Today we’d like to introduce you to Mark Sanderson.
Hi Mark, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
It all started at eleven years-old when my childhood friend received a camera from his grandfather. We made short films and even started our own production company and were involved with all aspects of filmmaking even marketing and advertising our films. We made genre movies and would screen them in his garage and charge admission like a real movie theater. It was during these pre-teenage years when I started co-writing more short screenplays and started my own productions. I continued making my own short films during high school, and then I was accepted to UCLA Film School where I studied screenwriting and production. Even though I really enjoyed directing and loved acting, it was screenwriting that always felt the most empowering for me. After I graduated film school, it took me six years to land my first professional writing job and sell my first spec screenplay. That script took seven years to reach the screen but it opened the door for steady screenplay assignment work. Now with over twenty years of professional experience, sixteen produced films and two dozen screenplay assignments, I look back and realize those early years of training certainly helped me focus on my goal of becoming a working screenwriter.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
No, this hasn’t been an easy or smooth road by a long shot. I’ve devoted my life to my craft and forging a career where I’m blessed to get paid to do what I love for a living. My parents were not in the film business, so my only choice was to learn filmmaking early on, and I was fortunate to graduate from a top film school where I continued to learn. It’s been a lot of sacrifices and wondering if it would ever happen, but I never put an expiration date on my screenwriting dreams. Early on when I wrote my first screenplays, started to pitch, and built valuable relationships, I worked as a waiter for ten years during college and after including many odd jobs so I could focus on my dreams. As I mentioned earlier, it took me six years after I graduated to land my first professional writing job and I was fired six weeks later! My fifth spec screenplay finally sold and that was a seven-year journey from first draft to first day of photography. That opportunity opened the door to paid script assignment work, but since then I’ve had busy years and slow years. As with any artistic pursuit, tenacity is vital to staying in the game over the long haul journey. I’ve been tested far too many times over the years to see just how badly I wanted a screenwriting career. My answer to myself was always, “More than anything else.”
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
I’m a working screenwriter blessed to be living his childhood dream of writing movies. I’ve sold one spec years ago that was produced and it opened the door to script assignment work. Now having just completed my twenty-fourth paid assignment, I’ve had sixteen produced films that have premiered on U.S. networks, some received theatrical releases, and all have been distributed globally. Most of my screenplay assignment work has been on the drama/family drama side with some action films, and usually the genre of the first script you sell will most likely dictate what genre you’ll be writing. Overall, I’m attracted to stories about broken people in difficult circumstances and how they find a road back to happiness. These stories really interest me in any genre. How to best deal with our life’s challenges in the movies I’ve written — if it’s fighting for your life against thirty deadly snakes on a submarine hundreds of feet under the ocean, losing your father and finding out that Santa Claus is your new next door neighbor, or a group of kids innocently befriending the “enemy” during WWII, I’ve tackled most every genre that has been offered my way. I’m most proud of my ability to stay in the game and continue to live my dreams being a filmmaker. I’ve been blessed to work with talented artists over the years and many have become my friends and mentors. After twenty years of experience, I wanted to give back as a mentor, so I wrote a book to help other writers embarking on their dreams with advice to help their survival in Hollywood’s trenches. I also offer screenplay consultation services on my website to help writers who need an extra set of eyes on their projects.
We’d love to hear about how you think about risk taking?
You have to be a risk taker if you want to pursue any artistic career. There are zero guarantees in Hollywood and my dream to pursue a filmmaking career has been a giant risk from the start. I could have pursued other careers that guaranteed a salary or steady paycheck, but I was never driven by the romanticized ideal of fame or fortune in Hollywood. On this long journey, I’ve lost friendships and relationships because others attempted to derail my plans. It was always about the work itself and my ability to create and work with other creatives on interesting projects. As I mentioned, I’m blessed to wake up in the morning and get paid to do what I love for a living. When writing feature films, writers go from job to job, and in television if you are blessed to write on a series, eventually that job will end too. Much like life, it’s all a risk without many guarantees. I never focused on the odds or the stats about how many writers find work or how few scripts sold this year. If you want it badly enough, you need to power through the rejection, criticism, and failure regardless of the risk.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://fiveoclockblue.net/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/marksanderson_scriptcat/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/scriptcat
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCTN_wvBLFeC3PnwG_6hxHZQ
- Other: https://www.amazon.com/dp/151730945X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1489184844&sr=1-1&keywords=mark+sanderson
