Format Bibles������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 111
Refine Your TV Format Genre Beyond Just “Reality” ������������111
Reality Competition������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 112
In the Beginning, TV Created the Game and the Show���� 114
Talent Shows ���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 114
“And . . . ACTION! ” Creative Reality
Competition Format Challenge������������������������������������������������������������ 115
Structured Reality �������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 115
Process/Build Shows ������������������������������������������������������������������������ 116
Legal/Crime���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 116
Cooking ������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 116
Prank������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 116
Transformation/Self-Improvement �����������������������������������������117
viii STORYSELLING • HALE

Social Experiment���������������������������������������������������������������������������117
Travel �����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������117
Unstructured Reality�����������������������������������������������������������������������������117
Lifestyle/DocuSoap���������������������������������������������������������������������������� 118
A Day in the Life of . . . ���������������������������������������������������������������� 119
Documentary/Nonfiction Specials and Series ������������������������ 119
Men-at-Work Documentaries �������������������������������������������������������� 120
“And . . . ACTION! ” Google Reality Comps Winners
& Nods������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 120
Children’s Programming ������������������������������������������������������������������������121
“And . . . ACTION! ” Creative Kids Programming
Challenge ������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 121
But . . . Will it Travel? ����������������������������������������������������������������������������� 122
Local Success First ������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 122
Proposals & Business Plans ���������������������������������������������������������������� 122
The Ask ������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 123
What Do You Want? ��������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 123
Proposal Elements ����������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 124
Identify Your Target Audience �������������������������������������������������������� 124
“And . . . ACTION! ” Reverse Engineer Your Target
Demographics to Seed Your Prospect Hit List������������������������������ 124
The Schedule����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 124
Budget��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������127
Cast Wish Lists and Talent Attachments ��������������������������������������127
Video Marketing Assets�������������������������������������������������������������������������� 129
Teaser���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 131
Theatrical Trailer ���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 131
“And . . . ACTION! ” Script Your Trailer ���������������������������������������� 132
“And . . . ACTION! ” Study Your Comps’ Trailers������������������������ 132
“And . . . ACTION! ” Study Award-Winning Trailers in Your
Genre �������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 132
Re-Cut Trailers Inspire Genre Insight������������������������������������������������ 133
“And . . . ACTION! ” Compare Re-Cut Trailers to Their
Originals�������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 133
“And . . . ACTION! ” Re-Trailer of One of Your Comps ������������ 133
Sizzle Reel�������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 134
Sell the Sizzle, Not the Steak��������������������������������������������������������������� 134
Animated Sizzle Reel������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 134
Rip-O-Matic ���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 135
C ontents ix

“And . . . ACTION! ” Edit Your Comps into a Rip-O-Matic


for Your Project������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 135
Talent Reels���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 136
Completed Scenes���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 136
Frankenbiting ����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������137
Proof of Concept������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 137
Dirty Pilot ����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 138
“And . . . ACTION! ” Script a Hypothetical Pilot of the
First Two Acts of Your Reality Show������������������������������������������������ 138
Game Show Proof-of-Concept Pilot������������������������������������������������� 138
Screener������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 138

Pitching �������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 139


There Are No Rules (and They Are Strictly Enforced)���� 141
Prospecting������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 142
“And . . . ACTION! ” Reverse Engineer Your Comps Lists
to Seed Your Prospect Hit List(s)������������������������������������������������������ 143
Speed Tour of the “Buyer” Landscape������������������������������������������������ 143
The “Big Five” Studios ����������������������������������������������������������������������������143
Mini Majors ��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������145
High-Profile Film Production Companies ������������������������������������145
High-Profile TV Production Companies ����������������������������������������145
The Top Baker’s Dozen of International TV Buyers ����������������146
Set Realistic Pitch Goals�������������������������������������������������������������������������� 148
Basic Pitch Architecture������������������������������������������������������������������������ 148
BLUF������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 149
Don’t Forget to Ask for the Order �������������������������������������������������������� 150
Questions Are Great Indicators������������������������������������������������������������ 150
Nervous? ���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 151
Timing of Deliverables������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 152
Follow Up! ������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 153
Adapting to Different Scenarios and Environments���������� 154
Pitch Fests ������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 154
Do Your Advance Due Diligence ��������������������������������������������������������155
Festivals, Conferences, and Markets�������������������������������������������������� 155
On-the-Lot Scheduled Pitches���������������������������������������������������������������� 156
Don’t Tell: Sell����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������157
Pitching Dos & Don’ts�������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 158
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Dos & Don’ts for Scripted Television Pitches������������������������������159


Dos & Don’ts for Reality TV Pitches ������������������������������������������������159
Social Experiment �������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 161
Factual Programming�������������������������������������������������������������������������� 161
Game Shows �������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 161
Pitching Larger-Than-Life Reality TV Personalities�������������� 162
Celebreality Is All About Access ������������������������������������������������ 162
Use Caution Bringing Talent to the Pitch�������������������������������� 162
Detachable Attachments������������������������������������������������������������������ 163

