Writing screenplays we sometimes forget how close success really is. We write and write and write some more and the day when we finally sell our script can feel so far away. So, for some much needed inspiration let’s take a look at some, I hesitate to say, overnight success stories! Despite the fact that the people in this list found incredible fame and fortune, I tend to believe that these writers honed their craft more than the media would have us believe. So to get us going, it’s Rocky Balboa . . .
Sylvester Stallone
An unknown Sylvester Stallone spent his early years in New York city, living in poverty whilst trying to make it as an actor. Upon moving to California to seek fame and fortune, a down on his luck Stallone went to see the great Muhammed Ali take on Chuck Wepner. From that one fight came the idea for the hit movie Rocky. According to legend, Stallone wrote Rocky in a writing blitz which lasted no more than three days. Although Stallone claimed that the first draft was quite dark; after receiving some much needed advice from his first wife, he went back and re-wrote the script. This writing a love interest into the story! The rest is the stuff of Hollywood legend! Rocky turned Stallone into an international movie star and the Rocky series become a huge hit across the world.
Kevin Williamson
After struggling for many years to break into Hollywood, Kevin Williamson was speaking with a friend one evening about Horror movies, most notably 1980s horror movies. This conversation lead to what would become the hit slasher comedy Scream. According to Williamson, he wrote the screenplay in just four days and almost immediately, the studios went into a bidding frenzy that made Kevin Williamson one of the highest paid screenwriters on the planet.
Matt Damon & Ben Affleck
Remember the 90s. Matt Damon and Ben Affleck, two Harvard undergraduate students had just written a spec script and started shopping it around Hollywood. The name of the script was Good Will Hunting. Like Williamson, the studios went gaga over the screenplay and started throwing money at the young duo. Eventually Miramax bank-rolled the two undergrads, paid them $500,000 for the screenplay and turned them into two of Hollywood’s brightest stars!
Joe Eszterhas
Are there any more controversial screenwriters out there than Joe Eszterhas?According to legend, Eszterhas used to take a hunting knife with him to Hollywood meetings, so the studio execs would think twice about butchering his screenplays. Eszterhas made the news recently with his bust up with Mel Gibson. But there’s no doubt that Eszterhas is a money making machine. In just 10 days he sat down and wrote the hit movie Basic Instinct and sold it a couple of days later for a whopping $3 million! Not bad for ten days work. Eszterhas also wrote the infamous movie Showgirls which he pitched to a Hollywood exec for $4.7 million on a cocktail napkin.
Shane Black
As a young struggling actor, Shane Black was living in LA trying to make ends meet, when a friend recommended he try his hand at writing a screenplay. Black, having taken some drama classes during his UCLA days, drew on what little experience he had and sat down and wrote Lethal Weapon in a couple of weeks. He sold the screenplay a few days later for $250,000 at the tender age of 23, launching a major Hollywood franchise and turning Mel Gibson into an international superstar!
*Jennifer Sloane has worked as a screenplay agent in Los Angeles and Nashville for the last five years. Jennifer loves good movies, music and animals. A former television and movie executive, Jennifer currently heads business development at Script Mailer (a company that connects screenwriters with agents and producers in Hollywood).