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Screenwriting Services In The United States And Abroad
P.O. Box 1898 / Mt. Pleasant, SC 29465-1898 USA
Call toll-free: 1 (800) 876-6202 / Fax: +1 (843) 881-1899 / From overseas: +1 (843) 881-6080
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Screenwriting Services In The United States And Abroad P.O. Box 1898 / Mt. Pleasant, SC 29465-1898 USA Call toll-free: 1 (800) 876-6202 / Fax: +1 (843) 881-1899 / From overseas: +1 (843) 881-6080 Electronic mail: dickcote@bookdoctor.com |
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SCREENWRITING
SERVICESFor the author of a screenplay, the financial rewards can be substantial. During the 1990s, the number of screenplays which sold for $1,000,000 and over jumped dramatically. And in a 1996 interview, acclaimed actor/director Ron Howard said, "an independent screenwriter or director has a better chance of getting a film produced today than in any time in the past."
We can take your ideas and experiences and create a powerful feature film screenplay ready to sell to major studios or independent production companies. Our skilled writers don't keep you waiting. Working closely with you, we can develop a first-rate, professionally-formatted, production-ready screenplay from your concepts in 90-120 days. And our screenwriters can travel anywhere in the world to work with you.
With the stakes this high and competition so tough, authors frequently turn to highly-skilled screenwriting collaborators for assistance. These are the feature film screenwriting services we offer:
Feature film screenplay analysis ("coverage"). In order to compete with the best of the best, screenwriters need strong, solid guidance about their work. Our screenwriting critics are all veteran screenwriting professionals with solid teaching credentials or production credits under their belts. We analyze and report on all the screenwriting essentials: structure, plot development, characterization, and formatting. We tell you everything that works, and everything that needs strengthening. And then we go on to tell you how to improve whatever is weak.
Service: feature film screenplay analysis and critique
Finished product: 6-8 page report
Time to produce: 30 days
Cost (for a standard feature film screenplay of 105-115 pages): $500.00
Service: feature film screenplay "pitch treatment"
Finished product: 3-4 page thumbnail sketch of the plot
Time to produce: 30 days after a face-to-face conference with the author
Cost: $5,000 plus travel expenses
Service: full feature film screenplay treatment
Finished product: 8-10 page detailed outline of the plot
Time to produce: 30 days after a face-to-face conference with the author
Cost: $10,000 plus travel expenses
Service: writing a feature film screenplay
Finished product: 105-115-page screenplay, formatted to industry standards
Time to produce: 90 days after agreeing on the treatment and character biographies
Cost: each project quoted individually. Please call us toll-free at (800) 876-6202. From overseas, call +1 843 881-0232.
Service: novelizing a screenplay
Finished product: 300-page / 100,000-word novel
Time to produce: 120 days after agreeing on the outline and character sketches
Cost: each project quoted individually. Please call us toll-free at (800) 876-6202. From overseas, call +1 843 881-0232.
A Feature Film Treatment (early draft) SHOOTING STARS
Story by Yair Packer
Treatment and Screenplay written by Yair Packer,
Karen Mitura, and Richard N. Côté
W.G.A. Registration # 057618-00
Copyright © 1996 by Yair Packer. All rights reserved.
Actor TOM ERICKSON is bright, funny, and caring. At 30, he's undergoing a premature mid-life crisis, because he was a teen idol at 15 and a has-been at 20.
His fortune spent, he suffers through the indignity of watching his MOTHER die on an open ward in Bellevue. His last words to her are a promise that he will fulfill her dream to see him back on top. Just as she draws her last breath, his agent calls and drops him.
PHYLLIS SUSKIND, 30, is a ruthless mind dwelling in a brilliant body. The passion she inspires in the men she works with is instantly frozen into nothingness by the scalpel-slashing manner with which she wields her authority as Network VP of Marketing.
Seeking to rid himself of the Lady Macbeth of marketing, the NETWORK CEO has sentenced Phyllis to transform a losing soap opera, "Private Lives," starring his MISTRESS, into the number-one show on daytime TV. If she fails she will be fired. As Phyllis tells him that "Private Lives" should be coded DNR, Do Not Resuscitate, she has a brainstorm. She will add a new character, played by an actor with a real terminal disease, and broadcast his real death as it actually happens.
Knowing that the public likes gory spectacles, but turns away from death itself, the CEO gives his blessing. He believes that this will sink her career.
Reminded by his doctor at his mother's death bed that he has neglected his own health in caring for her, Tom keeps his promise to have a check up. Tom is examined by DR. PAUL FINE, 40's, who is filling in for his father. Although knowledgeable, Paul could use some time in Mayberry to brush up on his bedside manner. A specialist in Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS, or Lou Gehrig's Disease), he bluntly informs Tom that he has this illness. It is a disease of the central nervous system which is incurable, progressive, and lethal. Paul sends Tom for testing. The tests confirm the worst -- he has one year to live.
