Screenwriting : Video pitch tips? by Steffany Lohn Sommers

CONGRATS!!!! You should do both! You memorize your written pitch, inside and out, every corner and crevice of it, until it organically becomes to sound more and more conversational when you recite it. Keep at it, tape yourself and watch the footage. Look for where you can add in your natural personality and your secret "Steffany Sauce", as if you were telling a friend about your work and not "pitching for your life", lololol! CONGRATS AGAIN!!!!!

Great News! you should focus on what feels natural to you and your why this story should be told. Everything else will flow naturally when you recite it and your personality will shine thru.

Pretend there is a person sitting in front of you, just like in a live pitch. Memorize it until it's utterly conversational and it flows naturally without getting stuck, or glancing at what you wrote. Once that's done, to be dramatic, close one eye and center yourself on the camera lens. Don't move your body! Open your eye and your head will naturally center on the camera at an angle, which will make your presentation way more dramatic. Record yourself normally, then, then try the left eye, then the right. Pick the best one of the three poses. Good luck :)

Having just done a 1-minute video for a different purpose, definitely do it over and over and over, until it just flows naturally. Pick the 3 best ones, and if necessary, cut them together (most systems have some kind of free video editing software).

Conversational but have a clear idea of the main beats you want to hit with your pitch so you don't miss anything important. Then practice practice practice! Practice by yourself and with others on video calls so you can get their feedback and rework it. You want to sound natural, clear, concise, not rushed and deliver all the key information you need to.

As with many things in this business - the effort goes into making it look effortless : )

Start with YOUR personal connection to the story... Good luck.

Hey Steffany Lohn Sommers - great to have you here! I am the Director of Script Services at Stage 32. I have a great idea that I would love you to try. Every week in the Stage 32 Writers' Room we hold practice pitch sessions where you are able to pitch your project and get feedback from your screenwriting peers. The next Practice Session is tonight at 7pm (Pacific). So many members have honed their pitches there - which have resulted in script requests and meetings. Email me at j.mirch@stage32.com and I will hook you with a free month. You can start practice pitching today.

Congrats, Steffany Lohn Sommers! I strongly suggest you take advantage of Stage 32's Pitch Practice tonight, 7pm PST (or next Thursday, if you can't make it tonight). You'll get excellent feedback from Stage 32's pitch experts Nick Assunto - Stage 32 Script Services Coordinator and Brooklynn Fields, and chat feedback from other pitchers and members who are watching. It's a program with proven success stories. I've seen members hone and revise their pitches thru Pitch Practice sessions, and later deliver their pitches in the monthly Pitch Tank to industry execs who sometime request the pitcher's script!

FYI, Pitch Practice and Pitch Tank sessions are FREE to members of Stage 32''s Writers' Room. You can get one month's free membership immediately by emailing Jason Mirch , Director of Script Services at his email address in his post above. That also gives you access to Jason's free weekly webinars on screenwriting, two bi-monthly Script Coverage Read sessions with feedback from members on members' scripts, a monthly Table Read by actors of a members' script. AND once you get your "pitch perfect" pitch, I hope you check out the lineup of top industry execs you can pitch to through Script Services! Good luck!

First, CONGRATULATIONS! Celebrate that victory, girl! Second, thank you for reaching out to the Stage32 community for guidance. That's what we're here for! Third, I cannot recommend the Writer's Room Pitch Practice enough (so, I guess I third it? LOL)! We even had one of our members pitch to Andrew Kersey of Kersey Management yesterday and his first comment was, "you pitched better than a lot of industry writers". The power of practice and putting in the work! That brings me to my last bit O advice - while you are part of the Writer's Room, check out The Vault, which is all the recordings of our Wednesday Webcasts, including pitch tanks. Even if all you watch is our most recent Pitch Tank, I think hearing others' pitches and hearing their feedback will help round out your preparation.

Also, since you're jumping in on competitions, you should check out our current contests (https://www.stage32.com/scriptservices/contests) and especially "That's a Logline Contest", which is taking submissions through the end of this month: https://www.stage32.com/blog/Announcing-Thats-a-Movie-Logline-Contest-Th...

Y'all are amazing--thank you for the support. <3

CONGRATULATIONS! Definitely watch this. Its fantastic

https://www.stage32.com/webinars/Stage-32-%20-Netflix-Present-Television...

Congratulations! Way to go! Please keep us posted!

Hi, Steffany Lohn Sommers! Congratulations! That's so cool. You definitely want to be more conversational in your pitches.

May I also suggest joining the Writers' Room? We hold Pitch Tank Practice every Thursday. This is a great place to work on your pitch and to also hear other pitches and feedback (which I find particularly helpful). This is also great practice for when we have the opportunity to pitch working executives in our Room... which is SO AWESOME. In those sessions, we also get to hear feedback on pitches, which is tremendously insightful. There are so many perks of joining the Writers' Room (in addition to those I've mentioned): Script Coverage where we can give and receive notes, live webinars in which we learn about the business and craft, table reads and so much more.

Also, I'm not sure if you've seen what Stage 32 has to offer under the "Script Services" tab. There are a ton of services offered there, but particularly if you look under "Pitch Sessions," you will see the opportunity to pitch the best execs in the industry from Universal, MGM, Mandalay Pictures, HBOMax and many others. You have the choice to do this either verbally or as a written pitch.

And, honestly, this is just scratching the surface with all that Stage 32 has to offer their members. To top it all off, every single team member here at Stage 32 is always willing to help. They love seeing us succeed and are always here to encourage us. If you have any questions on what services may be best for you or need guidance in your career, please reach out to Jason Mirch, the Director of Script Services here at Stage 32. He is super knowledgeable and so helpful!

Happy writing!

Congratulations! I would suggest watching last year's finalists. I think the number one thing is to sound conversational. Start with Once upon a time and tell your story (then delete it out unless you're pitching a fairy tale). Tell a great story. Also the format of what should come first. I use: hook, personal connection, logline, comps, into the story starting with who the main character is (wants/needs/goals/obstacles), then for a TV series pitch the pilot and end with one sentence on season 2 and season 3+. Give a clean finish. Nothing is worse than hearing a great pitch and the person ends with "and I guess that's it. I'm done." Good luck!

A HUGE thanks to everyone for all the tips and support--it worked!! I was just notified that I was selected as a finalist and will be pitching to the panel at the ScreenCraft Writers Summit on April 11th: https://screencraft.org/summit/ Holy smokes!!

AWESOME!!! I'll be watching! I hope you win!

Excellent work, very inspiring!

Congratulations, Steffany Lohn Sommers! Break a leg!

Congratulations!