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By, Jacob Krueger

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How To Be a Latin Lover: Turning Sadness Into Salsa

Podcast Transcript:

This week we’re going to be talking about How To Be a Latin Lover, by, Chris Spain and Jon Zack.  And, while this wonderfully silly screenplay may not teach you how to be a Latin lover, it will teach you a hell of a lot about screenwriting.

 

If you’ve seen How To Be a Latin Lover, or if you’ve read the script, you know that from page one, from the very first scene of the film, it’s easy to know if you’re going to love this movie or hate it--  if you want to go on the ride with these characters or if you don’t.

 

If you want to succeed as a screenwriter, the most important page you will ever write is your very first page.

 

And the most important page you will ever rewrite, and rewrite, and rewrite, is also your very first page.

 

Your first page is the most important page in your screenplay, because the first page is the only page anyone is actually going to read.

 

Your manager, your agent, your coverage reader, your producer, your star-- everybody in the entertainment industry is overwhelmed with all the reading they have to do. They’re absolutely swamped, receiving screenplay, after screenplay, after screenplay. All these screenplays they have to read, stacking up on their desks or on their ipads.

 

And the truth is, everybody wants to read all those scripts, but no one actually does. Because reading every script that you receive is physically impossible.

 

Most of the scripts get sent out for coverage, and even the coverage readers can’t really, fully, read all of the scripts that are descending upon them.

 

A coverage reader makes about $50 a script. So, when you think about what it would take for you to read a whole script, write a good logline, a good summary, and a good commentary, you realize there is no way that a coverage reader can afford to actually read every script they're given. They’d be working for less than minimum wage!

 

Instead, what most coverage readers are doing is that they’re making a decision about whether to read or skim, and they’re making a decision on the very first page. Because what most of coverage readers read is bad.

 

Most of what coverage readers read is not exciting, not marketable, not producible.

 

And that means coverage readers are jaded.

 

They have a really rough job. They have to read bad material again and again and again. And that means that when they open your script, especially a script from an unrepresented writer or a writer they don’t already know, they’re already making an assumption it’s probably not going to be very good.

 

Because even the scripts they get from famous writers, from produced writers, from writers with big managers, and big agents-- oftentimes those scripts aren’t good.

 

So you’ve got someone who’s already feeling down before they even open your script, They’re already feeling jaded before they open your script.

 

And at the same time, every single one of those people desperately wants to find a diamond in the rough.

 

Because nobody wants to stay a coverage reader. Coverage readers want to become writers, or agents, or assistants, or development executives. And the way that you get there is by knocking the socks off of your boss with your incredible ability to find that diamond in the rough.

 

So there’s this interesting thing going on for coverage readers. On the one hand, they want to find a diamond in the rough, and on the other hand they all feel like they’re never going to see it,