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When you look over what the Writer’s Guild of America (WGA) say you should get for your screenplay at between $39,290 and $80,427 with another $26,495 to $43,875 for the treatment, you can look to screenplay writing as a good way to earn a more than reasonable living, providing you’re selling more than one a year, each and every year.

Then you balance that against the actual top commissions paid out which include:

$4 million for Shane Black’s The Long Kiss Goodnight (or $4.5 million)
$3 million for Joe Eszterhas’s Basic Instinct
$3 million for Tom Schulman’s Medicine Man
$3 million for The Ugly Americans (Eurotrip) by Alec Berg, David Mandel and Jeff Schaffer
$3 million for David Keopp’s Panic Room

Further, you check commissions paid for movies not yet produced that include:

$3 million for Bad Dog by Dale Launer
$3 million for Married in the Morning by Harry Elfort and Deborah Kaplan
$2 million for Joe Eszterhas’s Sacred Cows and also for his Reliable Sources

The figures are from Wikipedia. They’ve completed a good job of bringing together the highest paid amounts for screenplays that have been produced and released, while some have not even made it into production – and the writer still got paid!

Now come back down to the land we call Earth.

What you might sell first is just the ‘option’ for a producer to take temporary ownership of your screenplay. He’ll then try to find the finance to make the movie. That might be from a known studio in Hollywood or it might be from one of the other million sources around the globe, including people’s very own credit cards.

How much is he going to pay you for that ‘option?’ You might get $1,000 or it might just be a hundred bucks. When the option period runs out you can either have your screenplay back to offer to someone else, or the same producer might take it from you for another ‘option’ fee.

You have to consider if you’re going to take what you can get:
a) to keep living
b) to eat food
c) to push your career forward
d) to attach your name to a completed project

We can all quote WGA rates or more if we’re asked to complete a screenplay on request, but if your screenplay is with you and looking for a home, realistic life sources remind you of what deal to make. Early on, making the deal is important. Later, the type of deal becomes more significant. As you progress those union rates should be your minimum.

What stage are you at?

Go look over Wikipedia’s page at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Screenwriter%27s_salary
Those WGA rates are at http://www.wga.org/subpage_writersresources.aspx?id=68

I have to add that Basic Instinct still remains one of the best screenplays of all time. You’re worth every penny, Joe.

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