There’s a “rule” for writers that when you’re first starting out you need to “stay in your lane.” This oft-preached concept refers mainly to the genres you’re writing but has also been applied to the format (shorts, television, film scripts, etc.).
The truth is that stepping outside your format into new lanes and expanding your portfolio in the process could lead to some of the best career opportunities, and there are a lot of paths from which to pick.
Shorts, TV, or Features
The simplest way to first push yourself is to try a new screenwriting format. By going “all in” on one of these formats, you could potentially miss waves within the entertainment industry.
For the past 20 years, television has seen a golden age in streaming that had never been before. It became so prevalent that, whereas before you would rarely see a movie actor on television outside of a cameo, you now see them producing and starring in entire series.
However, in the time following lockdown and the different guild strikes, there has also been a bit of a production slowdown and it’s had a major impact on television productions. Writers with low-budget features or who want to create a proof-of-concept with a short film were prepared to film without hesitation.
Series formats will bounce back, there’s never been a time where people didn’t want to be entertained and audiences are always hungry for new material. But, if you haven’t already, you should expand your portfolio first with other forms of screenwriting within these traditional avenues.
Read More: How To Write a Big Movie on a Small Budget Like ‘Challengers’
Playwriting & Audio Dramas
Many well-known screenwriters, including Leslye Headland, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, and Aaron Sorkin, got their start as playwrights, and many showrunners love to read this format as samples when hiring.
Adding a play to your scripts gives you a new sample that shows how you can push yourself creatively, particularly with how you work with limited settings and stories that rely on dialogue more than traditional screenwriting.
Another great reason to write plays is that you have more control when seeing them come to life. You can produce it independently, try to sell it to a producer, and even self-publish the scripts to sell, all of which help in getting your work in front of more industry eyeballs.
Audio dramas, or scripted narrative podcasts, are another great opportunity that’s similar to playwriting. It’s great to have these samples with scripted audio dramas blowing up in the past decade. Because it’s entirely audio, it’s also easier than producing an entire film independently.
Producing a play or audio drama also gives you the added bonus of owning intellectual property (IP), which I’m sure you know has become one of the entertainment industry’s favorite kinds of projects in recent years.
Poetry, Short Stories, and Novels
Just as playwriting pushes your dialogue, writing a novel or short story will challenge your prose writing. You’ll also have more space to show the inner complexities of your characters in this format. Many screenwriters also write novels such as Yulin Kuang, who was hired to adapt Emily Henry’s best-selling romcom novel for the screen and also released her own novel earlier this year.
Some writers trained in screenwriting who have never worked as screenwriters for features or television have written popular novels, such as Victoria Aveyard. She attended USC and earned a BA in Writing for Film and Television, but she’s not known for her screenplays. You likely know of her as the author of the Red Queen and the Realm Breaker fantasy series.
If you don’t want to write an entire novel, you can always write poetry or short stories. Former Saturday Night Live writer and creator of Man Seeking Woman, Simon Rich, is a prolific short story writer that has been published in numerous publications and released in six collections. Short stories are a great option to show your writing skills in bite-sized pieces that pack a punch.
With a novel, you could pitch the project and try to sell it through the traditional publishing route, or you could self-publish.
You can also pitch or self-publish poetry or short stories, but there are many more fiction publications ready to pay for poetry and short stories than there are book publishing houses. Publishing your work is also a boon for you as a writer, particularly if it gains traction and becomes valuable IP.
Read More: Is Your Prose Project Actually Prose?
Social Media and Independent Platforms
Last, but absolutely not least, you want to be looking at social media and platforms like YouTube or Vimeo. These video-sharing platforms provide a distribution opportunity for your short films, but also for ongoing series, sketch comedy, and other short-form content.
While YouTube may have been one of the first of these kinds of platforms, creators on other social media apps have been investing time developing scripted projects on Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat, Twitch, and more. These vertical videos are so popular that YouTube introduced its own vertical format called YouTube Shorts in 2021.
While some may lament the shortening attention span of viewers, these videos still require tight writing skills that quickly grab the audience’s attention. And the more viewers watch them, the more financiers will invest in them and make space for opportunities.
It’s worthwhile to try your hand at writing your own scripts for social media and possibly even produce them. It’s another opportunity to release your work, get feedback from audiences, and grow a following that could get you noticed by the industry. We see this a great deal with comedy performers online, but there’s no reason the same process couldn’t help a writer to succeed.
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There have never been more outlets available for creatives to explore and utilize and the benefit is that they can add to your portfolio, raise your profile, and potentially even help you start financially living off of your art. Don’t hesitate to jump in and expand your voice.
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