Phyllis, who is dating Paul, recognizes Tom from his glory days. She rummages through his private medical records and targets Tom for the role of the dying actor.
Phyllis tracks Tom down at a children's charity fund-raiser at Sardi's Restaurant. She offers him a million-dollar starring role in "Private Lives." Tom tells her he may not be able to accept a long-term contract because he is dying. Phyllis explains that's why they want him. Every stage of his illness will be part of the program. The height of the story will be his live death via satellite, telecast throughout the whole USA -- maybe worldwide. He will make history being the first actor to actually die on the air as part of a scripted plot.
Tom declines the job. He later relents when he finds out that the only hope for him is a costly experimental treatment, which the studio agrees to fund. Tom's role in the soap and the exploitation of his illness make him an overnight success again. Suddenly he has it all back: the public adulation, glitz, and big bucks. Having already done the super-star bit, Tom tries to avoid the things he knows will end up owning him. Phyllis, however, requires that he keep up the star image, including the obligatory luxury condo and chauffeur-driven limo. Tom prevails upon her to hire GABRIEL, a Jamaican steetperson he has encountered, as his chauffeur.
Gabe is deliriously grateful. Although Tom is plagued with fans who loved him in his youth, Gabe and Phyllis are the only people in his present life who do not withdraw from him. Gabriel makes long lists of amusingly ludicrous ways for Tom to spend his million dollars.
Paul comes to the set to give Tom a medical checkup. He confronts Phyllis, accuses her of exploiting a dying man, and breaks off their relationship. Phyllis spits out that it's really too bad: the two of them had a perfect use-and-be-used relationship.
TIFFANY, the CEO's girlfriend, feels upstaged by Tom and is doing everything she can to make his life even more miserable. Tom is in a corner reviewing his lines when Tiffany intentionally bumps into him, knocking the script out of Tom's hand. Tiffany walks away and starts shouting at the DIRECTOR that she will not do a scene in which she has to kiss Tom.
Tiffany reeks of liquor and the director tells her so. Tiffany replies loudly that the smell of Jack Daniels is infinitely better than that of death. Phyllis arrives on the set just in time to overhear this. She rips the script out of Tiffany's hands, reads it breathtakingly with Tom, and shares a kiss that would melt the polar ice caps off Mars.
Fan letters come in by the thousands. People don't want Tom to die. Phyllis had expected them to stir them with the scent of blood, but when women show up with picket signs reading, "We love Tom," and "Don't write him off!" she realizes his matinee idol status eclipsed his original role. The public refuses to believe his illness is real.
Tom's condition has worsened. He spends a week in the hospital and a week out. Phyllis and Gabriel are the only ones who visit Tom at the hospital when scenes aren't being shot there. Gabriel brings Tom the daily newspaper, reads him the headlines and cracks jokes with him. Phyllis says she is only there to gather material for the story line, but she brings Tom silly little gifts and spends hours sitting with him.
Walking together on the hospital grounds, Phyllis consoles Tom about his close friends dropping him. She says he is lucky. Friendship is too demanding. You have to give away a part of yourself, show you care, and consider your friends' feelings. Then you open up to them and reveal too much by accident. Suddenly you don't have a friend anymore, just someone to remind you of your past. Tom says he is in unique position befriend her in the short term. There will be no commitment for a long and tiring friendship and, he adds heavily, definitely no romance. He can guarantee her secrets will go to the grave.
They make a date for the next day, when Tom anticipates being released. They have a Chinese dinner, drink too much wine, and on the way home are adopted by a bedraggled mutt that Tom names Laz -- Lazarus.
Phyllis won't allow the filthy mutt in her house, so they go to Tom's apartment to bathe him. As they do so, Phyllis shares that she originally wanted to act but gave it up. Laz jumps out of the tub and into Phyllis's lap, soaking her through. She changes into Tom's plaid flannel boxers and T-shirt and washes off her running makeup. Tom tells her how beautiful and young she looks and impulsively kisses her lightly on the lips.
She kisses him back with a kiss that evaporates the Martian rivers which began flowing when they melted the ice caps. They make love hungrily, but Phyllis leaves as soon as Tom falls asleep.
Tom's popularity grows to unimagined proportions. The CEO wants Phyllis to build a TV special like "This is Your Life," based around Tom. All of the meaningful people in his past will be brought back. She lines up Tom's drama teacher from high school, the lawyer who unsuccessfully handled Tom's wife's hit-and-run accident case, next door neighbors, and old romances. Phyllis hates how the media monster she created is feeding on Tom's mortality, but she is locked into doing it by her contract.
