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Another of my corporate sojourn entanglements. This one involved 3 non-profits and an Ivy League university and an Ivy League University club.The Yale Club & The Charter School: Left Once, Fired 3 TimesIt starts out at a charter school where I’m the liaison between the Superintendent of the charter school and the fuller non-profit owning agency that was starting the school. Since I’d been at the larger company for consulting gig at the behest of the consulting company owner, who literally begged me to take the assignment for 3 months to assist an insane Director, I was tapped, after being fired 3 times in 3 months by the Director, by the Superintendent.Okay, the Director, Regina wanted to be the Superintendent but the CEO of the non-profit felt, rightfully so, that though she had extensive experience in programmatic management, she didn’t have the experience or degrees to be the Superintendent. So he brought in Doreen.Regina’s right-hand assistant goes on vacation/maternity leave and I’m languishing at the Yale Club when my friend Liz calls and says Regina has run through 5 people while her right hand is on maternity leave. Could I jump in? she’ll pay my fee but she needs someone who’s more than an assistant, she needs a manager, who will act as an executive assistant to hold onto the overall contract. There are 1000+ jobs within this non-profit, 10% potential through the consulting firm, she doesn’t want to lose the account.I balk. Liz wants me, on a Friday afternoon, to go uptown to interview with Regina who says in the office extremely late hours. I’m in jeans, Timberlands and a comfy sweater, sequestered off in the back offices of the Yale Club—-eating good free food that they provided for the staff, reading Vanity Fair, probably typing up a manuscript. It was a cushy assignment for the summer that didn’t involve a lot of work just software know-how and the ability to sit alone in a back office for 8 hours and not fall asleep.“Can I do it on Monday?” I lived in Queens so it would be a 3-hour roundtrip to go home, change and then come back to Manhattan.“Don’t change,” Liz begs. “Regina, who doesn’t even like oxygen, loves your resume. Just go.”“It’s unprofessional.”“Just go.”“I’m in jeans, Liz!”“Go!”“It won’t look right!”“Look, Kyle, it’s a Black company and I think my mistake has been not sending specifically a highly qualified, professional Black person there. You’re my best Black person, ever. I’m nearly doubling your rate. Go.”“Wow, Liz, that’s very honest. You know how I appreciate near acidic honesty, you temptress you!”“I think they need a Black person. A good one.”“Let them know ahead of time I’m coming from the bowels of the Yale Club on a dress down Friday….”“I will, I will.”I go.Great interview. Regina and I like each other. Get the position.Regina proceeds to fire me 3 times and then re-hire me 3 times over the next 3 months. Generally, on a Friday, she’d call Liz and fire me, then on Saturday, she’d re-hire me. The third time Liz warns her that I might no longer be available.Turns out Mary, working for the Superintendent and having contact with me, though the school administrative offices are on another floor, regularly brings me overlapping work. Mary also passes the secret message that when I have a private moment could I wander up to the Superintendent’s office for a chat? I do. The Sueprintdnet says that she’s heard great things about me around the company for the past 3 months, in spite of working for Regina. When will my assignment end? Would I consider coming to work for her when it does and the other lady returns from maternity leave? I have a unique skill now of having an educational background on my resume and having worked for the parent company—-she needs someone who understands both worlds that she’s straddling.I lay out the insanity of Regina and her regular firings and rehirings.Doreen says she’ll handle it, in fact, she’s been looking for a test case to leverage to the CEO about power structures—that she should be Number 3 behind him and the VP, and not Regina, who has been there longer (and ostensibly helped to bury some bodies.)I agree. The salary offer though is low but Liz, who is now on a conference call offers to pay me for a period of time a second check plus benefits plus I’ll learn the ins and outs of school design, again so she can keep the account. The Superintendent says her employment contract is for 2 years, that will be our agreed time of employment. We all agree.A few days later Regina fires me for the 4th time. Calls Saturday, and Liz says I’m no longer available. I arrive promptly Monday morning and go one floor above where I was and sit at my new desk.By noon the shit hits the corporate fan.The CEO, Regina, and Superintendent go into an intense meeting that again involves Liz on a conference call. Regina’s attack is that I orchestrated this. It’s explained that I was fired several times and offered something new. The CEO cuts it down the middle that I work for the Superintendent for 90 days to prove I’m a good apple and then it’s mashed. The Superintendent sidles in that she should be allowed, as the 3rd in charge of the whole agency to make unilateral hiring choices as this whole process sis inefficient and unprofessional. The CEO agrees. She gets her bump officially in power and Regina gets her official slapdown.Hair Length Warning of Impending ReleaseTwo years later Regina has been fired, the Superintendent is on the edge of the knife of Quit-Fired and she tells me it’s her end, my end, of 2 years. I could use my wiles around the company to get a placement elsewhere…but it would come with a Liz-less pay cut.I’m like !deuces! I’d been interviewing and was about to accept a position with Amaranth a hedge fund company in Connecticut. I’d been interviewing a month before this discussion and the constant request for my updated vacation portfolio to count days suggested to me that HR, a department of two harangued women, was counting my days.Also and this is insane Dr. Paul Ekman-Lie To Me-behavioral science microexpression reading: Doreen had a short natural bob, completed her Ph.D. and got a waist-length weave. I knew then, the gig was up.I’m deeply intrigued by education, but not children, maybe adults. I’d actually been volunteer teaching workshops for men down the block…so I’m torn between 3 options.A Corruption Detour of DevelopmentThe Executive Director of that men’s organization makes me promise that when my sojourn at the school is over, I let him know—-hat I give him a shot at me. I tell him and he offers the Title Youth Coordinator—-14 to 25-year-olds plus the Facilitator position. It’s less money but he also offers complete design control over both programs. Interesting….Amaranth