Writer Awards
The Writer Award offers financial development support to established writers, comparable to that available to producers through the Producer Awards. As well as offering recipients a degree of financial independence for the year, the scheme will also benefit the industry at large through the generation of new projects to refresh and expand the development pool. The Award is worth $50,000 and is intended to cover the writer’s overheads for one year while they develop and write their nominated projects (see ‘Application Requirements’ below). We will expect the successful applicant to work full-time on his or her nominated projects for at least 8 months of the year for which the Award is granted. If circumstances change so that this amount of time becomes unavailable for work on the nominated projects in 2010 the recipient will be able to delay the drawdown of funds into the following year. Writer Awards will not be extended.
Who Can Apply?
Applications for Writer Awards are invited from experienced writers with at least one screenplay credit on a New Zealand feature film that has received theatrical distribution.
Requirements
Applicants must use the Award to develop projects that meet the NZFC’s objectives (see ‘Statement of Intent’ on the NZFC website for more detail). Applicants should provide a proposal that contains:
• A completed cover sheet & project title list (download from the bottom of this page)
• A personal statement
• The nominated projects
• The work plan for the year
• The expenditure plan
• A one-page CV
The Personal Statement
Please write between 350 and 500 words that tell us why you want this Award.
The Nominated Projects
• Applicants will be expected to nominate a minimum of 3 projects on which they intend to work over the year
• We actively encourage writers to submit a proposal comprising projects that reflect range and diversity in relation to budgets and potential audience
• Projects that have previously received support from the NZFC may not be included
• Nominated projects may range from an idea for a film to a draft script
• Please provide a one paragraph synopsis of each project on your slate, plus a treatment (5–15 pages) OR a draft script for any of the projects that are already developed to this stage
The Work Plan
We understand that creative work cannot always be done to a strict timetable and that priorities may change as work develops but we would like to see an initial plan for the calendar year 2010 that:
• Indicates the relative proportion of time to be spent on each project
• Indicates the nature of the work to be done on each project, e.g. research or writing, and that provides some detail of what any planned research may involve
• Outlines the stage the writer hopes to reach on each project by December 2010, e.g. treatment, step outline, 1st draft script etc.
The Expenditure Plan
Following on from the Work Plan please indicate in broad terms how you expect to spend the $50K e.g.:
• Writer’s fees
• Office/professional overhead costs
• Research trips
• Option/rights fees.
Delivery Requirements
We understand that ideas do not always develop in the ways envisaged for them, and part of the thinking behind the Writer Awards is to free the recipients from the tyranny of externally imposed briefs and deadlines in order to encourage creativity. However we also think it is helpful to set some goals and we require some accountability from successful applicants. To this end they will be required to provide:
• A brief written progress report in June 2010, followed by a meeting with one of the Development Executives
• A report at the end of the year that logs the progress of each of the projects that comprised the original application (and any additional ones that may have emerged over the year) and outlines a strategy for continuing development towards production
• At least one full draft script (or a more advanced draft of a project that was at script stage when the year began)
• Short ‘fundable’ or ‘pitching’ documents for each of the remaining projects.
Criteria for Evaluation
Applications will be assessed with the following criteria in mind:
• The experience and track record of the applicant, including their record in writing and delivering successful New Zealand feature film screenplays
• The range of nominated projects
• The strength of the premise of each of the nominated projects
• The viability of the applicant’s proposed strategy for developing their nominated projects within the available timeframe
• How the proposal meets the NZFC’s objectives.
Application Deadline
Submissions have now closed.