Melbourne: When Hollywood Comes Calling...Or: How to Make a Good Deal in LA

Want to work in Hollywood? Want to know how it operates for screenwriters? Wondered how to get your ideas up in LA and what they might be worth?

International opportunities for Aussie screenwriters are expanding like never before. But navigating the LA landscape can be challenging, with traps and pitfalls for the uninitiated. If you don’t know the laws of this jungle, then you’re at risk – of a bad deal.

That’s where we come in.

Leading Hollywood showrunner Shane Brennan and lawyer to the stars Kevin Kelly – whose law firm’s clients include Hollywood showrunners, such as Shonda Rhimes and David Chase, and A-List actors, such as Meryl Streep and Chris Pine – will be hosting seminars in Melbourne and Sydney, straight-talking to AWG members about getting smart in LA: who you need to know, how to gain access to them, what your rights are and how to get the best deal for yourself and your projects.

These two-hour seminars will run you through the building blocks of what you need to know to make a good deal in the US, including: 

•  What your ideas are worth in Hollywood
• What deals and credits you can expect
• How to bridge the gap between Oz and LA
• Who you need to know, including attorneys, agents and managers.  What’s the difference in these roles and how to find them
• How the arrival of Netflix and other SVoD services has changed the landscape
• What does a good deal look like?
• What to sign and not to sign
• How the legal landscape for writers differs from Australia.

This free event for AWG Members is one not to be missed. Make your LA story a good one.

Come along and learn from the best in the business.   

Places are limited so get in early!

Monday 22 October 2018

6.30 pm–8.30 pm 

Library at the Dock, 107 Victoria Harbour Promenade, Docklands

Shane Brennan is Australia’s most internationally recognisable television writer and our most successful showrunner. After working on numerous Australian television series, Shane moved to Los Angeles in 2003 where he soon became Supervising Producer on the CBS series CSI: Miami.  He then became the showrunner on NCIS, the #1 scripted drama on network television, during which time he also created the hit spin-off series NCIS: LA. He is currently renowned in the Australian screen industry for spearheading the not-for-profit screen development company Scripted Ink. Shane has been working with LA attorney Kevin Kelly on his Hollywood projects since 2005.

Kevin Kelly is a founding partner of Gendler & Kelly, a boutique entertainment law firm in Beverly Hills, California, which represents some of the biggest names in Hollywood, such as Meryl Streep, Steve Martin, and Chris Pine. The firm’s specialty is representing TV series creators and showrunners, including Shonda Rhimes (Grey’s Anatomy), Shane Brennan (NCIS: Los Angeles), David E. Kelley (Big Little Lies), Alex Kurtzman (Star Trek: Discovery), J. Michael Straczynski (Sense8), David Chase (The Sopranos), as well as the creators of hit shows likeHomeland, 24,SWAT, American Horror Story, Glee, Rizzoli & Isles, Power, Smallville, The Last Ship, The Shield, and Sons of Anarchy. Prior to starting the firm, Kevin graduated #1 in his class from UCLA School of Law and was a law clerk to Justice Sandra Day O’Connor of the United States Supreme Court. 

THIS EVENT IS PROUDLY SPONSORED BY SCRIPTED INK, AWG PATHWAYS and SCREEN AUSTRALIA