How to Secure, Adapt, and Sell Best-Selling Books to Hollywood
ABOUT THE WEBINAR
Hollywood loves source material and there is no better material for a film or television series than a best-selling book. The competition to find the next best read is ferocious and often books are optioned or bought before they are even published. But sometimes a great book will slip through the cracks and go unnoticed until someone with the vision for bringing it to the screen finds it. But before anyone can trumpet their amazing find, they have to make sure they have the rights, and the right approach, to sell that book to Hollywood.
This OnDemand webinar will illustrate the process for acquiring the rights to a best-selling book, or a book that may have been overlooked, in order to package and sell it to in today’s hyper-competitive Hollywood marketplace. Often, the process can be arduous and time-consuming. But if the rights are available, and you are willing to do the work necessary to develop the material, a book can be your calling card into the entertainment business. Also covered will be strategies for getting the book out to buyers, adapting the material for the screen; working with authors and their representatives to secure the rights with little or no money up front, and making sure that you stay attached to the work when you find that buyer.
WHAT YOU’LL LEARN
- How to research a title in order to find out if the film rights are available
- How to research the entertainment marketplace to see if the title you are interested in will resonate with buyers.
- How to approach an author or their representative with an offer to represent their material to industry.
- How to develop the material to make it commercial without sacrificing the dramatic elements that attracted it to you in the first place.
- How to write an outline for adapting the material from book to film.
- How to work with authors and representatives in order to get their work to market.
- How to write a successful logline and film treatment for the property.
- How to present the book to industry and build buzz around the title.
- How to find buyers that will “get” the material.
- How to stay attached to the material you are selling.
WHO SHOULD WATCH?
- Screenwriters who see the value in adapting material that is based on a novel or non-fiction book
- Writers who want to learn how take their career to the next level
- Writer-Producers who want to option the film rights to a novel or non-fiction book
- Writer-Producers who want to know how to research available book properties
- Writers who want to expand their skill set to include adaptation
- Writers who want to secure the rights to a book, comic book, play or other material
- Screenwriters who want to learn how to package material for Hollywood and take their career to the next level
- Writer-Producers who want to increase their odds of a sale in Hollywood
- Writers who want to become Writer-Producers
- Writers who want to know how to successfully engage authors and agents