Final Thoughts �������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 165

About the Author ������������������������������������������������������������������������ 169


Introduction
S
tories inspire us. They help make sense of the world around
us. They help us empathize with other worldviews and
strive to understand life itself. Great cultural change has always
been driven by creative innovators who manage to engage the
public’s imagination, ideally to make the world a better place.
There is no higher calling.
But stories can’t do any of that ’til they get out of the origi-
nator’s head, onto the page and onto the world stage. It’s not art
’til someone other than its creator encounters it.
Yet our modern global media and entertainment market-
place can feel overwhelming to content creators looking for
practical points of access. Contemporary audiences are incred-
ibly savvy — and inundated. They intersect with characters and
storytelling worlds across multiple platforms, sometimes even
simultaneously integrated.
Today, digital-native children are weaned on storytelling
technology that used to be the exclusive domain of Hollywood
studios. Many of the economic and knowledge barriers to entry
have been annihilated, thus adding to the morass competing for
the attention of the general public. Getting noticed — whether
it’s for a motion picture, television program, streaming content,
published book, video game, or live event — can seem onerous
if not impossible. And that’s if you can even get through the
series of quagmires to get there.
Before you even have the luxury of approaching that huge
hurdle, you must first tackle all the other ultra-marathon mile-
stones. Like getting someone — anyone — to read your script,
watch your film, take a glance at your TV format — or heck,
even just answer the phone or reply to a simple email query.
Feature screenwriters must first get someone to option or
buy their speculative screenplay — or at least read it as evi-
dence of skill to secure an assignment. Television scribes must

3
4 STORYSELLING • HALE

entice an entity to develop, package, and set up their pilot.


Independent film producers must convince not only equity
financiers to invest in their movie to get it made, but then a
distributor and/or international sales agent to sell the rights to
exhibitors in territories around the world. Independent online
content creators might turn to ad agencies and brands to help
fund their programming.
All of these scenarios — and infinite variations — involve
complex business-to-business sales. And that means getting the
right information to the right people, at the right time, in the
right ways. There is a huge difference between a screenwriter
pitching herself to an agent or manager for representation
versus an independent producer pitching a project to a pro-
spective star or director attachment, compared to a reality TV
host with a concept seeking to engage a coproduction partner
versus how a studio or network advertises film and TV to the
mass audience.
But that could actually be the trajectory of the exact
same original idea, morphing through its ancillary markets
and transmutations. The prospective customers at each node
are as wildly different as are their starting point positionings,
value propositions, and calls to action. But the guiding prin-
ciples are the same. And while every type of project, person
and sales scenario is undoubtedly unique, the real strategic
value lies in the thinking: the advance planning and targeted
preparation.
You learn to fish by fishing. By trial and error, you figure out
the best hooks and bait to use for which fish. Proximity helps
you network with veteran anglers who might humor you with
some tricks to cleverly reel in different kinds of fish. Through
camaraderie, they might even reveal a few secret fishing spots.
Refining their experiences and practices, you evolve your own
style, materials and techniques.
I ntrod u ction 5

The Develop ∞ Market ∞ Pitch Continuum


Pitching is the engine of the development-marketing discovery
process. These three phases inevitably overlap and incessantly
interchange. Like lifting the leg of a three-legged stool, insights
in one area raise the bar and require structural improvements
to the other two. Pitch stumbles might reveal glaring problems
inherent in the script. Pitchees’ confused questions may high-
light plot holes, credibility or pacing issues, demanding yet
another rewrite. Clarifying character bios for your TV show
bible might force you to rethink your entire series arc. Refining
your pitch deck might cause you to hone your logline and revise
your target audience and hit list. Like being stuck in Ground-
hog Day, “Development Hell” can feel like an infinite rewriting
or editing loop, incessantly folding back in on itself. Scripts and
films are never “perfect” — deadlines just coerce their release.
In an ideal world (that most can’t locate), you pitch your
script, it gets easily and quickly bought for seven figures and
is seamlessly and joyfully produced into a financial and criti-
cal success by professionals that become like family. Yay, you!
But that’s not how it normally pans out. Check your expec-
tations. It’s not uncommon to pitch — then get pitched back, by
people who were not at all what they represented themselves
to be. Or even if they are legit, they still might pitch back —
the changes they would need you to make in order for them
to actually proceed with your project. If you’re lucky, you suc-
cessfully turn their version into one you can all be satisfied
with that (hopefully) they are in a position to fund, produce,
and distribute.
Sometimes, instead of investing the time and energy spec-
ulatively writing an original spec script, a well-established
screenwriter might pitch an idea in hopes of getting an entity to
commission her writing that script. Or a producer might hire a
writer to draft a treatment of what was well received in the room.
6 STORYSELLING • HALE

