How do I break into Hollywood?
Short answer: You don’t.
Slightly longer answer: The question is meaningless.
I recently co-hosted a series of panel discussions for the USC School of Cinema-Television aimed at helping current students and recent graduates think about the first years out in the real world. “How do I break in” was the unspoken question in almost every session, so much so that I had to call it out in the wrap-up.
Here’s why it’s an invalid question: there is no “breaking in.”
For people just starting their careers in the film industry, it often seems like there’s a wall keeping them out, or at least a velvet rope, manned by a burly guy with a clipboard and a bad attitude. But the wall, the rope and the bouncer are all illusions. There’s no systematic effort to keep newcomers out of Hollywood. (On the contrary, in many categories there’s a disturbing tendency to favor the young at all costs.)
So if there isn’t a wall, why does it feel like there’s a wall?
Well, okay. There’s a wall. But it’s not a keep-out-the-infidels kind of wall. Rather, it’s a keep-the-roof-from-falling-down kind of wall. There’s a structure to Hollywood, a kind of ramshackle mansion that’s always teetering on collapse. The front door isn’t so much jammed as inaccessible, stuffed full of take-out menus and other solicitations.
So if there isn’t a front door, how does one get inside? You look for a window, a side entrance, a dusty chimney.
That’s what the seminar was about: looking for windows.
A sizable number of attendees were aiming for the below-the-line trades (such as editors, DPs, and visual effects), where there’s a pretty clear career path, roughly approximating the apprenticeship of the old-tyme trades. Basically, one works countless hours for middling pay while learning from experts, then eventually strikes out to shoot, light, edit or visually effect on one’s own. I’m not saying it’s easy — it’s exhausting. But it’s comfortably predictable.
Not so for the writers, or the writer-directors. One panelist, explaining her search for an agent, described her incredibly focused campaign to win every writing award imaginable and target very specific agents whose clients were already working on the TV shows she was suited for. But she didn’t talk about “breaking in,” because once she was staffed on a show, it was clear that there was never really an inside. She was a working writer, but could just as easily find herself a non-working writer by the end of the season. There was no wall, fence or other boundary metaphor dividing those two states.
So I’d ask everyone to disabuse themselves of the idea of “breaking into Hollywood.” It’s not like pledging a fraternity, losing one’s virginity, or pulling off a heist. It’s just getting a job, which is boring and real, and difficult enough without any inflated imagery.
May 15th, 2006 at 6:03 pm
Great info. I believe the reason so many aspiring scribes, such as myself believe that we need to burst open the doors to the incredibly small community of Hollywood is that most people in your situation write about “how they broke in”, as opposed to how they got the job.
Thanks for the insight.
May 15th, 2006 at 6:57 pm
Well put…its the prevailing notion that the business and specifically working in Hollywood seems in so many ways fun and easy (I watch tv/movies all the time, how hard could it be?) that a lot of people who have no business doing it, or certainly wouldn’t consider it for most other professions, are constantly trying to ‘break in’ as opposed to work their way in…
May 15th, 2006 at 7:16 pm
Hone your craft while “waiting” for your big break. The longer it takes, the better you will be. My 2 cents.
May 15th, 2006 at 8:30 pm
Good post, thank you so much for your words…there was a day when I too wanted to “break into hollywood.”
May 15th, 2006 at 11:05 pm
Behind the “breaking in” question is the idea that getting a job comes down to how to get to know the people you need to know. Or, rather, how to get the people you need to know to want to know you. That, I believe, is the commonality between writers and below-the-line folks.
I think it is extremely helpful to demythologize the process. Still, and even allowing for the differences in a TV staff job and movie work, getting that first job has close to zero in common with getting your standard 9-to-5. It has a lot more in common with getting a studio executive job, or most any creative job in entertainment. Yet it is still its own animal.
I agree that “How do you break in” is, ultimately, an invalid question. But no more invalid than that clichéd response: “Write a great script.” The problem with both question and answer is that they paint an incomplete picture.
