SINISTER MINISTER
How The Screenwriters' Summit Was Accidentally Born
Years ago I was talking to my good friend Zack Gutin. Zack was a young kid working at Final Draft. I got to know the people at Final Draft well because they were always incredibly supportive of the events I did, particularly Scott and Marc. Zack and I were talking about different events and ways Final Draft could become more involved in the screenwriting world when I suddenly blurted out:
“You know what Final Draft should do? Get four of the biggest screenwriting teachers in the world together for a single weekend, each teaching a full half-day seminar, and call it the Screenwriters’ Summit.”
But Zack and I always had easy, free-flowing conversations, so the idea just came flying out of my mouth before I could stop it.
And the SECOND I said it, I knew.
Oh shit.
What the fuck did you just do, Derek?
That’s a GREAT idea.
The second we hung up, my brain immediately went into overdrive trying to figure out how to do damage control.
My OWN damage.
So I immediately jumped online and registered ScreenwritersSummit.com.
Then I sent Zack a note:
“Oh, by the way…that Summit idea? I’m already doing it. I was just mentioning it as an example. But Final Draft should help promote it..."
That's literally how the Screenwriters’ Summit was born.
Not in a boardroom. Not through months of planning. Just two guys spit-balling ideas on the phone.
People later asked how I picked the speakers for the Summit. Honestly, it just seemed obvious.
After years working around McKee seminars, the landscape became pretty obvious to me. There were only a handful of names that truly mattered in that world:
Syd Field
John Truby
Michael Hauge
Linda Seger
and Christopher Vogler.
In fact, the very first Summit probably would have featured Chris too.
But he never got back to me.
That’s Chris.
What’s funny is when I contacted everyone, there was no elaborate sales pitch. No corporate presentation. No convincing. It was basically:
“Hi, I’m Derek. This is who I am, this is what I do, and I have an idea I think would be really cool.”
That was it.
The idea of doing a “master’s level” weekend with all these teachers together just SEEMED like a solid idea.
This was in 2005. The two screenwriting magazines - Creative Screenwriting and Script - were in top form.
The Screenwriting Expo, run by Creative Screenwriting, was bigger than ever.
And, at the time, the speakers all had decades more experience than I did, but honestly, I never really thought about it that way. The worst thing they could say was, “Nah, not interested.”
But nobody expressed an ounce of hesitation.
One by one, they all said yes.
Wow.
That was easier than I expected.
What’s funny is I couldn’t figure out why nobody had done it before. Final Draft, Movie Magic, The Writer’s Store, Script, Creative Screenwriting…NOBODY thought to put these people together for a single weekend?
Even now I don't understand how that's possible.
But I'm glad they didn't.
We decided to do the first Summit in Los Angeles since it was everybody’s backyard. We held it at Loyola Marymount University because it felt central to everyone, and close to the airport. I assumed people might fly in for the event.
They did.
When putting the weekend together, I wanted people to feel they got their money’s worth. The ticket price was around $395, but attendees were getting roughly eighteen hours of instruction from the top story teachers in the industry.
Each session ran four-and-a-half hours.
The idea of doing 60 or 90-minute sessions honestly felt like too little to me. You can’t really delve deeply into story in an hour. Four-and-a-half hours had gravitas. It felt substantial. I wanted attendees to feel like they had truly experienced a Syd Field seminar or a John Truby seminar — not just snippets.
It also allowed me to pay the teachers fairly.
Win-win for everybody.
One thing people sometimes forget is that the first two Summits also featured the great Robert Kosberg.
Bob was Hollywood's “Mr. Pitch.” He was known for 12 Monkeys, Commando, Man's Best Friend and more.
He was smart, funny, incredibly fast on his feet, and could distill almost any movie into a one-line concept. His famous description of Cujo?
“Jaws on Paws.”
I mean…c’mon.
After a full day of intense story theory on Saturday — with another full day waiting on Sunday — I thought the audience needed a little oxygen. So Saturday night became Kosberg’s time. He’d tell stories, talk pitching, and invite audience members to pitch their movie ideas live from the crowd.
Or at least try to.
We warned everyone beforehand:
“If you want to pitch, be ready. Treat it like a real meeting.”
Nobody listened.
One nervous young woman stood up and quietly said:
“My script is called Sinister Minister and it’s about…”
Then she froze.
Silence.
Kosberg stood on stage with the microphone, patiently waiting.
Finally he leaned forward and said:
“…a sinister minister?”
The place exploded.
That was the thing about those weekends. They weren’t just lectures. They became communal experiences.
People learned together, laughed together, bombed together, survived together.
The first Los Angeles Summit was a great proof of concept. Was it some massive blockbuster success?
No.
We had maybe 125 people in a 300-seat theatre.
But honestly, that was okay.
I had to figure out what the Screenwriters’ Summit actually WAS. How to market it. Who showed up. Why they showed up. Why WE were all doing it.
But the speakers were happy. The audience was happy. I was happy.
It made sense to do it again.
So we did.
New York.
Vancouver.
Toronto.
Each event got a little bigger. A little stronger. A little more anticipated. "When's the next Screenwriters' Summit?" people would ask.
The audience became clearer. The community around these events became more real.
It also quietly set the stage for what Story Expo would eventually become years later.
And then Israel called...
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I’m currently working on a long-form piece about the golden age of story seminars (roughly 1999–2020)—a time when hundreds of writers would gather simply to learn how story works.
(C) Derek Christopher - All Rights Reserved. Please contact for permission to reprint.
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