Are you thinking of moving to Los Angeles to pursue a screenwriting career, but wondering if you really need to?
Many people say you don’t need to, but are they right? In short, is moving to Los Angeles really necessary in today’s age of Skype chats and Google Hangouts?
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We wrote a blog post a few weeks ago: Are You The Cliche Of An Aspiring Screenwriter? which, while receiving mostly praise, featured one piece of advice which seemed to rub some people up the wrong way.
The advice was this: “Moving to Los Angeles is probably the single best thing you could do to increase your chances of making it as a screenwriter.”
Here’s what we said about moving to LA in the article:
If you’re serious about screenwriting, and there’s nothing holding you back, move to Los Angeles because this is where everything’s happening. i.e. If you want to be a Country & Western musician, where are you better off living? Portland, or Nashville?
And the same is true for screenwriting. It’s something many, many professional and aspiring screenwriters alike say you should do.
Our “moving to Los Angeles” point, however, caused quite a bit of heat among some screenwriters, and so here are the top four common complaints, plus our answers to them below. (The paragraphs in italics are the real complaints we received.)
1. “Moving to Los Angeles is just too damn expensive.”
“Looks like LA gives free apartments to people who want to start a screenwriting career I guess, even in US, many people work on daily jobs only for one purpose: to survive. And their apartments costs are probably 60-70 percent of their salary per month. So if they don’t work for 3-4 days, they get an overdraft.”
As we stated in the previous article when we’re suggesting aspiring screenwriters move to Los Angeles, we’re talking about the people who can move there if they put in the effort, but choose not to. We’re not talking about people who don’t have the means in the first place.
So, if you want to be a screenwriter and have the money, but are choosing to remain in say, Milwaukee, we’re saying you should make the commitment to becoming a screenwriter and consider moving to Los Angeles.
We agree—a screenwriter salary doesn’t really exist (at least at first) and LA is an expensive city compared to many in the US. However, it’s not Zurich. It is possible to find a reasonable apartment in a decent area of town if you’re prepared to take some time searching. It’s all about how much you really want it.
LA is the place to be if you want to break into the industry, and if there’s nothing really holding you back from moving to Los Angeles, then we say “do it.”
2. “Moving to Los Angeles is unnecessary now with the internet.”
“You don’t need to move to LA to become a professional screenwriter. There are many avenues for building industry contacts. First and foremost write something that people want to see. You can do that anywhere.”
True, writing a great script is probably the most important thing you should be doing, but —we’ll say it again—once you have that great script (or three) where are you better off living?
In the center of the film industry, or in Scotland? We’re not saying that it’s impossible to break into the industry from outside LA. We’re just saying it’s harder. So why make an already hard objective even harder by putting yourself at a disadvantage geographically?
Say you live in Madrid, Mali or Milwaukee, or wherever, you can certainly email agents, producers and companies from the comfort of your own home, but you’re not going to meet them face to face.
After moving to Los Angeles, on the other hand, you’ll easily be able to. In fact, you’ll never know who you’re going to meet next and make connections with. Literally anywhere—at a party, a conference, in Starbucks etc.—can become the place the meet the person who kick-starts your career.
And we all know people are much more likely to remember a face than an anonymous email address.
But let’s say you don’t want to consider moving to Los Angeles. You’ve written a smoking hot script but don’t fancy making the move west. And let’s say one of your query emails grabs the attention of a Hollywood producer. (Despite the fact the whole notion query emails actually working is somewhat debatable).
The producer will want you to come in for a meeting. So, you pay the airfare and fly in for a meeting. Then, it turns out your script is so hot, a month later you get another email from a different producer asking for a meeting.
And then another, two weeks later. You’ll spend so much in airfares you’d actually be better off just moving to Los Angeles.
This is especially true if you want to write for television.
In TV, you don’t really stand a chance in hell of breaking in if you live outside of LA. The fact is, Hollywood is built around relationships, and a big part of those relationships are formed not on Skype or in a Google Hangout, but through face-to-face meetings. Which you can’t really do if you live on the other side of the country. Or not in the country at all.
Now, some professional screenwriters are forced to remain outside of LA because of family or work reasons, but if moving to Los Angeles is an option, you should definitely do it. As Carl King, author of So, You’re A Creative Genius. Now What? writes “Moving to Los Angeles was the single best decision I made in my life.”
Just being here inspires in a way you won’t find anywhere else.
3. “I can’t afford to just quit my day job and move to Los Angeles.”
“You guys are funny. ‘Quit your day job and move to LA’?! C’mon!”
This response again misses the point of our original statement about moving to Los Angeles—i.e. if you have the means and could do if you wanted to, but are choosing not to because you haven’t made the commitment to making it as a screenwriter.
Granted, quitting your day job may not be a viable option for many, but if you’re young enough and have no real commitments, then quitting that boring office job you’re not interested in anyway, saving up a decent amount of money and moving to LA might just be the best decision you could make.
Michael Arndt did exactly that when he made the commitment to be a screenwriter and quit his day job to focus full time on writing for one year. He ended up with a screenplay called Little Miss Sunshine.
John August and Craig Mazin have also reiterated the importance of moving to Los Angeles many times on their screenwriting podcast.
4. “Moving to LA is impossible. I live on the other side of the world.”
“I looked at flight tickets prices from Tel-Aviv to LA and return. Almost 2K. That’s more than I earn per month.”
Okay, this is a legitimate claim. Trying to emigrate to the US is a whole different ball game to moving to Los Angeles from somewhere else in the US. The immigration system here, especially post-911, can be something of a minefield.
But we didn’t say, “Hey, if you wanna move to Los Angeles from Finland, just jump on a plane and come on over.” Obviously, it depends on your personal circumstances.
Ideally, no matter where you live, it’d be great if you could move to LA if you want to be a screenwriter, but it’s just not possible for many people.
One good option is to work as a screenwriter in your home country first. If you can get some credits in your own country as a screenwriter, you might then be able to use your experience to garner interest from agents and managers in the US.
Moving to Los Angeles: conclusion.
Yes, moving to Los Angeles is a big step, leaving your job, your friends and your family. And yes, there’s no guarantee you’re going to score a great screenwriter salary within a year of arriving.
But, if you have the means, it all comes down to having the will—and that means making the commitment to becoming a professional screenwriter by moving to the one place it’s more likely to happen.
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Are you thinking of moving to Los Angeles? Or have you made the leap and moved to LA to pursue a screenwriter career? Are you still glad you did? Let us know your stories in the comments section below.
Enjoyed this post? Read more on moving to Los Angeles and starting a screenwriter career…
How to Become a Screenwriter: A Pro’s Guide to Unlocking Your Career
How to Get a Screenwriting Agent and Manager in 10 Proven Steps
Script Coverage Example: How to Deliver What Readers Want
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