The question writers should be asking, and the one I suspect was the theme of that panel, is “How do I build a career?”
Please don’t say the answer is “write TWO great scripts.”
RED
May 15th, 2006 at 11:31 pm
I’m certainly glad it’s not like losing your virginity. Otherwise, I’d only be in Hollywood for 3 seconds.
May 16th, 2006 at 3:10 am
Maybe the term “break in� is used is because most writers aren’t anywhere near ready when they start pounding on doors. I know I wasn’t, but it took me a while to come to that realization. The energy spent trying to “break in� will be much better spent writing better and better scripts. I don’t think the response “Write a Great Script� is a cliché. I just think it’s very hard for most beginners to critique their own work.
May 16th, 2006 at 3:17 am
Wise Words, John. Wise Words.
May 16th, 2006 at 6:29 am
I plan on breaking into Hollywood via an air duct.
May 16th, 2006 at 7:02 am
Pragmatic advice is tough to find, thanks. The expectation to “break in” or worse, to be an “overnight success” is so dangerous because is often leads to severe, crippling disappointment. Nobodies an overnight success.
Here’s a question: John, even with your success, have you ever stopped paying dues?
May 16th, 2006 at 12:10 pm
Although I’m not in “the biz,” I have worked as a freelance writer. It seems to me that being an actor or screenwriter is very similar to that. It doesn’t really matter how talented you are, you have to be lucky. You have to hustle all the time and look for your next job before your current job is through. Hopefully, you’ll become known to the people that hire (or buy), and if that happens, you’ll probably work consistently. Eventually, if you’re really lucky, you’ll somehow make the jump to “star,” whatever that means…or you immediately get a lucky job on what becomes a hit TV show. The end…
May 16th, 2006 at 2:13 pm
Maybe it has always been there, but I just noticed the little JA icon next to the URL field at the top of my browser. Being a man of German tongue, I find this … positive.
May 16th, 2006 at 3:03 pm
You have to be at the very top before you stop paying dues, and even then, you’re still a TK-for-hire. Fill in writer, director, DP, editor, prop master or whatever else you want to do out here. Even the top screenwriters are hired by execs at major studios who have conversations with you such as: “Can he be a soldier in Iraq?” “It’s a romantic comedy set in Boston’s world of independent journalism.” “But can it take place in the Baghdad?”
At the lower levels, everyone tells you that your big break is the first screenplay/show you sell or get staffed on. Guess what? It doesn’t get any easier from there. It’s always a hustle for the next job, always another meeting where you have to sell yourself and your work, always someone else at the same level looking for the same gig. It’s not easy. And there’s no breaking in.
It’s just like in any other business. Nobody promotes you to president or CEO of the company after one year as an assistant. It’s a gradual process. There’s no mystery. Just do the work. Work the hours. Hollywood is like a palace behind a brick wall. You have to be able to beat your head into the wall long enough and hard enough. If you can sustain the injury, for a few years, someone on the other side might help you… by handing you a helmet.
May 16th, 2006 at 3:37 pm
Speaking of which, how did you lose your virginity?
May 16th, 2006 at 6:22 pm
I wish I could have thought of something clever to write like “ROB”(air ducts…lol), but thanks for the inspiration…I always leave this website with confidence in myself.
May 16th, 2006 at 9:36 pm
It sounds very much like self-employement. You’re hustling all the time trying to keep your product (scripts) or your other product (you) fresh and in good standing with those that are hiring.
It’s only a career if you manage do continue doing that over a decent amount of time.
I believe the days are gone when you could be hired by a studio as one of their writers and you’d show up 9-5 and write whatever you were told to write/re-write.
If you can look at it like a job, some of the mystique escapes (it’s not as glamorous as it looks from the outside) and also, I imagine it should be easier to accept some of the crazy stories you hear. It’s a job like many others and there are lunatics telling you what to do regardless of your job.
May 16th, 2006 at 11:27 pm
As always, much appreciated.
