In this post, I want to give some advice to beginning screenwriters who are having difficulty finishing — or even starting — their first screenplay. I’ve been mulling over what to say for several weeks now, trying to come up with some inspirational words of advice to motivate you into achieving your goal. After much thought and deep-dish contemplation, I’ve boiled my advice down to this:

If you want to write for Hollywood, think like a
hack writer and stick to the Hollywood Formula.

How’s that for inspiring rhetoric?

Now, most “creative” types (that is, people who don’t actually have a job writing for Hollywood) will tell you that adhering to a formula is a bad thing because it stifles creativity.

But in the hands of a writer who knows what he is doing and why he is doing it, the standard Hollywood Formula allows the creation of inventive, daring and inspiring movies and the occasional masterpiece. Whether adhering to these principles results in hackwork or a classic movie depends entirely on the gifts of the writer doing the work and the skillfulness he brings to thinking inside the box of the Hollywood Formula.

On the surface, “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen” and “The Hurt Locker” might deserve to be mentioned in the same breath. They’re both explosive action thrillers hitting screens this summer. Both feature young men on a physically grueling quest in the desert, and both even feature robots as their heroes’ unlikely aides-de-camp.

But viewers who happen to see both films will no doubt feel and think radically different things upon leaving the theater. In the case of “Transformers,” directed by Michael Bay, they’re likely to feel pummeled and punched by the movie’s loud, relentless action, not to mention confused by what all the sound and fury was about. Something to do with an ancient robot race extinguishing the sun by way of a sharp metallic dingus in an Egyptian pyramid? Whatever, let’s go grab a Super Gulp and play Grand Theft Auto.

Several years back, an article in the Los Angeles Times dealt with Hollywood closing its doors to writers over the age of 40. In it, a producer was quoted as saying that he could hire two 25-year old writers for what it would cost him to hire one Alvin Sargent.

(Alvin Sargent had recently written the Oscar-winning “Ordinary People,” as well as “Paper Moon,” “Julia,” the “A Star is Born” remake, and many others.)

I wrote a letter to the newspaper, which it published. All I asked was one question – “Why in the world would you want to??”

It’s worth noting that in the following years, Mr. Sargent (despite thoughtlessly becoming over 50) continued to write or co-write such films as “What About Bob?,” “Other People’s Money” and “Hero.”

Oh, and also all three “Spiderman” movies. The last, by the way, when he was 80 years old.