Film Courage: We often hear it's impossible to get a screenplay read and especially now
so many new writers want to get in to Netflix, want to get a meeting with someone. Is it
impossible? Gary W. Goldstein, Producer/Author/Instructor: No, it's not impossible but I think you have
to calibrate, you have to be realistic. I mean people talk about Netflix a lot, certainly
it's the big line in the jungle and we see a lot of good projects being produced are
required so that's great. Netflix is actually one of the companies being as big as they
are it's understandable they're a company who basically advertises they have a policy
that we if we don't have an existing relationship with you, don't knock on our door. So it would
seem logical that people would have this feeling like Oh I can't get read but there's but it's
really not what it seems what they're really saying is invest a little time make yourself
known to us how do you do that um when the case first of all there's there's there's
a couple of dozen very vibrant streamers not just netflix they're not the world of streaming
they're one of the biggest of and there's a lot of places that you can go who don't
have you know the policy of we don't accept unsolicited material or you can't come pitch
us whatever it might be but if you really want to get in the door it reminds me of you
know back in the day when carlos antenna wanted to play at fillmore west up in san francisco
and bill graham the empresario was like i don't know who this kid is and he you know
people you knock and you knock and you knock it's like jeffrey castenberg always used to
say if if you can't get in the front door go through the back door if you get in the
back door climb through a window if you can't go in through the basement there's a way in
and that's true well carlos santana climbed up a drainpipe on the exterior of the building
to the third floor and fell through the window into bill graham's office that's how they
met well i don't recommend that necessarily but it worked it started his career by the
same token if you want to get into netflix how hard is it to research who are all the
people who've either produced for them an original or had a film acquired by them and
cozy up to them this is a team sport this is it takes a village to get any project made
series feature limited series docu-series whatever so you're going to want to be knowing
these people regardless well why don't you just find the ones who are doing the kinds
of projects genre budget that are similar to yours who happen to have that relationship
and go that route there's a lot of ways in but there's the other and and the other way
is there are a lot of people who work at netflix befriend them
it's not all this is not a like a pass fail report card or menu of options it's a human
reality if you really are determined to get into netflix there are people at all levels
from from assistant all the way up uh where you can identify them and you can find them
on linkedin they're they're named and you can reach out to them and you can do what
we were just talking about a moment ago which is introduce yourself but not to say i want
a pitch meeting or i want you to read my script i just want to get to know you because what
happens is if you actually invest a couple of short calls doing that over a period of
weeks that prohibition against we don't deal with strangers or we don't read unsolicited
material vanishes it evaporates because now you're not unknown that's a human metric and
you can overcome that um i'll share a quick story about many many years ago i always when
i have a project i always put together what i call a top 100 list who are the people that
ideally in every category that i want to that i would want to approach to talk about this
project from editors and writers and cinematographers and casting directors to producers to buyers
studios streamers you name it and i will just go through that list and prioritize them and
i'll reach out to them and usually again it may not be the name on the door or maybe it
is um but the idea um the story that i want to share is that years ago i i made a list
and um it wasn't arrogance it was just i'm it was a dream so i added a name to my list
that was the most preeminent name in hollywood at the time and probably still is steven spielberg
so here i am a little guppy and i put the name of steven spielberg on my list and i
think you know you know normally you would think oh sober up child it's not going to
happen but as it turns out i had gotten to know this wonderful guy young guy named mitch
who was an entry-level guy i met him when he was an assistant he got promoted to creative
executive and he was now a creative executive at amlin his ultimate boss was stephen and
so i spent some months just nurturing that relationship and one day someone sent me a
script and it was absolutely gorgeous it was beautifully crafted a story young characters
kind of a very special care very emotional young young leads but it was just tremendously
well done
so i called up this fellow whose name was mitch and i said mitch i read this script
we'd been co-conspirators we're both starting out in the business we were friends now new
friendship and we were excited so he read it and he called me back he read it on the
weekend the usual monday morning call back and he he called me back and said he praised
it he said this is absolutely gorgeous it was very emotional it took me back to when
i was that age i had a not dissimilar experience fabulous thank you it was really really interesting
it's going to be a pass and i said okay mitch um one favor why why is this a pass you just
you were just singing at spratuses and it's because it's too small for stephen i said
okay that's fair i understand that but let me ask you a question if you put the script
in steven's briefcase for his weekend read and he were to come back monday and say to
you this is a pass would you have any and specifically whether it's because it's too
small or otherwise would you have any cause for embarrassment would it in any way jeopardize
your standing in the company they said no it's a brilliant script i said great then
i am on we're on a phone you can't see me but i'm on one knee and i am begging you put