May 17th, 2006 at 11:42 am
That’s great…but how do I break into Hollywood?
May 17th, 2006 at 12:21 pm
Hey John,
Another great bit of info… just yesterday I posted about the idea that the most important part of Hollywood is not getting invited to the “party.” What’s important, is to stick around the party once you’re there.
Scribe LA Borderline Inappropriate scribela.blogspot.com
May 17th, 2006 at 3:28 pm
I’m just lucky. An agent fell into my lap and he’s been incredibly dependable, helpful, and extraordinarily patient with my “writer” tendencies. Of course, due to my lack of delivery it’s going somewhere slowly. But hell, I don’t mind. I just want to get there before I, you know, turn 80.
May 18th, 2006 at 2:35 am
John,
As usual, you’ve hit the nail on the head with a modicum of words. After 5 or 6 years of slogging away on specs from the age of 20, I suddenly found myself in the middle of a highly paid writing assignment only to experience this exact feeling - and almost being deflated by the blandness of it all.
So as a follow-up to your post, my question is this:
Now that you’re well and truly inside the ‘ramshackle mansion’, was there a moment when you took a breath and felt like you had genuinely arrived or ‘made-it’, or has it simply been a long string of those boring and real moments?
May 19th, 2006 at 6:52 am
You have to sleep with everyone before you a job. That’s Hollywood. John August is so full of it.
May 19th, 2006 at 6:53 am
Thanks for the advice John. Keep up the work !!
May 19th, 2006 at 3:59 pm
I am currently working as an Office PA on a Lifetime Movie of the Week. And I agree with John, there is no breaking in. I want to make it to that writer/director level; but I also need work to help support the family and pay bills. So I do this job, which is not glamorous at all; but it allows me to work on film and television and to meet people and learn from them.
My first gig was as a set PA working for free on a film with a $100,000 budget. I still don’t make a lot and the hours are very long. But I love workign in the industry. But, like any job I just had to keep applying and applying to gigs. I am lucky in that this is my third job here in Louisiana, and I got called to come work on this one. But, we are all looking for our next gig here. I think about a week or two into pre production on any job most people start looking for what is going to come after the project wraps.
So for those that want in, just start sending out the resume and be willing to work for peanuts or less on that first project or few.
May 19th, 2006 at 7:25 pm
Let’s hope Guy Sez writes better scripts than he does sentences. That first one’s missing a word.
May 20th, 2006 at 2:42 am
Great analogies, John. I liken it to getting a job with a top-tier firm, whether in management consulting, investment banking, high-tech product development, etc. Even top-of-the-class people from top-of-the-rankings grad schools have a hard time getting in since—and this is what they don’t tell the undergrads during admissions—everyone is trying to climb over each other to get in the same way.
The trick really is to find a different path. Some savvy individuals practice networking; others will send a registered letter to the specific hiring manager; a few even post their portfolio on the Internet. This last example ranges from blogs for writers to open source projects for software developers.
The key is imagination. After all, imagination is why producers employ writers to begin with. So in whatever field your readers are aspiring to, they can rely on their creativity to get their message across.
May 20th, 2006 at 10:21 am
I like inflated imagery.
May 21st, 2006 at 6:34 pm
I remember being in film school and then getting a job on a real TV show in Orlando, FL. When I showed up they had me dragging heavy cable everywhere for 12 hours a day. In one way it was exactly how I imagined it but in another way it was totally different. Now I want to be a writer and I feel like I’m going through the whole proccess over again. When I wanted to be a technician I networked and practiced my trade as much as possible and that’s what I am doing now. I guess nothing’s really changed.
May 22nd, 2006 at 12:59 pm
John,
Thanks for the dose of reality. We’re really all in this on our own. I’m tall… so reaching the window won’t be a problem. But I’m overweight and out-of-shape, so hoisting myself through might be the real issue. Time to get my writing into shape and give her a go!
Best Regards, Devin
May 22nd, 2006 at 7:13 pm
Great post. Similar topic for the actors in the bunch: here.