wants me to manage 6 lawyers' offices in what I have to admit was a BEAUTIFUL campus in the wilds of Connecticut—-with a fantastic list of holiday parties we would go on. Everyone was slim and pretty and blonde wood paneling.But the men’s non-profit—-it’s a block down from the school and I’d moved to Manhattan at the behest of the school so that an Administrator could be on hand before 7am. I’m situated and I’d be given a lot of educational design freedom.I take the non-profit job, being let go on Monday but having signed the paperwork for the new job that previous Saturday. (Ironically, Amaranth goes under a few months later…)Always, Always Be Professionally Networking-Formally, Informally2 1/2 more years go by and I’ve surmised that the 2nd non-profit is a cesspool of corruption and I’m plotting my escape (I’d even hired a Life Coach) but I’m torn by my commitment to my students and adult participants—-well over 150 people I interact with, counsel and teach a month.However to compensate for low resources I’ve made several informal relationships with half a dozen other non-profits, including Gay Men’s Health Crisis that has a GED program which I push needy youth into. To help out with the push of people I’ve brought them I teach a class or two, then I start helping with administrative duties with the overall program. Finally, the director says that there’s an FT, high paying position to construct an educational/vocational training program, am I interested?I say yes but I interview with the ACLU.My plan had been after the charter school to take a simpler job and finally go to Columbia for my post-grad work. So now I’m really juiced up for the move and sort of finger burned about non-profits.GMHC never calls about the job so I’m about to sign with the ACLU, going back into corporate legal work, when the phone rings—-I was actually walking down the block for lunch on Madison and 125th—-where am I? who the hell do I think I am? What exactly is my problem?My work hours are completely off of a corporate schedule—-I work mid-week through the weekend, off-hours, because sometimes I’m even down at the Piers (the docks, the friggin’ docks until after midnight!—-the jobs I’ve had….) and nite clubs recruiting for my programs—-so uh, no, it takes me a while to catch up on voicemails, especially if the number is blocked. Do you have any idea how many people have my number? It’s better to email me.“By the way, who is this?” I ask.It’s the Asst. HR Director at GMHC, he’s been trying to contact me for two weeks. Do I ever pick up my phone?!!!The Coordinator position was filled, I remind him. Though the CEO and a Director at GMHC had offered me at their Christmas party (my non-profit had no money, remember. Volunteer teaching at GMHC got me into their fabulous parties. I have crashed, been invited to, sidled my way into and eventually volunteered at more places to insure I have holiday parties to go to. It’s sad but it’s one of my few must-haves in life.) either the Coordinator position or a Grants Developer position.It seems that yes a Coordinator was hired. She, however, had quit a week later. Was I still interested? I had to still be interested! Could I be there Thursday, he could assemble two Directors, himself, another person and they’d do a deep, fast interview and explanation of the role?I wanted to stay in education. They were offering a lot more money (I did the best salary negotiation/boondoggle of my life and got 35% more than I’d expected). Plus, most importantly they had resources, knew of my work uptown and in their brother programs and wanted to give me reasonable carte blanche to create as I will. I reasoned that this would be a beautiful evolving culmination to present on a platter to Columbia as I then designed my university teaching aspirations.I accepted. I interviewed Thursday morning and got to work 10 minutes late on Thursday afternoon. The ED, of the corrupt agency, imperiously calls me in and tells me I’m being laid off, Thursday was my last day. Don’t even bother coming in on the weekend. In fact, he’d cash out my next 2 weeks.I say okay with a bright Kool-Aid smile. He’s stymied.(He liked to twist people by their entrails, later, as the Executive Director of GMAD, Gay Men of African Descent he would go on a multi-year bender of embezzlement to buy crystal meth to go to barebacking sex parties to fuck men who weren’t HIV+, with his HIV+-ness. It made the news. Yeah, he was that kind of an asshole.)Two weeks later I come to pick up my last check, it’s just him and the office manager there. He says I can clean up my desk and office and then he’ll give me my check. Under escort from the office manager. This had never happened before in 20 years of the micro agency’s history. The office manager is profusely apologizing to me as we go back to my office. I pick up a magazine and a paperweight. Then turn and get my check. Oh, I’d cleaned off my computer months beforehand and all that paperwork and such on my desk and cabinets was just flotsam.The ED fumes. I can only assume my foresight and chicanery lead to his crystal meth addiction, embezzlement and swapping fluids at unsafe sex parties after decades of steadfast HIV prevention work.Or he was just, you know, an asshole.The corruption and general asshole-ishness of the ED and several other members of the staff meant that I had to play my cards both tight and vicious.I’d spent the past 3 months disintegrating my programs from the inside, referring peopel out, pushing others out of the nest to school, jobs, etc..Friday morning GMHC calls to confirm all my references checked out and the job was mine, starts in 1 week. I technically worked for both agencies in overlapping, double pay weeks.The best part was the old ED came to GMHC to beg for money a few weeks later and passed by my classroom and saw me teaching (though he’d been informed by an in common client I was there.)I Now Have Wolverine Sharpened Senses At Work2 years at GMHC and I go down to the HR office where I was friends with one of the assistant directors. Her office is full of stacks of boxes with white envelopes. And it’s not Christmas. She acts nervous and can’t go to lunch. I mosey away.Those are the lay off letters, I surmise.It was March. I had intended to complete my current class out to April or June and then start at Columbia.I was about to give GMHC notice.But based upon her nervousness and all the envelopes, I wait. I don’t give notice.They deliver our letters in April. However in a stroke of Whoopi!, the Obama Administration, extends healthcare for 2 years from all companies who lay folk off—your benefits won’t end and then he extends Unemployment to 99 weeks if you’re laid off. You can still get it if you go back to school. Essentially it might cost