The CI Magic Query Letter Formula

Query letters! Your key to the castle of the entertainment industry… maybe… or maybe not. Often writers are surprised that they can send out dozens of queries and the response is still crickets.

Okay, hard truth first: going in cold (without an intro, without a connection, without any heat,) radio silence is what you’ll get 99% of the time. But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try. Maybe you’ve got the killer concept they’ve been looking for, the voice they’ve been waiting for, or the script they’ve been hoping for.

Or as Wayne Gretzky famously noted, you miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.

Now let’s talk about how you can maximize your chances with a query. As you may know, we review your query letters for free. (just email it to us at info@coverageink.com and give us a day or three. No upsell. No BS. Free.) And often we find the same problems crop up in many of them:

Length: Sometimes writers cram in every detail they can find in a misguided effort to sell themselves and their script. Unfortunately, that tends to achieve the opposite. To quote Polonius: brevity is the soul of wit. If someone opens an email and you blow up their phone screen, their eyes will glaze over and they’ll hit the delete button. Hey, they’ve got hundreds more emails waiting for them. They don’t know you. You’re coming in cold. So why would the response be anything else?

–> If you can’t be concise and voice-y in your query, why would they assume you can in your screenplay?

Writing: Your query letter is your chance to dazzle them with your voice. You have five to ten seconds before they hit delete. So make sure the writing isn’t boring and pedestrian. Polish every sentence to scintillating perfection. Scrutinize every single word. 

And it should go without saying—spellcheck your query before sending it out! Why would you think that sending out a query full of typos is a good idea? And yet we see this almost every day. Remember, everyone is looking for an excuse to stop reading. Pedestrian writing, weak verb choices, clunky grammar/spelling/lack of polish have sunk a great many writers.

–> Not a plug necessarily, but running your query through Grammarly free certainly can’t hurt.

Concept: Sometimes a query can be concise and tick all of the boxes writing-wise, yet still nobody bites. Of course many queries are simply deleted unread. But others are at least glanced at. They’re looking for not just a great voice, but most importantly, a killer concept.

Remember: this is a business. Representatives need things they can sell. Producers need something they can can raise the money for. More often than not, that means you need a great hook; a movie or TV show idea that feels fresh and exciting and, most importantly, sellable. Hence, no matter how well-written it may be, your period drama is almost certainly going to face more of an uphill battle than a contemporary thriller or a a genre script or something considered a bit more pop.

Maybe you have the contemporary thriller—but still nobody bites. It’s possible that the particular McGuffin you’re working with has been overplayed. Maybe there are 20 other specs (from well-known writers) with the exact same hook currently on the market and none of them are selling. Maybe the topic is considered tired (zombies, anyone?) 

–> Be a student of the business. It’ll save you a lot of time.

So what should your query letter look like?

Three or four short paragraphs, no longer than three or four sentences each. (And, no, we’re not talking about run-on sentences.)

Paragraph One: Who are you? Why should they give you the time of day? And, no, “I’m a recent film school graduate” doesn’t count because it’s true for most of your competition as well. What makes you unique and fascinating? What is it about you that will intrigue the recipient and make them want to learn more about you and your writing?

The job of the query is not just to sell your idea — it’s to sell YOU. This is a key factor many writers overlook.

In one way or another, you should answer the question: why are you the best person to be writing this script? What is it about you that will intrigue the recipient and make them want to learn more about you and your writing? Life experience, skills, interests, awards, bonafides.

–> Create the impression that you’ve got it going on.

Paragraph Two: Your pitch. What you need here is a logline polished to perfection. Check out this Save the Cat article. 

Many folks make the mistake of sending too much info – a 1-pager, links to their websites, artwork, bible, deck, etc. It’s great to have that stuff, but generally speaking, only send it if requested. Right now you need to pitch your idea as succinctly and intriguingly as possible.

Crucially, make sure to tell us at least a little about your protagonist — what their key issue is and what the character arc might look like. We don’t care about concept as much as we do about how it affects the characters.

And never tell them the ending. Your pitch should conclude at the end of act 2, leaving them hanging to see how it resolves.

–> And again, do all that in three or four sentences.

Paragraph Three: Conclude by asking them if they want to check out your script and thank them for their time. If you said something fascinating or funny in the first paragraph, call back to it here.

And yeah, if you’re a comedy writer, your query best be funny.

You should be employing voice and humor throughout. Your writing and your personality should jump off the page. You should leave them with the impression that not only are you a wonderful writer but also someone they’d like to have a beer with.

Go get ‘em.