SPEC
A “spec” screenplay or treatment is written “speculatively” or
“specced,” meaning it was written in the writer’s “free” time,
on their own dime, with nobody “commissioning” (i.e., order-
ing or assigning) it, in hopes of identifying and submitting it
to a prospect who might option or buy it in order to develop,
finance, produce and/or distribute and market it.
It’s a bit like building a house on spec, where you front
the time, effort, expertise and expense with the intention of
flipping it, finding someone who likes its architecture, colors
and curb appeal enough to buy it just the way you built it.
The difference with a script or treatment is that it’s
but a literary blueprint, seeking someone else to front the
money and take the risk to actually construct the house you
described with words. That’s a huge leap of faith — and one of
the many reasons why selling the plan for a movie or televi-
sion show is so hard. And why so much changes when dozens
of other imaginations and areas of expertise begin barn-rais-
ing. The more specific your script, the more likely everyone
will be making the same movie or TV show.
That is, if you can get them all on board in the first place.

The development process can zigzag in an endless maze,


reminiscent of an impossible Escheresque staircase. You
may invest years of your life in a single project — including
exhausting the best of your creative energies and profes-
sional (and personal) relationships. Make sure the promise
of each premise is worth the dedication it will require to see
it to fruition.

Mise en Place g Mise en Scène


“Mise en place” is a culinary term that refers to the advance
preparation and ordered arrangement of all a recipe’s
I ntrod u ction 7

ingredients. This completely prepares a chef to pull everything


together when the heat is on. This process emboldens her
instincts to change proportions or even ingredients on the fly.
Feng shui relies on this philosophy as well, mandating “a
place for everything and everything in its place.” Even a chaotic
kindergarten room can be organized in a flash provided there
are color-coded drawers and cubbies with sufficient, obvious
spaces for everything.
In pre-production, a director pulls together all the visual
elements necessary to tell the story. She then decides what will
be framed in the shot. This “mise en scène” encompasses every-
thing from the actors’ performances, wardrobe, hair, makeup
and props to locations, sets and lighting.
Development is like that. You polish every component you
might need and line them up, at the ready for any possible use
or combination, rearranging them for each opportunity. As the
process unfolds, you adjust the pitch. Like a director, you pre-
pare and hope for magic. Whether you’re a writer, producer or
director — a chef, kindergarten teacher or parent — unpredict-
able obstacles can derail the best of intentions into disaster or
create moments of delightful surprise that will become lifetime
memories. . . and great stories!
Pitching film and television projects are complex sales,
with long sales cycles, that usually have multiple decision-mak-
ers and stakeholders. During this research and development
period, you prepare everything you might need, lining every-
thing up in order: Mise en place.
Think of it as pre-production. Deciding which elements
— in what proportions and combinations — should be in
each marketing deliverable or verbal pitch for each prospect.
Everything anyone would need to make a decision — and not
a single thing more that could cause them to second-guess
their interest.
8 STORYSELLING • HALE

Consider mise en scène as principal photography. It’s when


you’re live and all your hard work in preparation must come
together in an instant. It’s your Got Talent audition, your Olym-
pic event, your oner. Months to years to lives of hard work
culminate in a performance under pressure. If it’s excellent,
lives are changed forever in seconds. Just like a pitch.
Primary Marketing
Development
E
very industry, every product or service has a research and
development phase. A learning process that helps define
what it is you’ve got, what’s working, what’s not.
The best way to assess where your proposed project might
best fit in the media marketplace is to study comps — compa-
rable films or television programs — that predate yours and are
relevant for one reason or another. Similar shows illustrate the
landscape and illuminate your prospects. They help you fine-
tune your own project by delineating what your project is like,
what it’s not like — and why.
What are the blockbuster benchmarks in your genre? What
were the ratings favorites in your format? What cult classics
define your genre? Does your project build upon them? What
are the current critics’ darlings? You must also study the bombs
to differentiate how your project promises to avoid those pitfalls.

Comps = Your Project’s Provenance


Think of comps as the “provenance” of your project. Prove-
nance is documentation that tracks the lineage of a work of
art, an antique or an archaeological discovery. It reveals where
(and when) it came from and how it’s changed hands over time,
paper-trailing its origin to assure its chain of custody. A prov-
enance evidences authenticity.
Critics, especially Internet Haters, often accuse Hollywood
Greenlighters of being myopic when it comes to original mate-
rial, only able to wrap their capitalistic minds around familiar,
pre-sold, already “proven” franchises or remakes, with the con-
sequent derivative diminishing returns, both creatively and
financially. While this criticism might be valid in some cases, it
is actually quite shortsighted when taken in light of the multi-
screen, new media landscape we all find ourselves repurposing in.

11
12 STORYSELLING • HALE

Even for fresh, original ideas, comps provide some measure


of comparing totally subjective art. There are all types of “comps.”
For ease and speed of read, we will start with creative and mar-
keting comps and focus on financial comps under Business Plans.

