Learn How to Avoid Screenplay Theft with Reed Martin

Description

Did you know that most of the biggest indie filmmakers, screenwriters, and producers working today each made the same avoidable mistakes early on in their careers?

On July 25 at 11 a.m. NYU adjunct associate professor Reed Martin will be speaking at The Writers Store to discuss some of the methods and techniques from his book "The Reel Truth: Everything You Didn't Know You Need To Know About Making An Independent Film" for avoiding story and screenplay theft.

This is an important issue that most aspiring screenwriters and filmmakers know very little about even as the sprint headlong into disaster and put their hard work and passion (and careers) in peril. For this and other reasons the many myths aspiring screenwriters often live by are actually real-world dangerous, since the years of late nights, shut-off notices, Ramen noodles, broken romantic relationships, life without health care insurance, festival passes, writing classes, MFA's, defaulted student loans, credit card penalties, debit card overdraft charges, and creative struggles spent writing a terrific screenplay on spec are usually not recoverable.

Among the concepts discussed in "The Reel Truth" that professor Martin - who previously worked as a management trainee at 20th Century Fox Film International in Los Angeles and was formerly Director of Marketing at producer Cary Woods' ("Scream," "Swingers," "KIDS," "Gummo") New York-based Independent Pictures production company, will be on hand to discuss and take questions are the basics of copyright law as it currently applies to motion picture screenplays and in studio pitch meetings. He will also discuss little-known legal concepts covered in "The Reel Truth" that trip aspiring screenwriters up such as the application of "scenes a faires;" the dangers of describing a story as a "story cross;" strategies for watermarking or LoJack-ing an unproduced script; the manydifferences between the protections afforded by WGA registration and official U.S. Copyright registration (since they are actually not the same as most screenwriters wrongly believe); the outright and unequivocal dangers of attending magazine-sponsored "pitch fest" contests and/or script seminars where the specifics of a writer's unproduced screenplay is discussed; the importance of sending unproduced screenplays via (the higher-priced) signature-required FedEx rather than via regular mail; the definition of and risks inherent in "hip-pocket" representation by agents; the many dangers of palming a script on a famous actor or film director on the street or in any public place such as a coffee shop or restaurant; and many other issues discussed in his recently-released, 550-page book.

Professor Martin will also be on hand to sign copies of "The Reel Truth: Everything You Didn't Know You Need To Know About Making An Independent Film." All filmmakers, producers, directors, and members of the larger extended family of aspiring screenwriters are invited to attend.

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