No one makes it. No one breaks in. We all just work, work, work… and work some more. And that rocks.
May 23rd, 2006 at 8:27 pm
I JUST RECENTLY JOINED SAG AND WANTED TO FIND OUT HOW I CAN GET AN AGENT TO REPRESENT ME.
May 24th, 2006 at 9:19 am
A dose of reality indeed. I always second guess my ability and it doesn’t help I don’t have an answer for the age old “what have you done?” question. Even though I’m from little old New Zealand and am reasonably young, I’m still determined to make it. Thanks John, your site has been a great help to me when faced with doubt. Renae.
May 24th, 2006 at 1:08 pm
Maybe a screenwriter should just pass by a film production’s office, and toss their script through the window. It might work !
May 25th, 2006 at 2:08 am
I like your thinking Johnny Hartmann. Ajay
July 7th, 2006 at 5:59 pm
A spanish translation of this post is available in Pianista en un Burdel. Thanks a lot, John.
July 11th, 2006 at 11:14 pm
I’m 39 and have just placed in the finals of three spec sit-com competitions. Everyone loves my specs, but at 39, am I too old to break into tv? I’ve heard you have to be 25. I trained at Second City Chicago, so at least I have that under my belt. Any advice, please let me know. (And I don’t need botox yet, I still look early 30’s, so please don’t advise that…)
THANKS for any advice.
January 13th, 2007 at 10:51 pm
Hey Todd, Go for it pal. You are still young at 39, as I am 47 and I would still love a role in Hollywood. I have no training whatsover (in the film industry), but strongly of the opinion that I am talented (as an actor and musician/singer)and believe that I could make the big time…. (and so could you).
January 19th, 2007 at 2:58 am
I recommend the course “You Must Act” by Bob Frazer. For more info, check the website at http://www.youmustact.com or write me at lillis@switchevents.com
Stefan
March 10th, 2007 at 4:42 pm
The fact that we are all considering this is stupid, the fact that we are even considering this is stupid but what seems in reality the only way. Hollywood has fucked up their system it shouldent be about being lucky at all, it should be about having the skills and experiance that suit you. Hollywood need to get their act together.
December 12th, 2007 at 3:40 pm
Hi. I am 47 years old. I am a housewife and believe my job to be very important. I was a nurse for many years, however, I am presently disabled and collect a disability check each month; not much, but at least it is “for-sure” income while I do something like… try to write for Hollywood. My husband works as an IT professional and wants me to do whatever I want. My disability isn’t so severe that I cannot write! So… what classes, or what steps, should I take to begin to hone my skills to something Hollywood would want?
January 22nd, 2008 at 3:55 pm
Hey John,
I still think there is such a thing as breaking in, and I think the question still has meaning. Maybe there are different variations when using the term “Breaking in� but I believe it to be the moment Hollywood accepts you as one of their own (above-the-line) and you’re paid for your talent. How happy were you when you sold your first script to a studio? That would be breaking in. How did you get to that moment? That’s what everyone wants to know because they want to recreate it in their own way.
The tricky thing about breaking in is that it’s very specific to an individual. The breaking-in routes are similar but there’s no one person that can break in like someone else. It’s impossible because they would have had to have met the same exact people and make the same exact movie.
Spielberg broke in after he made Amblin and signed a deal with Universal. Rodriguez broke in after making El Mariachi, and Quentin broke in after Reservoir Dogs, with each way of breaking in being different. So there is such a thing as breaking in, or else this concept would have never existed in the first place. And this concept has meaning because there are many people who are trying to break into the “ramshackle mansion� but what they must know is that they have to make their own way, they have to make their own windows.
March 19th, 2008 at 12:37 pm
For all the dreamers out there, there is no such thing as “breaking in”… It’s about time meeting preparation. The NUMBER ONE thing is not to have any constraints, debt, children, etc… Nothing is impossible, but burdens will deminish the path to success. One must love and enjoy the art of film. If your main intention is for the glamour and fame than your destined to fail.