Storming the Walls with Thirty Peasants

INTRODUCTORY DEPARTMENT

Last week I attended the Sherwood Oaks All Access Weekend. This is where aspiring screenwriters like myself go to meet Hollywood player types. The Hollywood player types sit on a raised platform and talk about their projects and answer questions. Then when they are finished, they get bombarded by aspiring screenwriters like myself pitching their wares.

I don't consider myself a good networker, but I guess I was feeling cheeky since 20 minutes after walking in the room I managed to get one development exec and one director to agree to look at my stuff. These weren't just random folks either -- these were top targets of mine for the type of material I write. For the rest of the day I was asking the heavens -- what in hell did I do right?

You see, I've been attending events like this for about a year now. I generally sit in the corner, take notes, then go looking for the dessert tray.

This one was different. There was no way I could not talk to these two particular people. I simply got in the queue and let it all out.

Dang. I guess it worked.

I even got a cherry with my cake. I got to meet one of the writers of the original Alien and ask him about his screenplay. Now how cool is that?

Later in the day, one of the speakers said that to get noticed as a writer in Hollywood you have to do everything you can -- write, go to events, query, make phone calls... you have to storm the castle walls, and you have thirty peasants.

So, consider this blog one of my peasants. He's mildly literate, so his job is to document the attack in progress. He also does PR work for the peasant army. He looks for other peasants to join the fight and if the bastards still won't yield, to go build a castle somewhere else, run by peasants.

Let the adventure begin.