it in steven's briefcase and he did steven read it and he wanted to buy it now
no one was more stunned than i was but i think this is a business that turns on belief it's
a business that turns on passion it's a business that you just got to go with your instincts
and get your head out of the game sometimes because this is the fear factor right this
is the don't take risk factor speak the truth and make friends with people if i can get
steven spielberg to want to buy a script i mean he didn't gary goldstein's name i might
as well have been the clerk at the local convenience store right
if an agent by the way had sent that very same script on my behalf it would have been
absolutely a pass it would never have gotten to stephen because it wasn't about report
wasn't about an exploration it was like okay it's a pass i get it
magic happens when you make yourself available when you make yourself known when you care
enough to ask the right questions speak your truth the fact that i as a young guppy in
the business could get the attention of steven spielberg and maybe actually have a project
together was unthinkable people would have said you're nuts
so do i think that it's hard to get your script read i think it's hard to get your script
read when you don't take risk if you're relying on the wrong mindset the wrong strategy a
blind query letter or relying on some third party we all of us need we deserve to get
in the game we deserve to have relationships to have cohorts and collaborators and champions
and fans and allies and help one another mutually
at what point is too much though i think many people in the entertainment industry they're
long on enthusiasm but sometimes certain times it can be too much maybe they gotta sort of
reel it back in because you don't want to hurt your reputation where oh it's that person
again that happens often and and it may be a very well intended enthusiasm sure but the
enthusiasm i think you're referring to is a very self-facing enthusiasm okay so it's
it's it's it's maybe not intended to be overly grand or braggadocio or any of that but it
may come across that way or just too self-focused period right so what i would share with people
is is that idea that vulnerability and honesty and truth is not a push energy it's a pull
energy it's a very attractive energy
but don't spend the whole time talking about yourself in fact one of the great life lessons
in not just hollywood but in life is fewer words listen more the less you say the fewer
words you use to communicate the more the other person remembers if you talk too much
this just becomes a blur
but be other focused care about the other person be curious i think that curiosity and
gratitude and all you know they're by words today but they're real those are real energies
and if i approach you and i'm grateful for you know thank you so much for taking this
call not over being overly solicitous but just honest um and asking about you know how
you know how long have you been there and how did you get that job it's awesome and
where do you aspire to go i would probably be the only person not only that day but that
week month and possibly longer who's actually shown a genuine curiosity or interest in you
because everyone else is in a rush to get past you to the boss
it's easy to make friends in this business actually
but you're right you can't assault people with enthusiasm and expect it to be an effective
strategy it has to be very moderated less is more quiet is better than loud truth is
better than grandiosity so it's just being measured because it's it's it's it's hard
to you know the g-force of people's enthusiasm can be um unwelcome if you were starting from
zero today how long do you think it would take you to get into a place like netflix
to pitch ideas it's a great question i
i think it takes i think it takes a while it's going to take a while regardless you
have to be committed you have to be willing to invest some time
in the olden days we networked in a different way we showed up in person for coffee breakfast
lunch dinner office meetings non-stop the advantage of i mean the downside to that was
it was extraordinarily time consuming the upside of that was it was very personal the
advantage of today is we can reach anyone we want i can google anybody find out how
to get in touch with them where they are where they work if i don't know someone at that
agency or that streamer i can find out who works there
i can reach out to them very quickly digitally i can speak to them on a phone i can get them
on a zoom i can do whatever you know those are those options are very available to us
so we can truncate the time but we need more frequency of interaction because of the lack
of personal connection if we're not sitting across a lunch table from them it's different
but again i i really think that's incumbent on us to be so conscious and present and and
aware of what our mission is and how we want to get there i think the problem today is
we are separated by um technology or we're connected by technology but we're not physically
in the room with them more often than not people are saying do i need to be an la no
you don't need to be in la if you're in la you'd be having the same number of meetings
that you're having right now initially for the foreseeable so technology's our friend
but it's not as personal the hardest part back then was finding someone and getting
together physically with them so you could have a relationship with them today you can
find identify someone quickly in an instant online and you can reach out to them instantly
by email by phone what have you but you have to invest in that and make it personal you
have to come across in a different way if you're if the if the intention is i just want
a pitch meeting that's going to be hard especially at a place like netflix until you build your
those bridges those rapport-based bridges that let you walk into that opportunity so
i think it's really less about how is it the same or how is it different than are we are
we ready willing and able to invest ourselves in bridge building human bridge building or
are we just looking for someone to set us up for a meeting one is realistic one is not.
Question For The Viewers: Do you think it's impossible to pitch a movie idea to Netflix?