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Day 2 Assignments
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Lesson 2 – The 10 Components of Marketability – Assignment
Mike O – Marketable Components
What I learned doing this is aligning creativity and your character’s various traits with different audience segments to attract more movie-goers.
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Pick one or two components and tell us how your script already fulfills them AND how you might highlight these two in order to elevate the pitch.
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1. Tell us your current log line.
As executor of her estranged father’s estate, Brooklyn discovers the truth about her parent’s divorce. On the verge of recognition and financial success as a painter, romance finds her at a crossroads: a treacherous employee and a mother’s deception conspire to undermine her world. Brooklyn rises above deceit and tragedy in order to create her happy ever after.
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2. Look through the 10 Components of Marketability and pick one or two that have the most potential for selling this script.
01. Unique THIS ONE
07. Wide audience appeal THIS ONE
10. A great role for a bankable actor THIS ONE – ties in with #1, character’s uniqueness[1] Unique — This means some important part of the story or characters hasn’t been seen before. It needs to be something important enough that the public will be willing to go to this movie and not another.
The protagonist, Brooklyn, is able to feel her father’s presence whenever she is close to one of his paintings. She uses painting in his cabin to bond with him. *She sees/imagines him beside her guiding her as she paints. *Use of FLASHBACKS shows her dad helping her as a little girl with her water colors and crayons. He is her muse whenever she paints. *Show a photo of him with her as a little girl clipped to her easel in her art studio… *Show her talking to him, as if he’s beside her, when she is alone painting in her studio. *At the end of the movie, we see Brooklyn ‘talking’ with her dad at his grave: show him hug her, then go lie down at his grave and slowly settle into the earth…
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[7] Wide audience appeal — This one is essential. Will this story appeal to a wide audience? The larger the audience, the better. Especially if they are avid movie-goers. Anything that will get teens in the door is hot.
The protagonist, Brooklyn is in her late twenties, she is pretty (physical attraction, easy on the eyes) she talks to herself, is OCD, and imagines her father beside her whenever she is painting. (Appealing to an A-list actress).
Brooklyn’s best friend and mentor, Carolyn, is happily married w/ children. She is in her late forties. She will appeal to that market segment as she is hardworking, successful, and always trying to “set” Brooklyn up with some guy. Meaning well, she mothers Brooklyn, thinks of her as the daughter she never had.
There is Brooklyn’s love interest, Tarek, he’s in her early thirties, single dad. He has two sons: one is cute and irrepressible, the other more serious, less trusting… hurt by the death of his mother. His character will appeal to those in the audience who have gone through what he has and can identify with him.
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3. Do a quick brainstorm session about ways to elevate those two components for this script and tell us how you might pitch the script through the two components.
How I would pitch those two elements:
#1 Unique & #10 Bankable : The protagonist is a woman, a gifted artist, who is OCD, someone who has been sheltered, and who buries herself in her work to avoid life. The inciting incident and our hero’s journey begins with tragedy. As the executor of her father’s estate, she discovers her mother’s deception, the depth of a father’s posthumous love, and comes to terms with her past, ‘finds herself’ and discovers she is capable of true love.
#7 Wide Audience Appeal: Brooklyn’s initial reticence, her fear of the unknown will speak to the Millennials and Z generation. Her best friend and mentor, Carolyn, will draw the ‘parents’ to the theater as her character’s insistence on helping, guiding and being a parent to Brooklyn will speak to this audience segment. Brooklyn’s personal growth and the fact she finds true love is a requisite of all holiday feel-good movies and is a universal draw
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David Harper’s Marketable Components
What I learned doing this assignment is that my script has quite a few points in its favor, I just need to emphasize them a little more in the script and highlight them in the pitch.
Logline: A young man must choose between family loyalty and his own personal convictions when his ex-con father drags him into a murderous bank heist in the middle of a raging wildfire.
Marketability components:
Timely: Wildfires are bigger and bigger news each year due to climate change
Role: The protagonist has a great arc, going from a timid young man seeking to build the family he never had, to a community leader who realizes family is not just about blood.
