Did you move to L.A. with your ONE BIG IDEA? The screenplay that would make you famous? To pitch a reality show and get rich? Are you somewhere in Middle America right now with an idea so hot you’d risk life and limb just to share it with anyone on the West Coast?
Okay, I’ve got good news and bad news. The good news is your chances of breaking in to Hollywood just increased exponentially by reading this post! The bad news is…
Your One Big Idea is Not Enough.
Like many businesses, selling product in Hollywood is a numbers game. The numbers say you need heaps of ideas, so you can pitch loads of projects, to sell just one. The numbers also say that the chances someone will sell their one and only idea are slim to none (and as my Dad used to say, Slim just left town!)
Lots of Ideas are not Enough
You can have a million ideas. They’re useless unless they’re great ideas. Are they fresh? Current? Unique? Develop a better sense of how great ideas lead to projects sold by watching TV, going to the movies, and abusing your Netflix account.
Great Ideas Are Not Enough
Remember, even a basket full of ideas is useless if the ideas only live in your head. Having a lot of potential projects at any given time is important, but at some point you have to take action. That means you finish your screenplay, shoot your pilot, make you trailer…turn your idea into something concrete. (Be sure to subscribe for future articles on the best ways to pitch your ideas to Hollywood.)
The secret, to quote the legendary Dov S-S Simens, is to “have numerous projects in various stages of development.” Recognize when one of your projects is gaining traction, and push that project, screenplay, or show idea to the head of the line.
Does this mean you should give up on your passion project if it’s going nowhere? Absolutely not!
Play the Numbers While Keeping Your Passion Project Alive
If your ONE BIG IDEA is your passion project, never give up on it. Maybe you’ll sell it right away, maybe 20 years from now. With every passing moment, you’ll be honing your skills, expanding your creativity, and building your resume. Channel your passion into every project you create, and soon you’ll be so busy, so successful, and so good at what you do, that you just may find it’s easier to sell your big idea after all!
Seriously, though, Andrew makes an excellent point: many hold fast to one idea (some as “interesting” as mixing pirates and robots) as if their artistic integrity depends on it. Your best shot at selling the robot-pirate show is to sell a bunch of other, less “out there” shows first, and then, when the industry finally realizes you’re good at what you do, they just might trust you with a Lost in Space meets Hook competition reality show.
For the record, I would trust Andrew with that show right now, but after all, he can fly.
If it’s fictional learn about screenwriting, if it’s reality do some more brainstorming and research on what’s already out there.
You don’t want to be that hack do you? Then learn your craft and have it at your command. Anybody can come up with one good idea, but only an artist can create at will.
You make a great point. Fact of the matter is that if you want to work in any business, ideas are just not enough–you need the skills to execute that idea. I think the trick is for aspiring producers to use their passion for that “big idea” to drive them to develop their skills. Use the promise of “what could be” to get through the long nights of learning to write, shoot, edit, etc. As you say, learn the craft so it becomes a tool you can wield to get things done.