Over the years, I have pitched to more than one hundred executives, agents and managers. In the beginning I would write out my pitch and memorize it. Then when I was face to face with the exec, I’d trip over my tongue. Getting control of my nerves was always a problem. I don’t know what it is. I can pitch the hell out of a friend’s script but there’s more at stake when it’s my own.
But then I realized that the way I write is not the way that I speak. I had to make my pitch sound more like a conversation. So I recorded it as if I were talking to a friend and played it over and over until it became second nature.
It’s my advice to practice your pitch until you are so comfortable talking about your movie that you don’t have to think about it. Then, when the opportunity presents itself, all you need is raw enthusiasm.
I’ve seen a manager get so excited about a writer’s script that it got into a bidding war that paid the highest price for a spec script in years. And I’m not sure the studios bidding actually read the script. If you can talk about your story like it’s the person you love most in the world, people will feed off your emotion.
We’ll continue this in Part 2…
#pitchingtoanagent #pitchingyourscript