Thread by @MXHeilig

So earlier this week, I did a lil survey of the big screenwriting competitions to see which correlated best with moving forward in the biz: landing representation and paid work. Here's what I found (thread)

#screenwriting #pipelinewriters

Out of 55 finalists across 6 contests, 22 landed a rep or paid work after the contest (that's 40%). 7 of those writers (13% of all finalists) now have the makings of a screenwriting career. Before I get into how each contest did, a lil word on methodology

This is some back of napkin math, and if anyone wants to gather more data, I encourage you to research more years or competitions (or try a feature focus). For each competition, I googled 10 finalists to see where they're at now. TV first, but features as well in certain cases.

All of mine are 2016 finalists. Which seems to be the right length of time – roughly half of the 7 writers that now have the makings of a career got their first staff job in the past couple years. So, the contests, bottom to top. The results were surprising...

Austin Film Festival: 2/10 finalists made next steps (such as reps, option, or sale). But none of the 10 were landing steady work, on TV or features. Again, this is a limited set of data, but I was a little surprised here.

Nicholl: 4/10 finalists made next steps. None making a career from it, as of yet. For obvious reasons, this was the only contest I relied on features for, so it's a little bit of a funky comparison.

Next we have Page: 5/10 finalists made next steps, and one of those even has a career going, with multiple TV staff writing gigs!

After that, we've got @TBLaunchPad: 4/10 finalists made next steps, and two of them have started a real career in the biz.

Then it's @finaldraftinc Big Break, with 4/10 finalists making next steps – ALL of whom have since made a career in screenwriting! In the case of one finalist, that also included co-writing a massive, narrative-driven video game.

@finaldraftinc But in terms of writers making next steps, @ScriptPipeline came in first: 6 out of 10 finalists from 2016 have since landed reps or deals. One of them now has a staff writing job (and others landing credits, selling scripts, and placing on the most recent blacklist)

@finaldraftinc @ScriptPipeline I want to emphasize that I'm tracking correlation, not causation here. In many cases, I'm sure these contest placements helped move these writers forward in their careers. But to earn those placements, they were already talented writers. That said, a win can't hurt.

@finaldraftinc @ScriptPipeline Two takeaways:

One, a contest placement (or even a win) does not by any measure grant you a career. Only 13% of the finalists were earning steady work in the business, though plenty of others had made deals or landed reps.

@finaldraftinc @ScriptPipeline Two, it takes time. Man, does it take time. Most of the writers landing steady work got there in the past couple years. Most of these writers found their career down the line – not in the year or two after placing.