Film Courage: Can you give us an example of how you helped one of your writers sell their
scripts and get a movie made?
Peter Katz, Story Driven CEO: I have a project that I sold and we basically worked on developing
the pitch together and we brought together to write producers and team and made attachments
and we had a pitch on zoom which made it very challenging because this was during the pandemic
so this was a project to just make which made it crazy is we sold a movie during a like
dystopian event like where we can't leave our our place so we prepped it on zoom and
it was extremely like challenging because a lot of the process of selling an idea is
very physical you're in a room together and it's something that you have to have a presence
but when you're on a laptop like Max Headroom and you're just like a floating head it makes
it infinitely more difficult to sell a project so we had a tough situation how do we make
something really good because we had a studio executives that were going to be on a zoom
call so we decided that the pitch that we just make 20 minutes make it just the best
20 minutes possible because at a certain point the tension span of most people starts diminishing
especially on a screen if you're in the physical world it's so much easier to just like be
compelling and have that kind of like energy that everyone feeds from but when you're looking
at like your laptop it's like completely different so we decided that making it shorter was better
and the goal was in the questions and answers we'd be able to activate more interest and
get more information so we shortened this pitch way smaller than we'd ever do in a normal
event would make it much longer if we were in that room so we shorten it really practice
it we ran the pitch through multiple people we actually had and I think some people don't
get it is that like pitching is like writing you have to iterate like I think some people
think you just show up and pitch but actually pitching is kind of when you think of like
a performer like a comedian they might even record their sets just to hear do they hit
all the beats is it does it really resonate or a musician could perform at a show and
then see people and really get a sense of does that set work so we had the writer go
through all these cycles of prepping of different types of people because we didn't know the
energy that was going to be given in that and ultimately through defining the the size
of the pitch prepping through multiple people during this horrible event that we were living
everybody was living in and we were able to sell a movie um despite those challenges and
it resonated perfectly with the buyers so I mean that is an event that like collectively
we weren't looking at the pitch and stuff something that's ready made and I think that's
a problem with a lot of filmmakers there's like god just get ready for the pitch but
a pitch you should even to me look at it like a like a script you get the script you kind
of come up the idea and you just refine it and you iterate and you just keep making it
better and better a pitch should be the same way you should be able to try it on different
people workshop it see where people are at and don't just pitch people that are already
working on it like you're just oh I just talked to my collaborator you should get individuals
who are new to what you're talking about and they should have notes for you what ideas
resonated do you rush by exposition how did it develop and really just making sure that
the timing is right and is it exciting do you get all the information across and we
really had this criteria and ultimately it was successful because we were taking that
seriously I have a tv pitch going out soon we're doing the same thing um because right
now we're we're still getting past this horrible situation to ultimately be in the real world
but I think that was the valuable you know experience was taking that part of the equation
as seriously as writing that amazing script because if it's just the pitch it's about
trust why should we trust you to be the one that gets hired to write something and you
need to put that work in because the person that you're pitching to if they're valuable
if they're like high high powerful executive on the top of of a major company they don't
have a lot of time so you can't just kind of waltz in and throw ideas around you have
to like really just snark test your presentation to the point where it's fantastic it doesn't
matter how long you've done it too like it's not just doing it once maybe you do it 10
times maybe you do it more but it has to be at a point where a new person who's never
heard of this project sees it and if it's done on zoom that's where the situation is
it's fine you move them you get them to go this is something that I want to get behind
and that's what was successful I sold multiple projects so I think that you have to when
you sell these new films or tv shows you want to make sure that the energy that of your
idea is transferring and the information is to people who don't have the same level of
relationship that you do and it could have been harder during the during that time to
get make this work because it was so unnatural to everybody involved but once we were okay
with it we're like this is our our frame a screen this is the attention span we designed
it to the user to the individual who has the power to say yes and that's why I was successful
and that's my my role in this project was making sure that the pitch was ready for showtime
do you have the writer film themselves and then you critique it or they even watch themselves
back to see how are they coming across in the pitch I don't have them look at themselves
on video but what I do is I firm it up with them and then I just recommend them just testing
it on people they respect so get to the right length and you're just hitting those beats
over and over again it's almost like you want to make it feel like it's natural but it's
not it's designed when you do a certain expression or when you pause they're going to lean in
it's so designed that you're kind of taking them on a on a journey but where the tracks
are do you think most writers take too long to get to the point because by nature they
love writing they love communicating and they need to shorten their message I think there's
no one experience i've had on the on the pitching front but I do think that it's very important
and that the people that you want to bring on as stakeholders in your your in your movie
or your tv show they have a little window and you have to get them to care because they
might not they may not start caring you have to take them from potentially apathy to really
being invested and that's the journey you have to take them take them on in it's really
there's no one approach and there's no one writer with a certain temperament it's all
across the board but the more you cycle through feedback and really perfect it you have a
better chance of resonating with the right people so a great writer and a great pitch
