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Whatever you do, be a friend to a script reader. They might be the one who gets your script to the desk of the one who can say yes.

It’s thought that the names of script readers are kept secret by the movie studios. Is this because they’re so poorly paid or require unbiased opinions? The answer may lay somewhere in between.

Screenplay readers aren’t paid well for their work and it’s usually required on a strict turnaround timescale. Sometimes there’s only just time for the Fedex driver to get a Starbucks or two before they need to return to pick up the reader’s report.

The readers need to get through 2-3 screenplays a day to make a living. They need to write their reports at a marching pace. Whether they write pass, consider or recommend is down to a short period of time compared to how long the screenplay took to write, edit, re draft (at least) six times and market just to get the pages in front of a reader.

Readers have seconds to assess your work. Who is it from; which studio/producer/agent? How does it feel – not too many pages? How does it meet the necessary requirements; enough dialogue, enough white space, correctly formatted?

Failing in any of those criteria will have the ‘pass’ stamp approved quickly. Meeting the standards gives the screenplay a chance to be assessed in a tiried and trusted method, as instructed by the studio.

It’s rumored that script readers can’t give a ‘recommend’ grade to a screenplay for fear of the studio disagreeing and terminating the reader, so it looks like a ‘consider’ is the best you can hope for, with a glowing report.

Script reader and story analyst D.C. Mar gives an insider’s view on this screenwriting website. There are six pages to look over http://scottdistillery.googlepages.com/ascriptreaderspeaks

Time will best be spent by screenplay writers assessing what D.C. Mar has to say about presentation and content. If you’re a known writer you stand a much higher chance at getting a ‘consider’ grade. If you’re new, then DC will find that out and you may get pushed to the back of the script mountain.

As if writing the screenplay wasn’t enough work already, if this is your first screenplay you now need to learn the language of the studio/script reader process and pass with flying colors.