more to keep folk than hold onto them—he’s trying to stave the recession lay off trend.Between savings, extended benefits and maximum amount from Unemployment I literally made MORE than being employed as I started school.If I had quit though as I intended to pre-April, I would’ve got none of this.GMHC delivers our letters, the day AFTER, his announcement. They have to change their payouts. I sign on the dotted line, take the severance package and the years of healthcare and go on vacation then go to Columbia.By that time I’d been through so many non-profit layoffs and firings in a handful of years that I could see it coming a mile away and even more importantly I was always ahead of the curve, never saying anything, but halfway out the door. I’d also lost that kind of blind trust I had in companies so I was aggressively Kyle, Inc. dealing with these companies.But…So What?So it seems like, Ok, Kyle, you bounced through some places, met some folk of questionable morality and sanity but what’s the true profit?Here’s the true profit.No one made me sign a confidentiality agreement or an NDA as I bounced around as was de rigeur when I’d been a Securities Litigation Paralegal beforehand. I was surprised as I was creating all of these new programs and such. But I suggested profit-making, licensing, royalty ideas, once, then went silent.And continued to use all of the positions as test labs and the employees as feedback on things I was developing.(It was actually Mary at the school who suggested one day when I mentioned volunteering at the second non-profit down the block that I write my own books and start a TV show. (Then at the 2nd non-profit, we were filmed by a crew from the studio I work with now and Time Warner. I suggested to the crystal mething ED that we do a show regularly, it was free to set up at the studio and I have youth galore who could manage it. He shut me down. I went and struck up what has been a 10-year contract, with now a 5-year extension, a year later for my own TV show. Because it’s cable the valuation of the shows is less…but there’s still monetized valuation, licensing, rebroadcast profits.))The non-profits, all of them that I’d been systematically laid off from allowed me to experiment with curriculum design school design, creating educational materials, facilitating workshops, aggregating data, etc. for years throughout thousands of people, while paying me.I had suggested several times along this journey to these agencies that books, videos, a TV show could be designed from these interactions with clients, students, agencies, professional developments.They, the leadership, generally balked.When I got to Columbia University I mentioned some of this, they immediately suggested ways—through professors there and agencies—-to publish, produce, distribute my work.That I’ve been able to transmute, transform into millions of dollars of content that will continue to produce and offshoot money for the next 125 years….that I have 100% (Oprah) ownership of!Smooches.#KylePhoenix (the blogs, the books, the briefs, the articles—-monetized)#TheKylePhoenixShow (the TV show, the videos, Live Streaming, etc.)

I founded the sky diving club at my college— even though I had never sky dived.In our first semester, I convinced 60 classmates to jump out of a perfectly good airplane.I wrenched my neck and was in a neck brace for three days.I completed my open water dive for SCUBA certificationwhile my new wife waited by the side of the roadon our drive to our honeymoon.We took our dog on our honeymoon.I’ve had over 14 dogs, usually two at a time.They stay with me all the time. I’m a bit of a dog whisperer.I used to sneak dogs into my classes at MIT.The dean tried to catch me, but never did.<Can I see a picture of your dog?>Our daughter slept in our bed for her first three years.With two Belgian tervurens plus my wife and me.My father operated on me several times.He removed my appendix and several moles.Surgeons still remark how small my appendix scar is.I have undressed Cher!She was having plastic surgery in NYC.I was the orderly who brought her to the OR, moved her onto the operating table, and prepped her.[Comment: Concerned about this revelation?]When I was 17, I operated to remove a tumor on our family dog’s neck near his carotid artery.My father, a world renown surgeon, supervised, but he could physically no longer operate, so I did the cutting, excising, and suturing.The operation took about an hour— on the washing machine in our home.Boots survived for four more years. :)I have actually had a policeman draw his weapon and threaten to shoot me.I was running, and chose not to stop.No bullets were fired.<0931: Why are libertarians so preoccupied with the legalization of drugs?>My best friend from high school turned out to be gayand eventually died from AIDS.I didn’t know he was gay until I came home from college.I still regret my lack of immediate support. (It was 1975.)I have been called “stupid” many times in my life,Most memorably, as a third grader, I overheard a teacher talking angrily to other teachersAnd then a study group classmate was surprised that I had broken the grading curve at MIT.<Should I inform MIT that they made a mistake admitting my stupid friend?>I had a speech impediment so severe I was thought to be retarded.I have overcome the problem.I give inspirational speeches that are well received.I spent many hours in bars as a child and a teen.My mother was a jazz trumpet player and a band leader.I was attending her gigs.I was certain that I would never get married.I “dated” many girls/women from age 13–22.I never said “I love you”, until my wife.I have been happily married now for 37+ years, and am still surprised at how lucky I was…<How did my wife react to me becoming a libertarian?>I’m a very good body surfer.Yes, I surfed on a board, and windsurfed,but relative to other people, I can body surf very well.At 61, I was called a “wave whisperer” just this summer by a young NC body surfer.I created a program for MIT business studentsto help entrepreneurs write their business planand present them to the MIT Enterprise Forum.This was essentially Shark Tank 1985.I have worked on 25+ new product efforts in new industries,as part of one of the first new product incubators,at the research labs of a telecom company.My expertise was market strategy, market research, product design, and financial forecasting.<0860: What do entrepreneurs just "get" that other people don't?><1029: Why are libertarians more likely to be entrepreneurial?