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New Site Still Being Built!

Are you bothered by the current "Development" Process where some "Reader" who has never made a movie or written a screenplay gets back to you 3 or more months after you finally had it accepted for submission just to pass on behalf of the Producer or Distribution Exec because they don't understand how your blueprints translate into a Great Movie because they have never used a script in the production of a movie and actually aren't that familiar with Movies to begin with, they just got into town or they are going to school perhaps and are reading the script for the Producer or Development Executive since that person doesn't have time to Read your Screenplay along with the thousands of others that are waiting on their desk?  And does it bother you that if it turns out they actually do want the script, they offer you the absolute minimum to detach yourself from the making of the movie because you have not brought them any well known actors who at least have an interest in the Movie on which they can finance the Movie?

What if you had your Screenplay acted out by some Professional World Class Actors so the decision makers can watch it themselves and not have to resort to the Reader?

And if you are concerned about Protecting your Screenplay, think of this, the Absolute Best Protection is to Publish it by filming it and having it accessible through this site on a Membership Basis where we know who has access to your Screenplay Reading and who has requested it, if they ask that it be mailed out.

Typically people make Trailors and a One Sheet to get their Movie Made or have several hundred thousand dollars to put down a pay or play commitment contract on a well known Actor, but how do you plan to come up with the money for even a Trailor when it's hard enough to put together the money for a Reading and The Trailor doesn't adequately enable investors to assess the screenplay for backing, in fact, many foreign buyers consider Trailors suspect at this point since they agree to make the movie based on the Trailor and when the movie is finished, it's falls far below their expectations from the Trailor.  In fact, many of them would rather see The Readings on videotape, the One Sheet and the DP and Director's Reels.  The Foreign Buyers made this clear to us at the American Film Market (AFM) this year.

It is against Union Rules to distribute the Reading for any other purpose other than seeking the sale or financing of your Screenplay and anyone caught doing so will have to deal with both us and the Unions.  This is to Protect both the Writers and the Actors.

Why we know this system works?   It's based on a well known successful program our friends put together in New York.   Their failure?  Not having a sound financial model where writers/producers and anyone owning the rights to a Screenplay actually paid for the Reading, subsidized by Sponsors in a Non-Profit setting where the Reading was videotaped for buyers or financiers to see later.  The MSRG is an improvement to our friends' system.

 

Fifth Night Screenplay Reading Series at the Nuyorican to Close Eight Year Program Tonight
(indieWIRE: 04.02.02) -- The Fifth Night Screenplay Reading Series, an institution for many New York screenwriters, filmmakers, and others in the creative community, will host its final reading tonight due to a lack of funding, organizers have announced.

Founded in 1994 as a forum to allow writers an opportunity to showcase their work and receive feedback, the series evolved into a weekly Tuesday evening event featuring writers, casts and directors. Fifth Night describes the weekly readings as a "sellers market, where the writers exhibit their work to industry professionals, directors of development, producers, production companies and agents seeking out new, up-and-coming talent."

Downtown Manhattan's venerable Nuyorican Poets Cafe, which helped create the program, has hosted 212 readings since Fifth Night's creation eight years ago. Thirty-nine of the screenplays have either been made into films or are currently in production and more than 2,000 actors including Liev Schreiber, Karen Allen, Kyra Sedgwick, Steve Buscemi, Frances McDormand, Christina Ricci, Alan Arkin, and John Leguizamo have participated in the readings. Writers have included Karyn Kusama ("Girlfight"), Michael Ondaatje ("The English Patient"), Darnell Martin ("I Like it Like That"), Jeremy Pikser ("Bulworth"), Maria Maggenti ("The Incredibly True Adventure of 2 Girls in Love"), and Matthew Harrison ("Kicked in the Head").

Past Fifth Night participants currently in production include Steven Starr's "Rosebud," Marcus Hahn and Brian Cange's "Coyote Run," Maryam Dalan's "Romeo Run," and Eve Pomerance's "The Secret Trials of Effie Gray." The last scheduled reading (tonight at 8pm at the Nuyorican) is Katherine Burger's "Forever Wild," described by Fifth Night as "a contemporary retelling of Peter Greenaway's 'The Draghtman's Contract,''Forever Wild' casts a gimlet eye on a world where social climbing is considered a greater sin than murder." [Brian Brooks]

 

By the MSRG charging even nominal rates our New System to reinvigorate the development process would have no reason to ever end.

 

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Copyright © 2001 The Malibu Screenplay Reading Group (MSRG)
Last modified: June 10, 2002