Creative Comps
Usually the most fun and useful to writers, creative influences
vary wildly by format and may include other intellectual prop-
erty touchpoints such as iconic characters, graphic novels,
Broadway musicals, children’s storybooks and video games.
Milestones of your genre or format may be used as sensibility
references for style, tone, theme and issues raised.
Comp lists are uniquely specific. One comp might have an
archetypical protagonist or antagonist; another might capture
the mood; another, the milieu; while they all might reflect a cer-
tain Zeitgeist.
Creative comps offer greater freedom of breadth and depth
than financial or marketing comps. You have the luxury to ignore
financial or demographic relevance, even recency. It’s alright if
the budgets (of your creative comps) are way off from your real-
istic projection. Creative comps may be decades old or appeal
to wildly different target audiences. Study previous models to
ascertain how to contemporize or broaden yours. It’s even okay
to crisscross film and television (or other) formats. What matters
is keen creative resonance to your specific project.
Today’s content creators have the luxury of easy binge-
watching on demand, unlike the primitive, pre-internet era,
where we had to wait for a film to play at a local cineplex or
tape reruns off TV onto VHS tape. But all your “competitors”
have the same easy access to this bounty. Become versed in the
classics as well as the little-known gems of your genre. They
may have originally been blockbuster hits or labors of love with
little fanfare that gained recognition via word-of-mouth over
time, but “classics” are still relevant and enjoyed today.
P rimary M arketin g D evelopment 13

COMP EXAMPLES
Classic Romantic Comedies
10 Things I Hate About You My Best Friend’s Wedding
27 Dresses My Big Fat Greek Wedding
Bridget Jones’s Diary Notting Hill
Chocolat Pretty Woman
Clueless Romancing the Stone
Eternal Sunshine of the Sleepless in Seattle
­Spotless Mind Splash
Four Weddings and a Funeral The Princess Bride
Groundhog Day Up in the Air
Hitch When Harry Met Sally
How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days While You Were Sleeping
Love Actually You’ve Got Mail
Moonstruck

Festival Darlings & Indie Breakout Hits


500 Days of Summer Moonrise Kingdom
Amélie No Country for Old Men
Before Sunrise Raising Arizona
Before Sunset Reservoir Dogs
Being John Malkovich Run Lola Run
Brokeback Mountain Rushmore
Election Secretary
Juno Sex, Lies and Videotape
Little Miss Sunshine Strictly Ballroom
Lost in Translation The Usual Suspects
Memento Thirteen
14 STORYSELLING • HALE

But. . . What Do You Actually Do


with Creative Comps?
Studying your project’s precursors empowers it to stand on its
antecedents’ shoulders while clearly distinguishing your unique
work from the canon. Creative comps help you identify struc-
tural elements, diagnose weaknesses, capitalize on strengths
and maximize any missed opportunities. They can provide a
curated catalog of on-point images to repurpose for your look
books and rip-o-matics. And, as you’ll read in “Prospecting,”
they also seed your Hit List.
Pursue the bread-crumb trails of success but investigate the
footprints of failure, too. Don’t ignore the massive flops; you’ll
have to disassociate yours soon enough. Although an indispens-
able resource to figure out what went wrong (and how you can
do better), keep these creative comps a secret. Reserve these
for internal development and discussion only with partners
already officially attached to the project. Never reference them
in any pitch or marketing materials. The mere whiff of failure
can make most suits run.
This prep is priceless. If anyone ever throws one of these
bombs in your face, you won’t be blindsided. You’ll be pre-
loaded to confidently articulate how yours is different (read:
superior) and won’t suffer the same fate. Your specific market
awareness may eclipse their fears and enhance their esteem for
you. The backside of fear is hope — and that is what you’re sell-
ing. Your confidence, clarity and passion fill sails.

Studying TV Creative Comps


If you’re comparing your project to television series, study
whatever scripts and episodes you can track down to study.
Usually, you can at least secure the pilot script to read. Epi-
sodes are usually easy to find to view. You might even unearth
comparable concepts that never made it to the screen or those
P rimary M arketin g D evelopment 15

cancelled after just the pilot or midway through Season One or


Two. Can you figure out why they failed?
Watch at least the pilot of each creative comp to study
each series’ launching elements. Follow along on the script
with a stopwatch in hand to track the show’s pacing. View
with focused intent. Take notes. Maintain a notebook
or folders.
Popular, long-running shows promise an abundance of
material. For key comps especially (if you have the time), you
might watch the whole show from pilot to finale. If this is unre-
alistic, selectively study key episodes from each season; season
premieres and finales, especially. But also look for episodes
that won or were nominated for Emmys. These likely repre-
sent what their respective showrunners were most proud of,
perceiving them as their strongest contenders.
Go to IMDb.com and click on the shows’ “Awards” and see
which specific episodes were nominated and watch as many
of those as you can. These episodes are especially important.
Whether they won the awards or not is irrelevant. The
showrunners (and/or the show’s producers and/or distributors)
submitted what they thought were their best episodes, so if
you’re pitching to them, these are the shows to be familiar with
as they highlight what they thought was their best work. Also,
looking at all the competing nominees in that specific category
over the past few years might help you augment your list and
enhance your knowledge.
Sweeps-week entries might be the least indicative of a
given show as they often represent stunt-casted-cameo rat-
ings grabs.
If it’s a scripted show, your comp homework might illumi-
nate the number of characters or story arcs that might work
best for that type of show. If it’s a game show or reality competi-
tion, study the mechanics of the show. How are the contestants
16 STORYSELLING • HALE

selected? Eliminated? Do the stakes escalate in each round?