>I taught myself coding.I was programming in Basic on my own in the 1960s.I taught myself coding in (6502) assembler in the late 1970s.I eventually entered a CS masters program in the early 1980s.I never completed my thesis for my masters in computer science.I completed all Northwestern coursework with straight AsI completed all my research.But I so detested my thesis in fault tolerance that once I got into MIT, I never completed the thesis.I was the fourth of five children of my father,but the only one he interacted with positively.My father had no interest in children.Having dismissed my siblings’ intelligence, he saw me as his clone.I dropped out of college in my junior year.My father had given me an ultimatum; I called his bluff.I wanted to research and prevent knee injuries in football.My father wanted me to follow him into cardio-vascular surgery.I didn’t think I could emotionally take constant death.I moved to Colorado after dropping out, with a Northwestern coed.We set up house, with no money.I started minimum wage at a rental shop — even though I knew nothing about machinery.Eventually I became the manager of a local bar.I introduced comedy clubs to Boulder.I had been given an opportunity to turn around a failing bar.I opened up a Second City-type venue,transforming a quiet wine bar into a rowdy comedy club.When I was last in Boulder, they had three comedy clubs.I created the Gamma Delta Iota fraternity at Northwestern(GDI: God Damn Independent) .We had over 80 pledges.The fraternity lasted only for an hour.Everyone pledged, took part in secret ceremonies, and then depledged.Shots of tequila were involved.I majored in psychology,thinking I would understand how we think.I studied rats in mazes for two years.I transferred to a clinical program in Coloradoand was then studying schizophrenics and catatonics.“Positive psychology” had not yet been invented.I was the easiest sell into personal growth workshops (1986)It was exactly what I had been looking to study in college.I have taken numerous personal growth workshops.I love the challenge of improving myself.And I have a ways to go…<0586: Are libertarians psychologically healthy and happy people?>I created the largest in-person, personal growth group in the world.I had already been retired for 15 years by then.My original proposal was rejected by every major personal growth organization operating in MA.Yet, after four years, we had over 4,500 members and were running 250 events a year using over a hundred different personal growth providers.I derived libertarianism with a friend in 1981.He was my boss, and a staunch conservative.I was a socialist activist.Through logically resolving inconsistencies, we eventually came to a consistent philosophy, based on respect for each individual human.It was not until two years later, while riding on a Chicago bus, that I learned that this was an actual philosophy called libertarianism.<How did I become a libertarian?>Most of the kids I hung out with in high school died, were imprisoned, or were impoverished.I am one of the few successful survivors of our post-60s drug culture.After three weeks at Phillips Academy— where had I transferred for my senior year,after almost being kicked out of high school,despite the highest grades in the toughest classes —I called my mother to tell her that “I have wasted my life.”<How do I get into Phillips Andover Academy>So bad was my childhood, that I swore I would never have children.My daughter is the second greatest blessing of my life, after my wife.I eventually realized that it wasn’t me that was wrong with my childhood —my parents just hated kids.<1026: Why do my parents seem to not be interested in their grandchildren?>I led a parent revolt against our town’s teacher’s union.They refused to allow parents to help in the classroomsThey were seeking a tax override to increase their salaries.(They had warned of adverse consequences to our children without more money and I was trying to ameliorate the impact on the kids.)The school eventually submitted,but made me clean their supply cabinets for a full monthwhich I dutifully performed without complaint.By the end of two years, I was teaching their experiential sciences classes, running their computer lab, had started the school newspaper, and was organizing parents to teach Great Books and art appreciation.I stared an “afterschoolers’ board” for parents who wanted to supplement their children’s education.I was the only male.I homeschooled our daughter.I drove, and taught at, homeschool coops around MA.I spent a lot of time working to advance my daughter’s ability to think.I helped alternative schools start upand parents to find alternatives to government schooling.<0667: What are some alternative school concepts?>In retirement, I have pro bono helped numerous, small service providers to start up and to expand their small businesses.Few things upset me more than government profiting at the cost of of children and of underperforming minorities.Even though I am a libertarian, because I come from the left,I generally do not agree with the personal preferencesof many libertarians,who mostly come from the right.But what I love is that because we all eschew violence,we can agree to disagree,without worrying that the other will pull out the gun of the state.<1052: What are the best characteristics/principles of libertarianism?>I am an inveterate entrepreneur.I see primarily future possibility, and I have very little respect for tradition or of old ways of doing things or of giving up.My main blind spot is that others do not see as much opportunity as I do.My main frustration is with bureaucracy and lack of innovation.My wife has described the biggest challenge of living with me is that “no assumption is safe from inspection”.<1029: Why are libertarians more likely to be entrepreneurial?>I am the winningest football coach ever in my town.(I coached only the youngest kids (3rd - 5th graders in Pop Warner,))Still, I have a 47–1–1 record with six different teams over five years.When I started, the program could barely field 11 players,I ended up coaching two full 35-member teams simultaneously.I cry watching contemporary dance.In fact, I cry watching any heroics,or any intense efforts towards beauty or virtue.<What do libertarians think of libertarians?>I loved the martial arts, including fencing and karate.My daughter eclipsed me at 17 becoming a black belt instructor.Two people taught me love and empathy:my older sister and our Jamaican maid.I try to pass on that gift by expanding empathy into the world.<1026: Why do my parents seem to not be interested in their grandchildren?