The Mail I Get

If I Call My House a ‘Residential Erotic Writing Workshop’ Can I Write Off My Mortgage Payments?

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I got this spam email over the weekend:

Critically acclaimed author and anthologist Mitzi Szereto will be conducting a residential erotic writing workshop at
the world-renown Esalen Institute in Big Sur, California in January 2006. Mitzi
is credited with putting the erotic writing workshop on the map in the UK and
Europe, and has conducted them in locations from England’s Lake District to the
Greek islands.

I like to think of my house as a residential erotic writing workshop but my wife doesn’t always agree.

If This Is An Example of How He Writes Press Releases, I think I’ll Pass

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I got this spam email today from a PR firm. Here’s how it began:

Dear Mr. Golgberg:

I would like to make you aware of my public relations company as I
feel I could be a perfect fit for helping you promote and publicize your company
as well as your books.  My clients have been featured in publications numbering
Parade Magazine, People, Entertainment Weekly, Time, Forbes, Wall Street
Journal, Newsweek, and USA Today; as well as television shows such as Oprah,
Good Morning America, C-SPAN, CNN, CNBC, etc.

A real grabber, isn’t it? Now imagine what he writes for his clients.  (That’s aside from how he  messed up my name and offered to publicize a company that I don’t have).

Will the price of gas affect what studios pay for spec scripts?

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I had this  email exchange today:

I am wondering how much of an affect does the current state of the country will have on Holly Wood when it comes to buying scripts?

I replied:

Not to be dense, but I don’t understand your question. Do you mean the
economy? The war in Iraq? The hurricane in New Orleans? And what do you
mean by affect? The kinds of stories Hollywood will or won’t buy? The
money they are paying for specs?

He replied:

I apologize for not being specific. I was talking about everything you
mentioned including the high gas prices.  Will these events have an
affect on the number of scripts Hollywood will purchase for this year?
Will they have an affect on the purchasing price for the scripts they
do buy?

I replied:

That is such a broad question, I couldn’t possibly answer it. I have no idea if all the events in the world today — economic, political and social — will affect the number of scripts Hollywood buys or what they pay for them.  But I want to be helpful, so  here’s some advice: Don’t write a script about a private eye who can communicate with plants. I think a story like that wouldn’t do well no matter what is happening in the world today.

Mystery Lovers Corner

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I got a spam email the other day from Dawn Doodle of  Mystery Lovers Corner, an amateurish website that, for a one-time fee of $35, will list your bio and  one of your books.

You don’t want readers to wonder why your books aren’t here.

Lots of categories to classify your books.

We had our Grand Opening 5/27/05, and since then we‚ve had over 1700 hits to the website.  More authors are joining daily.  Currently over 60 have joined, including Carolyn Hart, Joanne Fluke, Robin Hathaway, and Lyn Hamilton.

We also have a Featured Author each month.  They answer interview questions and are featured on an additional page for no additional cost.  In the future, we may increase the number of Featured Authors each month to give more authors the extra exposure

I don’t see how paying for "exposure" on this amateurishly-designed, no-prestige, low-traffic site is much of a promotional opportunity — not to brag, but I get more hits here per day than they’ve had in five months. A blank page could probably get more hits (especially if you put the word breasts in the text somewhere).  Her low traffic and sloppy design simply aren’t worth the thirty five bucks.

In my opinion, you’re much better off spending the money on a five month subscription
to Typepad ($4.95-a-month, first month free) and starting your own blog. It will
look a lot better than her site, it will focus only on YOU, and you’ll probably
get as much (if not more) traffic than you would on her obscure corner of
cyberspace.

Can You Get My Portrait Signed?

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I got this email today:

My wife and I have been huge Dick Van Dyke fans since the early 1960’s.  Would
you please consider forwarding this email to Mr. Van Dyke, since it concerns a
portrait of him that I recently completed.  I’m hoping to persuade him to sign
one of my prints for my private art collection of celebrity portraits…

… I realize that this is a brazen request, but I hope that you will consider it
anyway.  If you would like, I’ll send you a digital photo so that you can
determine if my Dick Van Dyke drawing is worthy of a signature.

Please don’t.

Intercutting

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I got this email today:

I’m having trouble presenting a multiple location event in my screenplay. Let’s say, for example, there are 5 peace rallies in 5 US cities all going on at the same time. At each event there is some action and dialogue. We stay only briefly at each location. How the heck is that written? Every way I try to present it seems awkward. Thanks for your time.