If it’s a lifestyle or build show: What are the ins and outs?
What’s the throughline? If it’s a talk show: Does the host segue
to a field correspondent? Or transition to re-enactment foot-
age? Does each episode begin and end on the same set? Does
the host or the show engage with a studio or home audience?
What’s the set? Living room? Kitchen? Studio? Simple build-
ing blocks.
If a show “jumped the shark”1 (passed its peak of popular-
ity), try to analyze some of the reasons the show went downhill
— or how, when and why it picked up steam again. This can be
priceless information to inform your own project development
but also helps embolden your pitching confidence. Comps can
be a powerful research-and-development tool to help you dra-
matically clarify and refine your project and prepare to pitch to
those who make that kind of content.
Reach out to everyone you know in the industry to see if
you can get your hands on the shows’ bibles or formats2 to
study what got the shows sold in the first place or how their
original vision might have evolved.
A great exercise is to reverse-engineer the show’s bible
yourself. What might they have contained? This is an incred-
ibly fertile exercise to do for your very best comps — especially
if they qualify across the board as creative, marketing and
financial. . . even more so if you’re pitching to their creators or
distributors!

1 
Google it + “Fonzie” if need be.
2 
More on all these in their sections. If you need help sourcing material for educa-
tional research, e-mail me at [email protected] and I’ll check my library
or try to help you track down (but Google first, please).
P rimary M arketin g D evelopment 17

Marketing Comps
It’s prudent to study marketing comps for several reasons. They
can serve as excellent case studies for everything from their
loglines, taglines and key art3 to help diagnose target audiences,
brainstorm cast wish lists, study social media and advertising
campaigns to distribution strategies. They may reveal geograph-
ical trends, the territories that might be most responsive to your
project for presales (or to reserve for most profitability) or even
ideas for festival premiere strategies.
If you can identify key cities with outsized affinity mar-
kets or relevant events, you might modify your predecessors’
strategies. Boutique domestic distributors might be responsive
to considering proposals enriched with suggested marketing
campaigns or cascading distribution models. Fully funded
independent producers can just hire service vendors to exe-
cute their plans. Marketing comps are also very relevant to TV
producers raising funds for time buys and selling ad spots or
internet content creators facilitating brand integration.
Writers typically focus on creative comps. But for many,
a frustration with insufficient script sales and sluggish career
traction can drive the most dedicated to shift into marketing
their work like a producer, to ultimately producing their own
projects. If your work as a writer is so good you don’t need to
wear any other hats, you’re in rarefied air. However, most writ-
ers find themselves somewhere along that spectrum. Analyzing
the key art and marketing campaigns of a project’s comps can
force everyone on the team to rethink how to best visually com-
municate a high-concept idea, crystallize murkier concepts and
further elevate the script.

3 
I cover key art extensively in my first book, How to Work the Film & TV
Markets: A Guide for Content Creators, but a sizeable excerpt, with full-color
examples and a great creative brief, is available for free on my website at: http://
heatherhale.com/key-art
18 STORYSELLING • HALE

HIGH CONCEPT
High concept is an ingenious idea that appeals to a mass
audience. It can be communicated in just a few words, maybe
a sentence, and its potential is obvious to all who hear it. It’s
the kind of idea that hits writers and producers with “Why
didn’t I think of that?” All genres and formats benefit from
marketable high concepts. Its importance cannot be overly
emphasized. While high concepts notoriously don’t guarantee
the resultant project will be good (or even profitable), they do
help to secure pitch meetings, get scripts read and find audi-
ences to pay to watch — all critical achievements.

HIGH- CONCEPT TV SHOW EXAMPLES

Awake (2012) After a car accident takes the life of a family


member, a police detective lives two alternating parallel lives,
one where his wife survived, the other, his son. Is one of his
“realities” merely a dream?
Continuum (2012–2015) A detective from the year 2077 finds
herself trapped in present-day Vancouver, searching for ruth-
less criminals from the future.
Designated Survivor (2016–2019) A low-level Cabinet member
becomes President of the United States after a catastrophic
attack kills everyone above him in the line of succession.
FlashForward (2009–2010) A special task force in the FBI
investigates after every person on Earth simultaneously
blacks out and awakens with a short vision of their future.
Frequency (2000) An accidental cross-time radio link con-
nects father and son across 30 years. The son tries to save his
father’s life, but then must fix the consequences.
Jane the Virgin (2014 – ) A young, devout Catholic woman dis-
covers that she was accidentally artificially inseminated.
P rimary M arketin g D evelopment 19