>I’ve won couples’ dance contests.both with my wife and with my daughter.With a style I taught myself, watching others dance in bars.I know quite a bit about market research, statistics, psychometrics, and large scale monte-carlo modeling.While I’m a nerd (e.g., very comfortable in mathematics),My real passion is ethics — how should humans treat one another?I am most saddened by how we treat one another.Of course, direct bullying and violence is terrible, but it is rare.The more common bullying, where we vote for politicians to whomp on one another, makes me the most sad.Although I am an atheist, I absolutely love logical (for example, Jesuit) ethics.I believe that Man is here to live a life consistent with the principles of universality— that each human has equal rights(not equal abilities, and not equal outcomes!)And that our greatest act of love is to allow each person the freedom to become the greatest person they uniquely can be.Bruce Springsteen played in my high school cafeteria in 1973.I love allusionary writing.Even though I have little respect of most poets’ understandingof what causes the problems of the world, and thereforeof what direction the solution lies.I believe that peace, love, tolerance, diversity, and consensual community is most consonant with a better future world.I have a tendency to try to give a bit more than is required, and then just a bit more.See related:→ More essays on <Dennis’ Personal Info>→ Return to <Table of Contents> to Dennis’ Quora essays.

Writing competitions go back thousands of years. The centerpiece of the ancient Greeks’ annual Dionysia festival was a competition between playwrights at the Theatre of Dionysus dating back to before 600 BCE (and eventually actors were permitted on stage). Writers have been celebrated in festivals and competitions, and they have been remembered long after their deaths, from ancient times.The early days of “screenwriting” go back to the birth of film in the 1890s. Back then, they were called scenarios. Films were only a couple of minutes long and scenarios provided brief explanations — written by writers and filmmakers — primarily utilized for marketing and as explanations for audiences that weren’t used to experiencing entertainment in this then-revolutionary technology.As films became more narratively complex, they went from just one “scenario” to many. One of the first examples of the modern screenplay was from George Melies’ iconic 1902 film, A Trip to the Moon. The script had thirty-some lines of basic descriptions that provided action and locations.As cinematic narratives grew, so did the film industry. The first movie theater opened in 1905. By 1910, there were ten thousand movie theaters in the United States alone. Audiences were engrossed with cinema. And as with any budding industry, the more popular it became, the more people wanted to be involved.The Early YearsBudding storytellers began to write their own scenarios. As the film industry grew, the existing studios making movies at the time were bombarded by submissions.In 1913, Moving Picture World magazine reported that likely over twenty thousand fans had written their own movie “scenarios.”To engage the fans and to discover talent, studios began to offer cash prizes for the best scenarios. And thus, the screenwriting competition was born.Women in ScreenwritingFan magazines like Photoplay worked with studios to collect success stories and even began to publish advice articles on how to write for the cinema. Dozens of screenwriting schools and scenario advice books — like Louella Parsons’s How to Write for the Movies (1915).James Quirk, the editor of Photoplay magazine, realized that intrigued cinematic audiences not only wanted to watch movies, but they wanted to participate in them as well. And he also observed that women trying to break into the film industry as actresses were being taken advantage of — often in the most negative of ways.He later wrote that writing screenplays was a safe way to enter the film industry for women. It was challenging, creative, and crucial to the filmmaking process — and it offered possibilities for fame and fortune. Because of such articles, many early screenwriters of that time were women.Between 1915 and the early 1920s, Photoplay worked hard to convince women that their futures lay in screenwriting rather than the pursuit of being a Hollywood starlet in front of the camera. Quirk himself promoted the trade as the ideal pursuit for women of all aspirations and backgrounds.A housewife named Cordelia Ford earned a $250 cash prize in a screenwriting contest.Helen O’Keefe, who usually wrote after her children went to bed, paid off all of her debts after winning a cash prize from the American Film Company.Ida Damon, at that time working as a stenographer, won what was then an astronomical figure of ten thousand dollars from a screenwriting contest awarded by the Thanhouser Film Corporation.Elaine Sterne, winner of Vitagraph Studio’s International Scenario Contest, was later hired by Photoplay to write a monthly column entitled Writing for the Movies as a Professional.Many of the women that began to win these early screenwriting contests would later become the literary voices behind such iconic Hollywood filmmakers as Cecil B. DeMille, Douglas Fairbanks, Rudolph Valentino, and many others.By the late 1920s, Photoplay Magazine began to focus their attentions on the glitz and glamour of Hollywood — accompanied by creative advertising for products. The screenwriting articles began to disappear — as did the screenwriting contests.The Dark AgesNot much is written about screenwriting competitions in the couple of decades after the 1920s. There were certainly contests that continued on, but the majority of writing competitions seem to have shifted focus to literary fiction as the ripples of the Great Depression affected the film industry.Despite the economic hardship faced by nearly everyone in the country in the 1930’s, many millions of Americans still packed into theaters each week. Why? Escapism from the difficult times.Musicals became the highest-grossing genre of film, and helped to entertain the masses during the Great Depression. Stars such as Judy Garland, Mickey Rooney, Shirley Temple, and Fred Astaire became models of strength, courage, optimism, charisma, vulnerability, and triumph.Scenarios were no longer being written nor requested — long forgotten as the cinematic narrative built to feature-length movies. Original screenplays were less in demand, with the studios now instead opting for more musical compositions.1950sThe most notable screenwriting competition during this time was started by legendary movie pioneer Samuel Goldwyn, Sr.In 1955, to celebrate his 75th birthday, he started the Samuel Goldwyn Writing Awards at UCLA to encourage young stage, film, and television writers. Notable winners included Francis Ford Coppola, Eric Roth, Pamela Gray, Allison Anders, Colin Higgins, Carroll Ballad, Scott Rosenberg, and Jonathan Kellerman.The success history of the Samuel Goldwyn Writing Awards is impressive, with winners having later written more than 300 films, television series and made-for-TV