Impact x Netflix Competition
To ring in the new year, I entered a new competition that could be a major break if I were to get it. In this competition, Impact partnered with Netflix to look for pitches in specific genres. I unfortunately missed out on the the earlier genres, but the one I got to was asking for action-comedy ideas. My forte is generally drama, however I have written comedic shorts in the past. I figured this was worth a shot and began the application. It turned out to be a much lengthier application than I was used to (makes sense considering the stakes involved) and took quite some time to complete. It asked for specific details on the characters, plot arcs, and more. The FAQ for the competition said it wasn't required to even have started a draft, however the amount of detail needed seemed like having a first draft would have made it much easier. In the end I was able to fill out all of the fields to the best of my ability.
One slightly confusing portion of the application involved making a video to pitch the idea, however you were only given thirty seconds. This is a surprisingly short amount of time and it really made me consolidate what points I wanted to get across without doing a speed read. I'm honestly still unsure if I did it "correctly" as it seemed as though each portion of their website mentioning the video asked for different content. One asked for an elevator pitch, one asked for me to tell why this would be the next big hit, etc. In the end I was able to upload something within the time constraints that came out alright so who knows?
Another aspect of the application that I was actually thankful for was asking for a full-length screenplay as an example of my work. This would normally be daunting, however I've actually completed a few of these since January of 2020. I was able to submit a full-length that I actually feel fairly confident about, even though it was technically a drama and not an action-comedy. Luckily, they didn't ask for any specific genre for that submission.
I won't hear back from that competition until around February 19th, so I'll treat it like I do many other stressors and put it out of my mind while it can't actively affect me. The way I see it, it's already submitted and nothing can be done until I hear back, so why stress?