The Last Man on Earth (2015–2018) Almost two years after a


virus wiped out most of the human race, Phil Miller only wishes
for some company, but soon gets more than he bargained for
when that company shows up in the form of other survivors.
The Last Ship (2014 – ) The crew of a naval destroyer is forced
to confront the reality of a new existence when a pandemic
kills off most of Earth’s population.
Limitless (2015–2016) An average twenty-eight-year-old
man who gains the ability to use the full extent of his brain’s
capabilities is hired by the FBI as a consultant.
My Name Is Earl (2005–2009) A ne’er-do-well wins $100,000
in the lottery and decides to right all the wrongs from his
past with his newfound realization.
Quantum Leap (1989–1993) Scientist Sam Beckett finds him-
self trapped in the past, “leaping” into the bodies of different
people on a regular basis.
Wilfred (2011–2014) The story of a depressed man who inex-
plicably is the only one who can see his neighbor’s dog as a
full-grown man in a dog suit.

The Infamous Cross


Many pitchers will lead off or end a query or verbal pitch
by crossing two movie or TV comps to illustrate what theirs
“is like.” “It’s X meets Y with a little bit of Z thrown in.” Of
course, there can be mixed results with this. Your “pitchees”
may have their own mixed feelings or preconceptions about
those references. They may be thinking you mean something
entirely different from what you’re referencing, not be familiar
with the program or, worse, be confused.
But these crosses work enough of the time that many people
use them as a framing device. If it’s really clear and you want to
work this comparison into your pitch conversation, be as spe-
cific as possible about your meaning. Something like: “It’s got the
bittersweet nostalgia of a Nicholas Sparks novel but with the
20 STORYSELLING • HALE

irreverent comedy of Deadpool,” so there’s no question which


specific elements you’re likening yours to. Ideally, the two (or
three) comps you’re using qualify across the board as financial,
marketing and creative comps — so they’ll make sense on every
front. If you have lots of comps this would work with, your proj-
ect is probably too derivative. The cross should be a collision
of ideas where the intersection teases your high concept. But
if you have several to pick between, try to mix it up with a cur-
rent hit, a blockbuster in the genre and something really unique
to your project’s sensibilities. Considering your comps in this
way is invaluable, even if you never use this phrase. It helps you
to further articulate your intentions (with or without the cross).
P e o pl e W h o L i k e d T h i s A ls o L i k e d ...
You’re probably familiar with the Internet Movie Database
(IMDb.com) and may even pay for their professional IMDb-
Pro subscription. They have a consumer feature that currently
is only available on the free version. So if you pay for the pro
upgrade, you’ll actually have to sign out to use this tool.
Under Videos and Photos, there is a header that reads “More
Like This” under which they provide six or twelve algorithm-
matched comps. You can flip through the titles, posters, loglines,
ratings, genres, directors and stars and IMDb public ratings to see
if any jump out at you as good comps to add to your research list.

The consumer version of IMDb.com (not Pro) suggests possible comparable


programming.
P rimary M arketin g D evelopment 21

You can dig one degree further by checking the respective


comp lists of each of the original titles. This is a super handy
speed reference but beware! It is absolutely an Internet Rabbit
Hole (read: writers’ time-suck procrastination device).

Movie-Map Waking Ned Devine ?

If you are looking for Fanny And Alexander


movies like Waking Ned
Planes Trains And Automobiles Whale Rider
Devine these could be
interesting candidates.
The closer two names Stairway To Heaven
Mamma Mia The General
are, the greater the
probability the two Charlie And The Chocolate Factory
movies are similar.
Million Dollar Baby
Hitch All That Jazz
Finding Neverland
Tora Tora Tora My Favorite Year
Ladder 49

Good Morning, Vietnam Whatever Works


No Trains No Planes Rudy
Dirty Rotten Scoundrels Norma Rae Breaking Away

Howard’s End Le Grand Seduction


Schmetterling Und Taucherglocke Small Time Crooks
Waking Ned Devine The Dish
Kalendergirls Ruby & Quentin
The Sunshine Boys Days Of Thunder

Persuasion The Hundred-Foot Journey


Cousins The Dressmaker American Wedding
The Snapper Uneasy Rider Full Monty

The Misadventures Of Margaret


The Matchmaker Sense And Sensibility
She’s Out Of My League Someone Like You
Seeking A Friend For The End Of The World Truth About Cats And Dogs

Brassed Off
Kissing Jessica Stein Sleeping Beauty

Movie-Map.com is another great resource to research comps.

TasteDive.com is yet another resource to research comps.

As IMDb is a public forum, a lot like Wikipedia, anything


you post is visible to everyone. If you upgrade to Pro, you can
add all your comps (or cast wish list) to a list titled after your
project and share this with select colleagues.
22 STORYSELLING • HALE

Sample Creative & Marketing Comp List: Ultra-Low Budget, Gritty Rock
Drama

Sample Creative & Marketing Comp List: Wine Comedy Romance


P rimary M arketin g D evelopment 23

IMDb can also be mined to search via plot keywords. Right


below “Storyline,” you should see “Plot Keywords” (right above
“Taglines”). If you click on “See All,” you can then click on any
plot keyword that your project has in common — and all the
other projects that have that keyword as well (or share a series
of them) will populate the list. This list can be sorted a num-
ber of ways (alphabetically, by popularity, release year, etc.)
and narrowed down even further by genre(s) and/or delineat-
ing between film and TV (episodes, TV movie, mini-series, etc.).