movies — and have won a total of 27 Academy Awards with 101 nominations, 35 Golden Globe Awards with 189 nominations, and 87 Emmys with 488 nominations. Previous winners have also become popular authors who, collectively, have published over 60 books — many of which were New York Times bestsellers.However, this wasn’t an open competition. Only regularly enrolled undergraduate or graduate students at UCLA could partake — a stipulation that continues to this day.1970sDuring the 1960s and 1970s, cinema began to change. The counter-culture movement began to bleed into the film industry. The days of actor, director, and screenwriter studio contract deals for multiple pictures began to dissipate. Auteur filmmakers were all of the rage and studios began to take more risks to answer the call of the times in a Vietnam and Post-Vietnam era of cinematic storytelling.In 1979, Willard Rodgers — a graduate of the American Film Institute’s directors’ program — started the AFI Alumni Association Writers Workshop. At that time, Rodgers convinced the alumni board that talented starting writers could benefit from a process that begins with professional supervision of their scripts and ends with a reading by professional actors and an audience critique.This was a shift in screenwriting contests. Screenwriters would still submit their scripts to the program, but those that advanced would now benefit not from cash prizes, but through industry access and mentorship where they would work directly with industry professionals during and after the writing process.At the time, such a process was unheard of — especially the concept behind having the script read in an open forum by professional actors and later critiqued by industry insiders.“There had not been one word written on staging a screenplay before a live audience,” Rodgers said. “Live readings are valuable in giving writers feedback. Sometimes, you just don’t know what the problems are until an audience tells you.”“Seeing your writing acted out in front of an audience gives you a sense of its impact,” said Oliver Stone, who moderated one of the readings. “I think it would have helped (me) enormously if there’d been something like it when I was starting. I think I could still use it.”Novice screenwriters often first read about the program through a regular ad placed in the Writer’s Digest.According to an old L.A. Times article, Tom Homans was a 24-year-old college graduate counting engine parts in a Baltimore warehouse when he first saw the ad. He was an aspiring writer that had a story about a Little League baseball star. He sent in “what read like a 200-page essay” with the $50 application fee and six months later he had an agent at William Morris, an option at Lorimar, and was living in an apartment at the bottom of the hill below the Hollywood sign.A newspaper article about Homans’ success caught the eye of J.B. Mackey in Texas. Mackey and his wife traveled to Los Angeles that day with his story about a sociopathic child and his demonic dog. Mackey didn’t even have a full script. Instead, he submitted fifty pages of hand-written notes with dialogue. Neither of them had any clue about the format of a screenplay. But they were accepted into the workshop program nonetheless.“I look for that raw talent,” Rodgers said. “I can teach somebody the screenplay form in three hours. But it won’t help if they don’t have a story.”Major films like Cross Roads and River’s Edge emerged from workshop readings.The workshop itself was considered one of the best kept Hollywood secrets at the time — but not by design.“When you add in Xeroxing and some other things, it’s a tough way to make a living,” he said.The program costed the accepted writers money as well. According to the article, the most writers would spend to complete the workshop was $450. Rodgers estimated the actual cost for each “graduate” at $2,500.Hollywood’s talent agencies, independent production companies, and major studios contributed in making up the deficit.The entire workshop process took less than six months on average — primarily depending on the original condition of the screenplay and how hard and fast the screenwriter could write. Rodgers read the scripts first, then sent them out to volunteer professional writers. When the script was far enough along, it was scheduled for one of the two readings held each month.After the script was critiqued and a final draft was written, Rodgers copied the script and sent it out to his list of 39 companies and agencies that would read every workshop script submitted to them.If any of the submitted scripts were bought, or put into active development, the writers were obligated to return 5% of their earnings from those projects to the program.Rodgers died in 2010 and the AFI Alumni Association Writers Workshop is now just a distant memory.1980sIn 1985, the esteemed Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences — those behind the annual Academy Awards —created what is still known as the most heralded screenwriting competition of them all. Gee Nicholl and Julian Blaustein were behind the development of a program that would aid new screenwriters — that program ultimately became the Don and Gee Nicholl Fellowships in Screenwriting, now known as the Academy Nicholl Fellowships.The competition was initially limited to California college students. During the first year in 1986, the 99 budding screenwriters that entered could submit a screenplay, a teleplay, a TV series episode, fiction, or a stageplay. The first Nicholl fellowships were awarded to Allison Anders, Dennis Clontz, and Jeff Eugenides.In 1987, the Academy Nicholl Fellowships expanded eligibility to include college students in nine states and to residents of Texas. Two years later, eligibility was expanded again to include any and all United States residents who had not sold or optioned a screenplay or teleplay.In 1989, Fellowship winner Radha Bharadwaj became the first fellow to have her Nicholl entry script released as a feature film —1991’s Closet Land.Very few contests beyond the aforementioned programs were running in the 1980s — at least at the national level. This was primarily due to the work that went into conducting such a contest. At the time, there was no internet. Submissions had to be mailed and copies had to be made. There was also no email correspondence, so mailings had to be sent out for marketing, submissions, and notifications.It wasn’t until the 1990s that the screenwriting contest began to see the surge that the secondary industry hadn’t seen since the early 1900s.The Boom of the 1990sBy the time the 1980s ended, the industry was thrown into chaos as a result of the 1988 WGA Strike. By the time the strike ended there was a sudden high demand for content, resulting in a plethora