Excuses, Excuses...

So... I just got my latest rejection letter.
I won't say from what agency it was from, but I will say that they share a name with a prominent DVD distributor.

Anyhow, they used the old,
"We're sorry, but we're not taking on any new writers at this time."

Don't get me wrong, there are probably times when this might (and that's a big "might") be true with agencies, but most of the time they're blowing you off because you're a nobody and they don't think you have anything to offer them... And I don't get that.
You might have the next Star Wars, the next Ghostbusters, the next Rocky, but because you're not already noteworthy and don't have a ton of self-invented internet hype around you or because you don't know all the right people (from going to the right schools, couch surfing on the right guy's couch or doing drugs with the right guy in the right men's bathroom somewhere in L.A.) you're obviously not worth their time.
How could you be if they've never heard of you?

I read once (I think in an agent Q&A at the beginning of one of the Writer's Digest Guide to Agents) where an agent fully admitted that they don't even read query letters and that they don't actually work.

So... how the hell do you actually break into the business??!!

I can't believe it relies entirely on luck and connections!

But that might be it...

But even then, I've had some people tell me,
"Oh, I know so-and-so... I'll hook you up with them."

... And that never works.

You all may remember a post I made in 2013, when a friend of mine hooked me up with a prominent (okay, formerly prominent) screenwriter. He pretty much blew me off. See, when friends set you up with their "connections", those "connections" usually roll their eyes and give you lip service as a favor to the friend of family member who set you up with them.

See, I'm convinced nobody in this business wants to let you in. Why would they? Then their piece of the pie gets that much smaller. And nobody wants to share!

And agents seem to be the worst. They act (and they're right) that they have your potential career in the palm of their hands. They are what stands between you working your current menial job for the rest of your life and having the greatest job in the world which will make you zillions, famous beyond your wildest dreams, sought after, respected and creatively fulfilled. And I kinda feel like they abuse that power.

And I hate sitting here complaining about my lack of luck in eliciting responses from agents... All of the reasons I cite for my unluckiness sounds too much like excuses (which we all know are the tools of incompetence).

I just long for better days that I wasn't even alive to see.

I read in Joe Eszterhas's autobiography (Hollywood Animal) that a producer just called him up one day (because they'd read his novel Charlie Simpson's Apocalypse and asked if he'd be interested in screenwriting!

Come on!

And in Alice Cooper's long out-of-print autobiography (Me, Alice) he writes that the band just overheard some guy bragging that he was a "rock'n'roll agent" (though without a credit to his name). They took him on (they had nothing to lose: they were being booed off of every stage and had a ramshackle record deal with Frank Zappa) and rolled the dice and Shep Gordon (despite his lack of experience) wound up making them the biggest rock act of most of the 70's.

Where's my Shep Gordon?

Where's my random phone call?

And even though I say that, anyone who knows me (or has been reading this blog for the 3 years I've been writing it) knows that I'm not content to just sit around and wait for that to happen. LIke the old story goes: the man prays and prays to win the lottery, then the clouds open up and God says,
"Give me a break and a buy a lottery ticket!"

I'm doing what (I think) I'm supposed to be doing.
And I guess I'm doing something right... Circle of Confusion has asked for two of my scripts... The CAA rep at Pitchfest 2015 asked for one of my scripts... So has the Warden Group... So has Michael Meltzer... Zero Gravity has requested two of my script...  But nothing has panned out.

I guess I keep on keeping on...

But where does it end?