Use multiple keywords and sort options to search for comps on IMDb.

Digging around in this way, you might find comps you’ve


never even heard of. This can be invaluable if you’re struggling
to find recent or good financial comps or even creative ones to
brainstorm story problems.
Pinterest, Evernote, OneNote and other internet discov-
ery and capture apps can be used to collect, curate and share
research and visual information. Right click and save the posters
of comps. Add their loglines and taglines in the comments sec-
tion. Make a board of the headshots of your cast or the actors
on your wish list — especially images that most look like how
24 STORYSELLING • HALE

you envision them as your characters. Add their most relevant


credits. Post images of prospective or representative locations
or the cinematic styles or even music to consider adding to your
look book. This can serve as a virtual filing cabinet of relevant
research articles on the industry, subject matter or even pros-
pects. These boards or notebooks can be used privately for
internal development, to collaborate with a far-flung team, or
even publicly as a portal for social media efforts such as key art
or cast voting or even fan-submitted meme or clip competitions.
Studying how your comps — both successes and failures
— were marketed can be very telling. What do they have in
common? List and analyze these elements. Notice any pat-
terns? Brainstorm taglines. What is it you like (or don’t like)
about their marketing campaigns? What is similar — or dif-
ferent — from your film? Do most of the thriller comps have a
gun and a running lead in the trailer? Is there always blood
in the poster of the horror comps? Do all the romances high-
light both leads? Sometimes we miss the obvious.
This is a great exercise to do at any stage — and repeatedly
— throughout the entire development and marketing processes.
Breaking it all down can reveal if your project is really a different
genre — or might be better served in a different genre — than
you originally thought. Reviewing all these comps might make
you reconsider where your project fits in the marketplace.

COMP RESEARCH RESOURCES


• AFI.com/100years • Pro.IMDb.com
• Amazon • Rotten Tomatoes
• IMDb.com • TasteDive.com
• IMSDB.com (scripts) • TheMovieDb.org (also TV)
• Itcher.com • TV.com
• Movie-Map.com • WhatIsMyMovie.com
• Netflix • Wikipedia
P rimary M arketin g D evelopment 25

Financial Comps
Financial comps are the most common because they are the
easiest to identify. They are black-and-white, historical statis-
tics. Perhaps for this exact reason, they might also be the least
relevant. It’s a bit like script readers, whose only feedback is on
formatting. Yes, of course, that’s all important — but it objec-
tifies art when there’s so much more to consider. (But no one
ever defended Hollywood as being innocent of objectification!)
Still, for business plans, some equity investors will focus exclu-
sively on your comps’ stats. So, do your due diligence to make
sure they are as germane as possible.
Like comparable homes used in a real estate appraisal to
establish a home’s fair market value for a home mortgage, finan-
cial comps should be as current as possible, ideally within the
last year or at least the last decade. Five years is reasonable and
common. They should have the same caliber of cast you have
attached or can reasonably secure.
They should be as close as possible to your film’s projected
budget. This can be a challenge at any budget but strive to keep
your spread reasonable: within ten million in the upper ranges
and within a couple hundred thousand in the lower-budgeted
indie arena. The Screen Actors Guilds’ groupings are a solid
matrix4 to adhere to. Use only SAG Low Budget films if you’re
under $2.5M. Gather under-$700K references if you’re produc-
ing a Modified Low Budget project. Stick to SAG’s Ultra Low
Budget comparisons if you’re under $200K.
Your financial comps should ideally be of the exact same
genre or close subgenres. A dark horror comedy targets quite
a different audience than a family comedy or straight horror. If
you can’t find “close enough” genre comps, then bracket your
subgenres so you cross-collateralize to somewhat unskew
your average.
4 
Visit my website, HeatherHale.com for my Unions’ Low Budget Contracts Matrix.
26 STORYSELLING • HALE

Business plans or proposals might compare MPAA ratings


(G, PG, PG-13, R, NC-17), runtime, director bankability, star mar-
quee value, award wins and nominations and other categories.
DVD sales statistics can be expensive or difficult to acquire and
it’s nearly impossible to get accurate figures out of the stream-
ing behemoths (Netflix and Amazon) because they don’t have to
disclose this data to anyone. They don’t have any advertisers to
defend ad rates to, so their nonlinear “ratings” (how many down-
loads and views) are nobody’s business but their own.
It’s tough to quantify commercial art via calculating
averages and medians. While reducing comp lists to some stan-
dard-deviation formula might pencil out nicely mathematically,
it’ll likely mean nothing in the reel world. But you know your
comps better than anyone. Trust that. Own your subject mat-
ter expertise. You should be able to viscerally omit the outliers
to create a more relevant bell curve. You won’t likely have to
defend this rationale because the calculations will all have
been made after this curation. Thus, depending on the quantity
and quality of your comp list, tossing out the top and bottom
3%–10% might yield the most realistic predictions.