of original screenplays — spec scripts — that were sold for millions.Alan Gasmer, a William Morris agent during that time, started the trend of putting such scripts on the market for only a limited amount of time, with the auction block opening on Monday and closing at the end of that Friday. The result led to a competitive streak among the studios, leading to a ridiculous amount of big sales that we haven’t seen since. In 1990 alone, 14 scripts were sold for $1 million or more.Spec scripts like Milk Money ($1 million), Radio Flyer ($1.25 million), Medicine Man ($3 million), Basic Instinct ($3 million), The Long Kiss Goodnight ($4 million), and many more were purchased and eventually produced — to varying degrees of success. And even more were bought six to seven figures, only to never see the light of day.This boom sent waves across the country and world. Everyone wanted in.Los Angeles was no longer a destination for an immeasurable amount of hopeful actors — hopeful screenwriters began to take over as the ultimate Hollywood cliche.While the Nicholl Fellowship, Samuel Goldwyn Awards, and AFI Alumni Association Writers Workshop were still going strong, other contests began to slowly appear.The Disney/ABC Writing Program was created in 1990 in partnership with the Writers Guild of America and quickly became one of the most widely recognized and coveted industry writing programs — even to this day.The one-year program is the only program of its kind designed under terms approved by the WGA and has launched the careers of many successful writers. It offers writers the chance to receive a weekly writers salary for a year while working for and learning from the television industry’s best. It also provides access to executives, producers, and literary representatives through various meetings and events designed to facilitate relationships that can prove invaluable in developing a television writing career.The Chesterfield Writer’s Film Project followed in those footsteps, offering both television and feature writers a similar experience with a year long fellowship complete with access to and direction by industry insiders. It originated at Steven Spielberg’s Amblin Entertainment and was then sponsored by Paramount Pictures and overseen at the studio by Paramount Motion Picture Group Vice Chairman John Goldwyn and Senior Vice President of Production Dede Gardner.WFP alumni have written scripts for nearly every studio and major independent including Paramount Pictures, Disney, Universal Pictures, Warner Brothers, DreamWorks, Sony Pictures, MGM, Imagine Entertainment and American Zoetrope and were represented by the Creative Artists Agency, International Creative Management, the William Morris Agency, and the United Talent Agency, among others.There was even a contest that was created by an international writers group based two thousand miles away from Los Angeles — in Madison, Wisconsin. The Wisconsin Screenwriters Forum accepted membership from all states and all countries, eventually growing to be three hundred strong in membership.Their screenwriting contest — and the organization itself — were known well enough in the industry to earn a mention in Dave Trottier’s The Screenwriters Bible.One of the more immersive contests came from Robert Redford’s Sundance Institute, in conjunction with the Sundance Film Festival which is clearly the premiere event of the year for filmmakers worldwide.The celebrated Sundance Screenwriters Lab proved to be an amazing launching pad into both indie cinema and Hollywood. This competition allowed screenwriters to network and meet some industry professionals, but also served as perhaps the best possible education they could receive in screenwriting and storytelling through film overall.The Screenwriters Lab is a five-day writer’s workshop that gives independent screenwriters the opportunity to work intensively on their feature film scripts with the support of established writers in an environment that encourages innovation and creative risk-taking. Through one-on-one story sessions with Creative Advisors, Fellows engage in an artistically rigorous process that offers them indispensable lessons in craft, as well as the means to do the deep exploration needed to fully realize their material.They only accept 12 projects each year. Some of Hollywood’s greatest talents have gone through the various Sundance Labs, including famous auteurs like Quentin Tarantino and Paul Thomas Anderson.Coming in second to the stature of the Academy Nicholl Fellowship that was created in the middle of the 1980s, the Austin Film Festival came onto the screenwriting contest scene in the middle of the next decade — 1994 to be exact. Independent cinema was booming and the AFF reached out to screenwriters to help hone their skills. AFF was originally called the Heart of Film Screenwriters Conference and functioned solely to launch the careers of screenwriters that were historically underrepresented within the film industry.Started in 1994 by Barbara Morgan and Marsha Milam, the AFF’s competition was roughly one of a handful of screenplay competitions in operation.When Barbara and Marsha started the Austin Screenwriters Conference, they gave advancing writers an opportunity to attend panels and network with industry panelists. Producers Barry Josephson and David Valdez were asked to attend and judge, which later resulted in them optioning the winning script Excess Baggage by Max Adams. The script would eventually be produced into a feature film starring Alicia Silverstone and Benicio del Toro.This ultimately put the the Austin Film Festival on the map for aspiring screenwriters and their number of entries continued to grow each subsequent year.“Since our inception, we really pride ourselves in maintaining our mission for championing writers. This year, we received over 9,400 submissions in our various categories,” AFF Screenplay Competition Director Matt Dy commented.AFF led the charge in offering screenwriters professional feedback as well through contest. Reader Comments — a brief paragraph of one reader’s “overall” notes — are provided to all entrants. Second Rounders and above receive further Reader Comments based on specific criteria. This then unique feature offered writers the chance to learn from industry readers, something that later contests would develop even further.They also were one of the first contests to send finalist scripts to major production companies — a feature that was implemented at a time when spec screenplays were in high demand.But despite the boom in spec script sales and the ripples of wide interest that followed, screenwriting contests were still relatively few and far between.Hollywood screenwriter Sean Hood (Conan the Barbarian, The Legend of Hercules, and