Here’s how I replied. I think one reason it’s awkward is that the situation isn’t very conducive to good story telling. It’s hard to create conflict, or reveal much character, or tell a story, while cutting back and forth between five very similar events. My first bit of advice would be to restructure your story so you DON’T have to cut between five nearly identical events. But, barring that, you need to make it as simple as you can.

EXT. LOS ANGELES PEACE RALLY – DAY

Griffith Park is crowded with THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE (don’t you just love CGI? How did people make movies before?) It’s pouring rain. Biff and Joan make love in the mud while everyone around them sings Koombaya. Joan has great breasts. INTERCUT WITH:

EXT. CHICAGO PEACE RALLY – NIGHT

Convention Center. There are TENS OF THOUSANDS of peace-loving people here. But we don’t care about them. We FIND Jake creeping under the stage, carrying the BOMB that’s hidden inside the
INFLATABLE WOMAN. She has great breasts, too. INTERCUT WITH:

INT. SEATTLE PEACE RALLY – DAY

Hundreds of people mill around the base of the SPACE NEEDLE, holding hands and chanting. We PAN UP to the observation tower of the Space Needle, where HOYT, 12, is about to pour a cup of STARBUCK COFFEE on the people below, some of whom have great breasts and some of whom don’t. INTERCUT WITH:

and when you’re done visiting your five locations (I am exhausted just thinking about it), you end the sequence with a simple END INTERCUT.

Can I Sue?

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I got this email the other day:

If you’ve got
any time in your hectic sked to offer me advice I’d be grateful. As far as I know, you’re not a lawyer, but as a seasoned pro you may know!
Anyone that writes anything knows that ideas float around the ether waiting to be written.
Who hasn’t at least once, had that great , only to find out a week later  has just nailed a deal for the
same premise. That’s just the way it goes.

However… six years ago I wrote my first screenplay. It’s called XYZ, and it’s about an ex-astronaut who owns a farm/ranch in Montana. He builds his own rocket in a grain silo to launch himself into space.
Today I read that Billy Bob Thornton is to star in a movie called THE ASTRONAUT FARMER about… well you guessed it!There are no other plot points for me to see and compare yet.

I registered the screenplay electronically with ProtectRite in 1999. In the past few years I’ve entered the screenplay into a few competitions including Tribeca Films – for which I got a commendation, didn’t win of course.

So my question is this… let’s say this in-production screenplay bears a remarkable or even "uncanny" similarity to my finished work in structure and story. Do I have any recourse,  or is it just tough shit as I’m a still un-produced nobody without an agent?

Like you said, I’m not a lawyer. My guess is that
you’d have to prove that the screenwriter and producers had access to your screenplay and read it.
But I will say this, it’s not the world’s most original idea. There was even an
Andy Griffith TV movie with roughly the same concept and that later spawned a
short-lived TV series called SALVAGE ONE.

I think you sort of answered the question yourself in the first paragraph of your email… sometimes, people just get the same idea at the same time.

Many years ago, Bill and I thought we had a great idea for a spec script… a Russian cop who comes to the U.S. to find a bad guy and gets paired up with an LAPD detective. We called it RED HEAT. We were in the midst of writing it when we heard about…you guessed it… a movie going into production called RED HEAT starring Arnold as a Russian cop. This has happened to us many times during our career.

For a couple years now, Bill and I have been pitching a procedural series around town  about a special, multi-agency law enforcement team that goes after the most-wanted fugitives. This summer, TNT premiered WANTED, a series with the same basic notion. Do we think we were ripped off? No. There were probably a dozen guys out there pitching a variation of the same idea at the same time we were. That’s the entertainment business.

 

Playing in Someone Else’s Sandbox

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I received this lengthy email the other day. It read, in part:

I can understand intellectual property concerns about currently or recently
active creative concepts, but when a creative concept has been tried and
presented by the producers and craftsmen, has run its course and been
cancelled, has stopped being shown in reruns, has no active tie-ins, and
appears to have been completely mothballed by the original creators and
stakeholders of the concept – AT THAT POINT, would you still consider it
wrong for a fanfiction author to attempt to step in and write creatively in
that sandbox?

