Hollywood's Buzz Factor
Writer Paul Davidson tracks the imaginary journey of a mediocre script by a writer with great, fabricated "buzz," from query letter to eventual mid-six-figure studio deal. Sounds about right to us, though he did leave out the part where the agent stops returning the writer's calls when he figures out all the buzz is gone, and the writer loses sexual function from his fear of inadequacy:
The bids come in high. Very high. Studios are chomping at the bit, offering up $450,000 against $900,000.
The entertainment trades are poised, ready to write the article about the gimp from some backwater county, his bout with depression, abuse and being locked away in a four-walled padded cell and finding the passion and drive to write a light-hearted script about two guys driving in a car.
Back at the studio who is now $500,000 poorer, they have realized that although the story behind the script is great, the story within the script is average. In fact, it's just like a script they bought last year for $45,000 about two guys on a road trip, driving across America.