First Time I Got Paid for Doing This

by Peter Lefcourt, Laura J. Shapiro, Georgia Jeffries, et al.

Book Overview

The First Time I Got Paid for It is a one-of-a-kind collection of essays by more than fifty leading film and television writers, with a foreword by screenwriting legend William Goldman. Linked by the... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1586480138
• ISBN13: 9781586480134
• Release Date: October 2000
• Publisher: PublicAffairs
• Length: 288 Pages
• Weight: 1.40 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 5.8" x 8.6"

Customer Reviews

An 'A-Plus' for value!

Many of the essays provide great entertainment and valuable insight. Hey, I've just ordered an additional copy - I'll be sending it to a young friend overseas - a budding writer in need of encouragement plus a few words of warning!

more truth than some people can handle, apparently

I'm a screenwriter. Not a big name, no big successful movies or TV shows yet, but I'm working on it. This book isn't the endless parade of "how I won the lottery in Hollywood" tales that some people want...but that's because it reflects the reality of a career in screenwriting. Truth is you need skills AND luck AND connections. It's a tough gig, it really is. Million-dollar screenplay sales are very rare these days. Only about 5% of the scripts produced bewteen 2000 and 2004 were written "on spec" (that is, a screenplay some writer sat down & created, then turned around and sold as a completed piece of work). Most work is done as a "hired hand" in one form or another. War stories like these are a useful reality check for anyone thinking about taking up the career. If you LOVE to write, it can be a great job. If you want to get rich, buy lottery tickets, your odds are better. Also check out Wordplayer.com and SamAndJimGoToHollywood.com for realistic tales of struggle.

Hope for us all

One of the things I'd like to do in my life is write a screenplay. I haven't actually done it yet, and I have no idea what the process is like. But this book was a very interesting read. It has given me a renewed sense of hope. Some of the writers' stories in this book are like fairy tales to the hopeful screenwriters, and some of the stories show the reality to us. Reading these has helped me learn what to expect--because I understand that most of these writers were lucky, and that's a lot of what it takes to make it in Hollywood. Let's hope I have it.Also, I must point out that the forward by William Goldman was worth the price of the book all by itself. I thought I was going to die laughing. I think I read the whole thing out loud to my roommate.All in all, this is a wonderful book, with many memorable and hopeful stories.

Inspiring in an offbeat way ...

For anyone who's ever wanted to get paid for it, you ought to read this book. Especially wonderful for those who follow the Who's Who of Hollywood writers, and how they struggled. The foreword by William Goldman is especially charming as is the closing anecdote by Steve Zaillian, which I found touching. Audrey Wells' tale is flippant and funny as is Pamela Gray's.

entertaining and enlightening - but for screenwriters only

I could go on about the entertaining tales from screenwriters like Nick Kazan, Lawrence Kasdan, Ed Solomon and Pamela Gray, but I won't. That would rob you of the pleasure of hearing their tales for yourself. For aspiring screenwriters the messages are clear: overnight success is rarely overnight; when you have an agent that doesn't mean you'll automatically start raking in the dough; and lastly persistence in the crazy industry known as "motion pictures" pays off eventually.

Lots of laughs and a little wisdom

This book is a hoot! The tone of this compilation of short essays by Hollywood writers ranges from thoughtful to irreverent to downright hilarious. The title is somewhat of a misnomer since not all chapters tell about a writer's first sale. Chuck Lorre tells of the first time he was fired from a writing job (for defending a remake of "Beany and Cecil" from the eventual creator of "Ren and Stimpy.") Carl Reiner skips telling about his extensive television and screenwriting but focuses instead on the sale of his first novel. Delia Ephron covers the sale of several books as well as how she came to be a screenwriter. Peter Casey, already a successful television writer, relates the miraculous meeting when he and his partners pitched the idea for "Frasier." While these essays provide glimpses into the Hollywood machinery and a few of its gears, facts and advice are scarce. You won't learn how to navigate the "trenches" by reading this. Instead, you'll be entertained by the irony, good humor, and storytelling presented by this large group of talented writers. Because each piece lasts for only three or four pages, you can dip into this book for a few minutes at a time and read passages out of order. Don't skip any, though, because you might miss a gem.