A capacity crowd at The Speakeasy, Austin. Literally. People are waiting outside to get it. It’s packed to the rafters.
Directly in front of you, John Hamburg. Zak Penn and Lindsay Doran. Ready to score your pitch numerically to find a winner from among the finalists, and critique your story and performance. In front of everyone.
And…it’s your turn.
The Pitch Finale Party was a mash up of stand-up comedy and sales. The good news is, story completely crushed technique every time.
As usual.
The judges were impressed by polished performance, but nothing, not even a great hook, trumped one massively important element: why do we care about this protagonist at this time? Why do our hearts reach out to him now?
Definitely don’t leave it as a given that your protag’s feelings and needs are apparent. Enumerate the direct threats to his family/future/life that worry him and how the kind of person he is will make him respond.
Most less successful pitches skipped over the protag’s pain, desire, need in favor of describing the forces working against him. The pitches that engaged the judges put the protag’s emotional life front and center in the pitch.
The running joke of the evening came from Lindsay Doran, who greeted a great pitch with mixed feelings because she has a project in development with Craig Mazin with nearly the same logline.
After that, any insanely out of left field presentation (including one about a man with a micropenis who wants to succeed in porn) got “Craig Mazin and I are developing a similar project…”
The takeaway was, 90 seconds is more than enough time to pitch your project if you have nailed: why your protag’s fight is emotional, what your tone is, a few wow trailer moments and a hint at what the final crisis will be.
One of the most undeveloped pitches of the night got some great response because the idea that centered on a vulnerable young woman was visual, immediate and original. Much more polished pitches got lukewarm reviews for failing to nail the central concept in a personal, emotional way.
Zak Penn also said, “You can always start over if your pitch goes off the rails.” it’s not done and done if you blow it. If you freeze, just announce you’re starting over. It doesn’t count against you.
Even so. Practice your pitch A LOT before you whip it out.