The Calling Card Script

What exactly is a calling card script?

Let’s start first with what it isn’t. It’s definitely not fan fiction. It’s not based on someone else’s intellectual property (IP). It’s not a trend-following script either. If you write a script based on what you think is selling now, it’s not a Calling Card script.

When I was a baby writer, I really didn’t know anything about screenwriting except from the scripts I read on set or from the films I was lucky enough to be cast in. I also got to see the weekly scripts from the series I was a glorified extra in for six seasons. It was there I decided I would try my hand at screenwriting because honestly, it seemed to be so simple.

Truly, I was an idiot. Or maybe I was lucky because I knew nothing, I had no preconceived rules I thought I needed to follow. I believe it’s a combination of the two, actually, that spurred me to forge forward, fearlessly.

After I wrote my first script and it got optioned by a studio—via miracle—then unoptioned in pretty short order because the studio got sold, I had a conversation about it with a producer on the set of the series. I told him my tale of woe. He said, “Join the club” and proceeded to tell me I needed to write a Calling Card script.

A Calling Card script, he said, is a script so good and different that it doesn’t necessarily even need to get made, it just needs to impress the reader with the craft and skill of the writer. It needs to be a great story, but the more out of the box it is, the better for the writer it is. It also needs to be a story that the writer thoroughly believes in.

You can’t fake a Calling Card script.

Think about that. What a list. A lot to digest. Not only do you need to come up with a premise and story that’s completely unique (not easy) that comes from deep within your soul, it also needs to be crafted with skill that shows what you can do … that you know might never get made. Wow.

Was he right? From the tip of his head to his toes.

Did I write one? Yes, I did.

I came up with a unique and kinda controversial premise and story that ended up being the film Extracurricular Activities. You can watch it on Amazon, if you’d like. It’s become kind of a cult film.

It got made 28 years after I wrote it. 28 years after it opened every door in the Film Industry I could have hoped. 28 years after it got me my first Open Writing Assignment. After it got optioned 8 times, by 8 different producers, production companies, a studio (Universal), and a director … Each time, until the last one, not getting made but getting me job after job, opportunity after opportunity, and making my career.

Did I ever expect it to get made? Nope. Not from the minute I wrote it.

I wrote it exactly the way the producer suggested. I came up with a story I knew would be different and threw myself into making it something I wanted to see, even if I never did.

I loved every minute of writing it, too, not just because it was a great deal of fun, but because I was free to do anything my brain could come up with without worrying about whether it was commercial or not. It was 100% about the storytelling.

Right now, in the midst of this … for lack of better words … the industry shrinkage, that I don’t think will change for quite a while, I can’t think of a better time to draw attention to yourself as a writer than writing a Calling Card script.

I know you’ve got that one idea that you’d love to see that you know isn’t anything that would ever get made. That weird little thriller. That out-of-the-box horror idea. That family drama unlike any family drama. That dynamite screwball comedy. That genre idea that turns the genre on its head. That cool idea you got while out walking that you toyed with and dismissed because it was too strange or difficult to figure out easily. But if you could? Might open some doors.

I’m not talking about story ideas that have been done to death. I’m talking about something unique to you. That only you can tell. That will show your voice as a writer.  The fun part of the Calling Card script? You get to do anything you want to show off your storytelling ability.

Personally, I’m of the mindset that a Calling Card script is better off being low budget. Not super low, unless that works. But the million to five million variety is nice.

Why?

It shows you can be creative in the arena where most films are made these days. And for those rewrite jobs you may get from it. As a new writer, you’ll get your first chances on low-budget films. They want to see if you can handle those before trusting you with something that they have a lot more invested in.

That’s how the business works.

Even if you’ve had some success, right now may be the time to go out to the edge of that cliff and write something just to show what you can do right now. No other reason.

That’s what I’m doing. I hope it works even half as well as Extracurricular Activities did.

*Feature illustration by fabioderby (Adobe)