Let me set the scene for you. It’s a warm English summer’s day in July 2010. I’ve very recently relocated my whole life from Melbourne to the UK and am living with my two best friends in Kent. I’ve decided not to get a job until the end of August and, for the first time since I was about 13, I have enough enthusiasm and (crucially) time to write seriously.
With this in mind, I was very keen to soak up absolutely everything London could offer me in terms of writing inspiration, classes, workshops, anything. I wanted to learn as much as I could before I had to head back to Australia in two years time. I don’t even remember how I got there, but through a Google search, a website or three, I stumbled upon LSF 2010.
Needless to say, I bought my ticket pretty quick smart.
I noticed that they were running a short film competition and I figured that as I had the time to write, it would be silly if I didn’t at least try. I didn’t really have any ideas for anything, but the restrictions made it easier to focus my imagination on various possibilities. I spent the afternoon thinking about it, went to bed thinking about it and when I woke up, I had the nugget of the idea that would become the short script ‘With A Little Help From Our Friends’.
I hadn’t written anything seriously in over a year. I was incredibly rusty – and I knew it. But I worked at it. I had started reading scripts more seriously for the first time and, on a road trip to Cardiff, had found and devoured ‘The Writers’ Tale’ by Russell T. Davies and Benjamin Cook (one of the best books on the writing process out there, in my humble opinion). Whilst I was writing, I was using Twitter to talk to and ‘meet’ the people who I’d be meeting in person in a few month’s time. Getting in amongst a filmmaking and writing community made me crave that creative process even more. I juggled writing the short script for competition and a second draft of a feature I’d attempted to write two years beforehand – I wanted to have it to pitch at the Festival.
It was an errant tweet that I responded to that set everything in motion. Oli Lewington, a freelance producer, asked if anyone would read a short script he was thinking of producing and give him some feedback on it. I immediately said that I’d be up for it. I don’t think we’d even spoken on Twitter before, but I threw myself in front of him and waved; he shrugged and sent me the script. He (thankfully) agreed with the feedback I’d sent him and as a result, a fledgling friendship was born.
I finished ‘With A Little Help From Our Friends’ and submitted it early (as in, a month early) to the Festival. I was considering writing a second short script to submit as well but thought that a) that would be greedy and b) the feature was a bit of a monster to try and tame and I would really have to get a wriggle on if I wanted to get it finished before the Festival. I had sent it to a few filmmaker-y friends in Australia for feedback, but I didn’t get a huge response from them, so I wasn’t sure what my chances would be like. I figured they wouldn’t be that great – I didn’t write for a living and I hadn’t really properly put any time into my writing before then. Plus, it was the London Screenwriters’ Festival; the calibre of writers would be insane! I was under no illusions to my ‘talent’ (as they say, you’re your own worst critic) – I knew (and still do) that there are many more people out there who are much better than me. But I’d tried, so I was at least happy with that.
Imagine my absolute surprise when I was told that I’d been shortlisted. SHORTLISTED. It was essentially the first screenwriting competition I’d ever entered and I’d been shortlisted! I was stoked. I didn’t even care if I didn’t win, I’d been shortlisted. It was that boost of confidence in my script that prompted me to ask Oli to read it to give me some feedback, when we met at the Festival.
He read it. And loved it. And wanted to make it.
The script didn’t get any further than being shortlisted. I’ve read the three scripts that took out the top three prizes and I think they’re all fantastic short scripts (yeah, guys, you can pay me later). But I’d given mine to a producer to see what he thought of it and suddenly we were talking about moving into pre-production and making it! I didn’t complain at all – I’d completely loved the last short I’d made and thought it was high time to make another.
As always happens when you’re trying to get a film on its feet, everything goes wrong. Amongst trying to juggle full time work with a long distance working relationship, Oli then had to pull out of the film. But I talked to a few people about it (when I say a few, I mean a lot. People asked me what I was working on, I talked about the scripts I was writing as well as this short I’d written that had been in development with a producer but the producer had had to pull out. You should’ve seen the sparkles of interest in people’s eyes) and eventually found two guys who were keen as mustard to come on board and make something with me. And now we’re due to have our first rehearsal next weekend.
It’s been fifteen months since I first wrote the short and submitted it to LSF 2010. By the time we shoot, it will have been a year since the Festival last year. And just so you know, that’s not a particularly long time in low budget filmmaker world. But if it hadn’t been for that Google search on that day in July, I wouldn’t even have a script to be making. And if I’d not asked for Oli’s opinion on the script when we’d met at the Festival, then chances are it’d be sitting in my ‘Scripts’ folder on my computer, getting dusty. Not to mention the fact that some of the writers I met at the Festival last year are my go-to people for constructive feedback or bad jokes as well as several of them becoming really good friends.
There’s a moral to this story somewhere. I suppose, in a way, it’s to make the most of every opportunity you get and go for it. Meet as many people as you can, be lovely to as many people as you can because you never know who will come through for you when you need someone to. And you never know who is going to be looking for a script to make when they pull your business card out of a hat (always take business cards so that you can be put into the hat in the first place). I’ve had people contact me from LSF 2010 and the Comedy Writers’ Festival from earlier this year to ask me to write something for them or work on an idea with them. I reckon you just go for it and politely talk to as many people as you can. The worst they’re going to say is ‘I’m sorry, I’m just going to get another drink,’ and never come back. But you know what? There will be hundreds of other people to talk to at that Festival. You never know which one of them will want to read your script. So what have you got to lose?
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Find Alli on Twitter, here and read her short’s journey in full on her blog.
Posted by a member of the London Screenwriters’ Festival team.