Halloween: Resurrection) commented, “I went to film school between ’95 and ’98 and at that time, everyone talked about getting a short film into festivals, especially Sundance, but no one talked about screenplay contests.”But as technology grew and began to catch up with the industry, things changed.Moviebytes creator Fred Mensch commented on the impact that the internet made, “When MovieBytes went online in 1997, there were only about 35 or 40 contests worldwide, and most of them were pretty obscure. Almost immediately, though, we started getting 2 or 3 new submissions every week, and our database just took off. We were soon tracking hundreds of contests of all shapes and sizes.”The screenwriting contest industry was reborn, showcasing a widespread draw that hadn’t been seen since the early days of cinema.The internet made all of the difference. Contests could now be found with ease and were no longer regional. They were international. Screenwriters now had a platform to find places to submit their screenplays easily online, from anywhere in the world.Places like Moviebytes became a clearinghouse for screenwriting contest info, both good and bad. Screenwriters could review contests and communicate to others whether or not they were worth the submission.The technology grew as the 20th century made its into the 21st.Turn of the Century“The big shift in my awareness of screenplay contests came about when Withoutabox changed the way filmmakers submitted to festivals. It was suddenly clear that all these screenplay contests existed, and more and more sprung up with each passing year,” Sean Hood remembered.Withoutabox was website founded in January 2000 by David Straus, Joe Neulight and Charles Neulight and allowed independent filmmakers to self-distribute their films. The first product launched was the International Film Festival Submission system. It offered filmmakers a platform to submit their films to over 850 film festivals worldwide. This opened up the doors for screenwriting contests to utilize the platform as well.Contests could now request submissions via the web and manage incoming submissions electronically, instead of the traditional route of sending hard copies. Companies could market their contests, competitions, and festivals to over 400,000 active filmmakers and screenwriters already on the platform. They could also accept submission fees from them electronically, and automatically notify filmmakers for acceptance into their event.It offered a revolutionary approach to writing contests and would give birth to hundreds of additional screenwriting contests.Scriptapalooza, BlueCat, Final Draft’s Big Break, PAGE International Screenwriting Awards, Script Pipeline, Slamdance, and many others were born as the first decade of the 2000s brought forth the internet, social media, and overall technological advances that allowed screenwriters to find contests and submit with ease. BlueCat most-notably was founded by Gordy Hoffman, brother to the late actor Philip Seymour Hoffman.Cash prizes got bigger and more and more contests were offering access to the industry, as well as in-depth feedback from professional readers. Studios began to enter into the mix, with Universal, Warner Brothers, Fox, and Disney offering their own in search of undiscovered talent.Nearly every major film festival began to widely promote their own screenwriting competitions as well.This Past DecadeBetween the years of 2000 and 2008, the rate of screenwriting competitions began to increase, creating an oversatuated industry.If you visit MovieBytes.com today, you’ll find 553 records of contests to choose from.The promise of industry access became a game of which contests were true to their word, as far as what access they could offer.And then, in late 2007 and early 2008, the film industry underwent a drastic change after a new WGA strike was accompanied by one of the worst economic disasters since the Great Depression. It became more difficult for screenwriters to break through by going directly to production companies, studios, management companies, and agencies. If no major intellectual property (“IP”) was attached to any pitched project, it was next to impossible to get a meeting.But as the strike ended and the economy began to recover, the second decade of the 21st century begin to showcase a new resurgence of the screenwriting contest and its impact on the industry.Tracking Board’s Launch Pad leveraged its industry community and utilized it as a draw for screenwriters.Their Launch Pad competitions — pilots, features, and manuscripts — have helped dozens of writers elevate their professional careers, sell their scripts and even get staffed on television shows.ScreenCraft co-founders Cameron Cubbison and John Rhodes made the jump from Hollywood development and acquisitions jobs to launch a screenplay development firm specializing in screenwriting competitions by genre, aimed at discovering talented screenwriters and connecting them with producers, agents, and managers.ScreenCraft’s Screenwriting Competitions uniquely tailor the prize package and jury for each contest — eliminating potential genre bias — by specializing in screenplay competitions by genre. Their script coverage options and consulting packages offer some of the best and most detailed industry feedback that screenwriters can find outside of the studio system.Then came Coverfly.Coverfly is a free network connecting emerging screenwriters with industry professionals.It is also the industry’s largest database of screenwriting competition entries, connecting the industry’s most highly-regarded competitions into a single database for industry insiders to search and discover emerging talent. Users can sync their Nicholl and Black List accounts, as well as enter top competitions all in one place – and much more.As you can see, screenwriting competitions have come a long way.The key is to focus less on the prize money and more on the connections the contests, competitions, and fellowships have with the Film/TV industry.Hollywood uses the bigger contests as filtration systems to discover new talented writers and buzz-worthy scripts. It’s not the end all be all answer for screenwriters, but it’s one way to break through, get representation, and network. And they are a great way for screenwriters to test the waters.Please follow The Tao of Screenwriting for more fun Movie/TV discussions, as well as screenwriting and film industry insights. Ask me questions. Come visit this “dojo” for screenwriting, movie, television, film/TV industry insights, inspiration, writing exercises & best practices, tips, advice, and industry hacks. I’m here to help, entertain, share, and inspire. This answer was adapted from an article I wrote on The Script Lab. Check them out!