How I might emphasize those items in the film and pitch:
First, I’d make climate change a background conversation in the film. It wouldn’t dominate, but it would be there in the background. In the pitch, I’d highlight the fact that climate change has led to more frequent and larger wildfires, and how this might have an appeal to a wide audience.
For the other, I’d see if I could attach a bankable actor for the role. Then I could go to the producers with that actor already attached.
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MODULE ONE ASSIGNMENT TWO
FRAN’S MARKETABLE COMPONENTS
WHAT I LEARNED: You want to sell a product, you make it attractive. You make it a product they can’t live without. Entice them.
LOGLINE: Can a young, untested reporter, whose heart’s been torn by the loss of his fiancé, find true love again when he’s assigned to cover the steamboat race of the century: the race between the Natchez and the Robert E. Lee?
Though my story hits the mark with several of the 10 components of Marketability, I’ve chosen TRUE STORY and BANKABLE STARS.
1. The race is a true story. It really happened. The people were real, actual people who lived back then and experienced the race.
2. I looked for a long time for a star who could play my Charles, who really did exist and was a real newspaper reporter. (The person who married into the Knapp family told me there is a story about Charles alleging he really was on one of the steamboats, but he didn’t say which one.)
It’s been a long time writing this story and so the first young man I wanted is too old now. But I found a photo of Tom Holland that really looks to me like he’s Charles. He’s becoming a really good actor, and I think he could do justice to the man who made the Associated Press the powerhouse it is today.
As for the two, extremely colorful captains, that pretty much has been written in the stars. If I could show you the pictures of the captains I have you would understand. I want Liam Neeson to play Cannon and as for Leathers, Mel Gibson should play him—he looks like the reincarnation of the man in one of the pictures I have of the captains.
The other characters: Frances Shackelford and Albert Eberman also warrant bankable stars. These are roles made for young people eager to show off their talents.
My characters were real people and they really lived.
The captains really had a heated rivalry.
The sharp contrasts of their personalities.
There’s a great fight scene between the two captains.
The steamboats’ grandeur.
I think the photos of some of these people would really blow the minds of the producers.
A great female role for a young upcoming star.
Great male roles for young, upcoming men. But again I would sell it as a Tom Holland must play.
I have an indie producer who loves what I’ve done so far and a young up and coming filmmaker, producer who encouraged me to finish my script.
It’s a story that’s never been told and it really should be. It’s a story that everyone knows about in legend and song, but few really know what happened during the race.
I think I could sell it on the fact that this story has never been told. It’s a great vehicle for some young rising stars.
A great vehicle for Tom Holland and
A great vehicle for two veteran stars Liam Neeson and Mel Gibson. (I know he’s not a well liked person in Hollywood, but you really have to see the photos and drawings of Tom Leathers to know Mel Gibson really should play him.)
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Julie’s Marketable Components
What I learned are ten great tenants to use to break my next story.
1. Logline:
An old-school Detroit police force is forced to work with the progressive, civilian DART team to resolve domestic related cases peacefully, resulting in disruptive culture clashes.
2. Look through the 10 Components of Marketability and pick one or two that have the most potential for selling this script.
D. Timely — connected to some major trend or event.
I. Similarity to a box-office success.
J. A great role for a bankable actor.
2. Do a quick brainstorm session about ways to elevate those two components for this script and tell us how you might pitch the script through the two components. Example: If you say your script has a great role, in one or two sentences, tell us how you can emphasize that role as you pitch your concept.
D – Timely
This series is about a team of civilians who work separately or co-respond with police to resolve domestic issues such as homelessness, mental illness, and drug addiction. Excessive police violence is a timely, relevant social issue.
I – Similarity to a box office success
Nearly 1/5 of all network TV programming was police or crime drama in 2020. This show contains all the drama and action of a hit police series plus the addition of the domestic related calls and the conflict of how the two very different teams handle these and work together.
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