I ask this because I had been considering a fanfiction based on a series
you produced 10 years ago that has disappeared from the face of the earth.
I admit, as a potential fan-fiction writer, that the lure of
already established character study materials, settings, etc., is enticing –
like the idea of taking down and playing with a set of dolls – er, I mean,
ACTION FIGURES.

As for my own writing career, I’ve never had the courage
to try creating something truly original…

Here is how I replied: My personal feeling is that you are better off, in every possible
way, writing something original. I would never consider writing in "someone
else’s sandbox" unless they invited me to.  I never contemplated writing DIAGNOSIS MURDER or MONK novels. I am only writing those books now because
the rights-holders and/or  creators asked me to.  So my answer to you is this…the
show you’re thinking about, whatever it is, doesn’t belong to you. Or me. Write something that is your
own. The creative and personal benefits far outweigh the convenience of writing
with someone else’s creations. Good luck!

How Not To Sell Your Book II

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I got this spam email today:
 

Dear fellow MWA members and members of the forensic society,
    I have written a murder mystery series beginning with Death, Then
Murder and Murder Under Fire starring C.J. Thompson and Lauren
Lamplier.  I have also written a nonfiction book letting everyone know that God
sends messages to us through His angels in human form to make us aware of His
plans for us.  This one is titled INCOMING Listening For God’s Messages, A
Handbook For Life  and is a must read for young adults.  The reader will
find a miraculous change in their perspective towards others once realizing that
everyone may potentially be carrying a message from God.Take a look at www.amazon.com .

 
Enjoy and thanks,
Fred C. Wootan

Okay, Fred. Here’s the thing. This email is a marketing miss-fire on every level. Let’s dissect it line-by-line and explore why. My comments are in italics.

7025224128a0db5f5ec05010_aa240_l   I have written a murder mystery series beginning with Death, Then
Murder and Murder Under Fire starring C.J. Thompson and Lauren
Lamplier. Good for you, Fred. But the
fact you have written (and apparently self-published) a book isn’t
reason enough for someone to buy it. You have to pitch it to us, man! What makes it interesting? What’s
the hook? It’s not that it "stars" CJ Thompson and Lauren Lamplier…because no one knows who the hell they are. Their names are meaningless. Are they cops? Insurance investigators? Lesbian nurses? Transvestite paratroopers? Come on, Fred, show us some salesmanship!  I have also written a nonfiction book letting everyone know that God
sends messages to us through His angels in human form to make us aware of His
plans for us. This one is titled INCOMING Listening For God’s Messages, A
Handbook For Life  and is a must read for young adults.  The reader will
find a miraculous change in their perspective towards others once realizing that
everyone may potentially be carrying a message from God. That sentence is a rambling mess, Fred.  Not a good advertisement for the book or the writer. So which book is it you’re trying to sell us, the mystery thing or the Angels thing? Or is it both? Either way, neither sales-pitch is very strong. Take a look at www.amazon.com. Even if we wanted to ‘take a look’, and you haven’t given us much of a reason, you don’t even link to your books, just to the Amazon home page. You’re making us do all the work, Fred. Not good. You want to make it easy for your customers to get to the product, you don’t want them to have to hunt for it…because they won’t. And you totally forgot to mention that you also wrote THE SUCCESSFUL INSURANCE AGENCY which, if you ask me, is the real must-read for young adults.

“Would You Be Interested In Writing a Book On My Life?”

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I got this email today. It’s so, um, incredible that the only way to truly appreciate it is to read the whole thing. I present it here unedited. All I’ve done is remove the sender’s name (why, oh why, do they write to me?)

Dear Sir,

I can only imagine once you have read the first coupple of lines
of this letter you will probably think that I am mad ? but who knows and no one
ever said there was ever any harm in trying?

I was wondering if you would be able to assist or if you would be
interested in writing a book on my life, or at least advice me on how to write a
book, I will give you a brief outline.
 
I was born in the UK my Dad died when I was little and I had a  real struggle growing
up. I joined the Royal air Force and had a good life in the military,
I was in there for 15 years until I met my girlfriend,I came to America and gave up a military career and  pension and
benefits because I got my girlfriend pregnant, I stood by her and did what was
right, I married her she is an officer in the United States Air force.
I was left with the child our son Rhys at 4 months of age while
she went away on a TDY and partied getting drunk and blowing away $7000 of my
money that I gave to her to pay off a car loan to benefit us as a newly wed
couple.

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