FILM & TV STATISTICAL RESEARCH SOURCES


BFI.org.UK Studio System
Box Office Mojo UNESCO
IMDb Variety Insight
IMDbPro Wikipedia
MPAA
Nielsen Google “the trades”: 5
The Numbers • Cynopsis
Pew Research • Deadline Hollywood
Screen Australia • The Hollywood Reporter
Statista • IndieWire
StephenFollows.com • Variety
• The Wrap

5 
“The trades” refers to entertainment industry-specific news sources.
P rimary M arketin g D evelopment 27

“And . . . ACTION! ”


Template to Begin Your Comp List
E xercise : Make a list of all your comps. This is an ongoing
process. It can be a simple handwritten list on a legal pad, a
word processing table or even a Pinterest board, but my favor-
ite is a sortable spreadsheet. Something like the examples on
the following page.
Templates can be downloaded for free off this book’s com-
panion website: HeatherHale.com/StorySelling. If you aren’t
analyzing a specific project, consider working through this
exercise using your favorite movies or television shows (espe-
cially those in the same genres you write) because it might
reveal things to you about your own sensibilities. If you’re a
writer with no intention of producing your project yourself,
the financial info might feel like overkill but as long as you’re in
IMDb or Googling, if the info is right in front of you, you might
as well plug that in, too, because data can reveal surprising pat-
terns. Take the time to note significant awards nominations or
wins (Oscars, Emmys, Golden Globes, BAFTAs, WGA, People’s
Choice — even Razzies). If TV, add specific episode titles and
where they fall in the show (i.e., pilot, season #/episode #).
If you used spreadsheet software, sort the table every which
way looking for patterns. Highest grossing or rated projects is
an obvious, helpful view, but look at the group by MPAA rat-
ings or critics’ rankings. Are there any production companies
or distributors that dominate the list? What about directors
or actors? Do you see any budget or box office trends? Is there
a consistent number of weeks in cinemas? Average minutes?
Is yours in the range? Any outliers? What about the key art?
Recognize any common elements?
28

Your Film Project’s Title


# of Weeks
Film Comp Production Max # of
Year Genre(s) Runtime Key Art Logline Tagline(s) Distributor Rating Budget Gross D.B.O. W.W.B.O. in MetaCritic Awards
Title Company Screens
Theaters

Long live the king.


T'Challa, heir to the hidden but Hero. Legend. King.
Walt Disney
advanced kingdom of Wakanda, must A king will rise.
Action Studios 20 wins
Black Panther 2018 134 min step forward to lead his people into a The Avengers have a new Marvel Studios PG-13 $200,000,000 $700,059,566 $1,347,071,259 4,020 23 80
Adventure Motion 40 noms
new future and must confront a king.
Pictures
challenger from his country's past. All hail the king.
Respect the Throne.
STORYSELLING

Your TV Project’s Title


Distributor
HALE

Pilot Studio (Original


Format
TV Project Comp Release (or Broadcast, # of
& Runtime Key Art Logline(s) Tagline(s) Rating Budget # of Seasons MetaCritic Awards
Title Date - Last Production Cable or Episodes
Genre(s)
(Current) Company) Streaming
Network)
Series Logline: Nine noble families
fight for control over the mythical 294 wins
Winter is coming.
lands of Westeros while an ancient 490 noms
When you play the game of
enemy returns after being dormant for S1 = 10 eps
thrones, you win or you die.
One-Hour thousands of years. S2 = 10 eps E-W-ODS 2018, 2016, 2015
The Game Begins Typical
Drama S3 = 10 eps E-N-ODS 2014, 2013, 2012, 2011
War is Coming $10M/ep
4/17/2011 - Pilot Logline: Jon Arryn, the Hand of S4 = 10 eps E-W-OWDS all by DB&DBW
Game of Thrones 57 min Five Kings. One Throne. HBO HBO TV-MA 8 80
2019 Action the King, is dead. King Robert S5 = 10 eps S7E7: The Dragon and the Wolf" (2018)
All Men Must Die Final 6
Adventure Baratheon plans to ask his oldest S6 = 10 eps S6E9: Battle of the Bastards (2016)
Justice Has a Price $15M/Ep
Drama friend, Eddard Stark, to take Jon's S7 = 7 eps S5E10: Mother's Mercy (2015)
The Real War Is Between the
place. Across the sea, Viserys S8 = 8 eps S4E10: The Children (2014)
Living and the Dead
Targaryen plans to wed his sister to a S1E9: Baelor DB&DBW (2011)
Winter is Here
nomadic warlord in exchange for an GG-N-BTVD 2017, 2016, 2015, 2012
army.

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