turns apathetic people into sitting up straight in their chair I mean they may not give you
any tells because an individual might just be like this the whole time so you might not
know it's not to be totally clear it's not they're gonna applause or anything like a
big applause at the at the end of it they might give you a poker face okay because maybe
they don't want to give you anything during this time frame because when you sell something
they're spending money and maybe it's maybe it's an investor maybe it's someone who has
a fund or maybe they know someone of money whoever it is someone's taking a risk so you
might not get like any tells that it's resonating you might just get a very apathetic expression
but if they have all the information they need to make a decision once it's over
behind closed doors they might say it was pretty cool but they might not give that to
you during that time because they might lose power they have more of ability to really
think it through if there's a wall that's up over here because then they could think
about it they could talk to collaborators and really discuss the opportunity it doesn't
matter if they have a reaction or not you've tested it on all the right individuals that
give you feedback so regardless of the emotional reaction of who's listening at the end of
the day is you're ready that's what matters almost envision yourself at like a live poker
you're watching live poker on tv and you see these people with the dark shades and the
and the cat pulled down and almost envision yourself pitching in front of them and there's
going to be no reaction no they're not even going to scratch their nose to give away some
kind of discomfort or nervousness absolutely but there could be another type of potential
buyer who talks all the time so you just want to be able to test your pitch out on all sorts
of personalities if you don't know who you're pitching is it just going to be like a quiet
room that has low energy that could be the case or somebody keeps cutting you off you
have to be ready and flexible to get your message out in a confident professional way
so there could be high energy hyper almost like a caged animal type of a pitch not on
the writer's part but of the of the person being pitched you just don't know who they
are right I mean it's just like anybody we all have different personalities if you don't
know who you're pitching you could be ready for any type of energy you pull them in and
they really feel something you might know you might not know it doesn't matter you just
need to know you're ready for it with this call the zoom pitch that you're talking about
how many people were on the call and then was the project purchased after the zoom call
like immediately after I think it was might have been five or six I don't really completely
remember everybody that was on it but it was about it was about five or six and it wasn't
bought on the call um there was like we heard later typically I haven't experienced anything
that just happens in the moment where somebody would commit to so that it typically has a
bit of a delay where people have to regroup
like do how much like did you hear maybe a month later a week later I think it was a
I think it was about a week or so okay so you didn't lose too much sleep but no you
were you were waiting and then once do you get do you get an email that says it's a go
we're having people draw up contracts or do they have more questions there were there
really weren't any more questions on this event it wasn't didn't continue to like pull
information from the players involved in this project it was established on that one pitch
oh okay so then the email was basically we love it's a green light yeah the phone call
was like that yeah oh okay nice how long was the final curated pitch are you talking about
the the pitch that does that include the q a afterwards oh so so there's the pitch and
then the five people and there's a q a um well some people on the who are being pitched
to have some questions but it wasn't a lot I would say in in total I think that this
this one for about 30 minutes like because what happens also too it starts with a little
bit of like small talk so first is a small talk then there's a pitch and then there's
like a little questions and answers but that was it was about half an hour and this is
a silly question but in a time of sensitivity what is acceptable small talk because you
could really say the wrong thing and you think you're joking and you're just being sarcastic
whatever what is an acceptable realm of small talk and and how should a writer behave just
like any other job that the writer might have had what is an expectation if you worked in
an office or if you're a student in college it's what you would do in these settings that
you just have to hold a a serious presentation of yourself it's not a a space to be acting
so out of like out of that frame because there's an expectation that when you're in this kind
of room is that they're taking a risk on you when you're trying to get somebody to invest
in you and there's money on the line why do you go in their shoes how do they if you're
them what kind of person would you want to risk a fortune on and that should establish
how you behave is you just have to have empathy for them and if you do then how you initially
present yourself will be the right professional face well there's different cultures in different
workplaces i've worked in somewhere nothing but the facts don't don't refer to anything
that's not work related whereas there's others where people shared personal details of their
life and that was the norm it was probably too far on the spectrum but just knowing like
reading the room like going in because some people might have a little bit of more of
a looser style but you don't want to overstep that bound and that's an easy line to cross
especially these days well I mean this is most likely a new relationship in when i'm
talking about if you don't know what their approach to their business is is that you
might not know them that well or know them at all if they're a stranger then more of
a neutral approach makes sense because you can have the empathy that if this investor
is going to finance your film you could come out with more of a baseline because you don't
know them and you don't have to perfectly match their energy but you have to be respectful
of what kind of dynamic they're going to get into if they're good at green light your movie
so I think the key is not leading with assumptions and just imagining what it would be like to
be sitting down in the other chair and having to take a major risk on someone you don't
know or barely know in the terms of this online pitch during the pandemic that we're referring
to was this an existing relationship or did you start this during did you reach out to
this person during the pandemic I’d say that some parties had a relationship with
the buyers some didn't it was a mix.
What key insights did you gain from this video?