Tom learns that Gabe has a wife and six children in Jamaica. He anonymously gives him the money to bring them to the states, buy a home, and establish college funds for all of them.
Phyllis sees Paul when she is visiting Tom during one of the courses of experimental treatment. She asks him about the effects of ALS on reproduction. When he asks her why she wants to know, she says it is for script research. He assures her Tom's ALS should have no effect on a child he fathered.
Phyllis tells Tom she is pregnant. He asks her what she wants to do. When she says she doesn't know, he tells her he will support her with the decision no matter what she chooses.
Tom is so worn down that his makeup man comments he no longer has to make him look ill. He is debilitated to the extent that Phyllis hires a celebrity DOUBLE to fulfill his obligations for public appearances.
Phyllis arranges for Tom's birthday to be celebrated on the set after he finishes an episode. He blows out the candles, looking at Phyllis as he makes a wish. He starts to say something, but collapses in mid-sentence. Phyllis screams. The director shouts for an assistant to call an ambulance and orders the camera operators to start filming.
The CEO is on the set schmoozing with Tiffany. Tom's collapse gets his attention just long enough for him to order Phyllis to make sure he lives. If he dies the gimmick will end and the ratings plummet.
In tears at his hospital bed, Phyllis orders the CAMERA OPERATORS out of the room. One of them comments that she'll get fired for this.
She tells Tom she is going to have his baby. Now that she has made the decision, Tom tells her how thrilled he is. Now he has a goal of staying alive to see the baby born.
Tom tells Phyllis he wants to buy out the contract. He has sold his condo to replace the money already spent. He doesn't want his unborn child to learn someday that he sold his dignity.
Phyllis battles with the CEO who refuses to let Tom out of the contract. He tells her that Tom can either play out the rest of his life on the set or he can do it in court.
Tom is so elated by Phyllis's decision to have the child that he decides he will make the best of the situation and honor the contract. He establishes a trust fund to care for her and the baby after his death.
His joy over the baby fuels an ALS remission. Paul tells Phyllis this is a matter of mind over matter and will not last.
When Phyllis is seven months pregnant, Tom bribes his way into access to her apartment and has her home office turned into a fantasy nursery one day while she is in work. She is initially furious with him, but reverses instantly when she realizes he may not be there to see the baby in the nursery.
While giving his acceptance speech for a daytime Emmy Award, Tom collapses and is hospitalized with no release anticipated. He is pumped up with drugs and pain killers and conscious for no more than ten minutes at a time. The moments are so unpredictable that all the lines they thought Tom would deliver from his hospital bed must be dumped. The scenes in the hospital are shot as cinema verite live footage.
Gabriel and his family visit Tom daily and pray at his bedside for his recovery. Phyllis is with Tom as much as possible, trying to catch the last moments of his consciousness. They are out of sync and she keeps missing Tom's waking moments.
She goes into premature labor and delivers a healthy baby girl she names STAR. Paul visits them in the hospital and tells her Tom will be lucky if he lasts the weekend. Phyllis makes a phone call.
Phyllis carries the baby in to see Tom and places her in his arms. She orders the camera crew outside. They start to go, but the CEO appears with Tiffany on his arm. She's whining that she wants to go to a party. He tells her to shut up and orders the camera operators to keep shooting continuously. Phyllis motions Gabe into the hall talking to him out of their hearing.
Phyllis goes back to Tom and takes the baby from his limp arms. Gabe talks in the background to his WIFE and TEEN daughter. He takes all of his CHILDREN out of the room except for the teen.
Standing bored, looking out the window waiting, Tiffany suddenly lets out a scream. Gabriel is out on the ledge of the hospital building. He's going to jump. He says he wants to die with Tom. Phyllis says it's a shame that the camera crew can't film it. They have enough footage of Gabe with Tom that they could cut it into the show. She adds that they'd need his wife's release. The wife, who had bolted for the window and was looking anxiously out for Gabe, says that they gave Tom a million, but she'll settle for half a million.
The CEO looks at Tom's monitors and decides Tom is unlikely to die in the next few minutes. As Gabriel screams that nothing can make him change his mind, the CEO shoos the camera crew out to film him. Tiffany drags the CEO from the room, whining about not missing more of the party.
Tom regains consciousness and discovers that he is on a chaise lounge in the nursery at Phyllis's apartment. She is rocking the baby in a chair next to him, watching TV. The program shows footage of Gabe being talked off the ledge by his teenaged daughter. Phyllis tells him not to worry, that Gabe is fine. She says that Gabe and his family turned out to be the best actors she ever had work for her.
Puzzled, he watches his own death. As Paul pronounces him dead and flips of the monitors a shade too dramatically, she explains that the celebrity double she had replace Tom wasn't too shabby either. She puts Star in Tom's arms, telling him that she bets Star will be a great actress someday. [END]
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