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A list of contests that accept or specialize in short screenplays, or any scripts that are less than feature-length.
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Final Deadline: 05/31/2019
Bolt is an innovative new screenplay competition from the creators of Barnstorm Fest. The rules are simple: Submit a short film screenplay, web series or television pilot then Barnstorm Media chooses the winner and MAKES YOUR MOVIE OR PILOT! You get to be the Executive Producer. And, every submission receives feedback from the producers at Barnstorm Media WITHIN TWO WEEKS OF SUBMISSION.
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Final Deadline: 05/31/2019
The objective of the Screenwriting Master Contest is to award writers for outstanding achievement in screenwriting in both Feature and Short screenplay categories based on six sections: Dialogue, Plot, Characters, Premise, Tone, and Structure. Marketability of a screenplay is not something we take into consideration. We understand that writing is a process, which is why we allow our contestants the ability to submit an updated draft of their screenplay in the event their work is selected to move onto the next round.
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Final Deadline: 06/01/2019
The Capital Fund Screenplay Competition, now in its fifth year of successes, where your scripts are read direct by investors that buy projects and fund films at the studio level domestically and abroad. Our entrants have been optioned and sold at AFM, Cannes, Berlin, Toronto and Shanghai Film Markets. A Different Screenplay Contest Congratulations to the 2018 Winners at Universal 2019 Competition opens September 30, 2018.
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Final Deadline: 06/14/2019
Guaranteed distributor review by World Wide Motion Pictures Corporation (WWMPC.COM) for features, Adler & Associates for features and shorts, and Polaris Pictures (for Screenplays) among others, AT NO EXTRA COST TO YOU, for our select few ‘Best Of’ and "Award of Outstanding Excellence" winners in the 20 Major categories, based on sufficient qualified entries.
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Final Deadline: 06/16/2019
WriteMovies has been helping writers succeed since 1999! Now in our 20th anniversary year, we are currently accepting entries to our Spring 2019 Screenwriting Contest! Grand Prize: $2000 A year of free script development worth up to $3200 Guaranteed pitching to industry Exclusive prizes from InkTip Get free entry to the contest when you commission a script report, with Judging Feedback from just $89 Through our exclusive arrangement with TALENTSCOUT INTERNATIONAL MANAGEMENT (TSIM) we can guarantee the contest winner representation.
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Final Deadline: 06/21/2019
To discover and encourage both new and long committed screenwriters. Our mission is to take the winning writer's vision from screenplay to screen!
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Final Deadline: 06/30/2019
Script Summit is a festival dedicated to supporting screenwriters. You will have the opportunity to connect with directors, producers, and other writers at the Script Summit Networking Event. The Summit also hosts Q&A panels, seminars, table reads of selected scripts, an awards dinner, and over $1,500 in cash prizes! We are very excited to announce that we have partnered with the famous Action on Film MEGAfest! This allows all of our writers with officially selected scripts, the chance to attend the AoF.
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Final Deadline: 07/01/2019
The Action on Film 15th Annual Film Festival celebrates and honors WRITERS of all genres and formats like no other festival does. $2000 in CASH PRIZES for TOP Winners. Now in our 15th year, our Film Festival has garnered a solid reputation as being one of the premier Writing competitions. The AOF MegaFest has created a solid community of Filmmakers and Writers from around the globe.
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Final Deadline: 07/10/2019
CALL FOR ENTRIES! Shriekfest, the Los Angeles Horror/SciFi Film Festival continues its tradition as Los Angeles' Premier horror film event, presenting an exciting program of films each fall with beautiful Los Angeles as its backdrop. Now, in its 19th year, Shriekfest takes place at the legendary Raleigh Studios, which is the largest independent studio operator in the country.
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Final Deadline: 07/15/2019
The WeScreenplay Shorts Competition is dedicated to connecting talented short film writers with Oscar-nominated short film directors and creators for advice on how to create emotionally impactful storytelling in short-form content. EVERY ENTRY GETS WRITTEN FEEDBACK WeScreenplay believes that every entrant of a contest should benefit from entering – whether the writer wins or not.
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Final Deadline: 07/17/2019
The Scriptation Showcase is officially open for submissions! Emerging writers can now enter their best screenplay, teleplay, or short. The Scriptation Showcase is the screenwriting competition that circulates winners’ scripts to the directors, showrunners, and producers behind your favorite movies and TV shows. Why submit to the Scriptation Showcase? UNPRECENDENTED EXPOSURE Never before has a screenwriting competition made your script so accessible to working industry professionals.
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Final Deadline: 07/29/2019
The Slamdance Screenplay Competition is dedicated to discovering and supporting emerging writing talent. We welcome screenplays in every genre, on any topic, from anywhere in the world. A unique feature of the competition is providing constructive feedback for every entrant. In addition to this, we also offer a more intensive coverage service for a supplementary fee.
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Final Deadline: 07/30/2019
To promote and support new talent by creating real and original opportunities. To make Hollywood more accessible than ever before to more aspiring screenwriters, American Gem Short Script Writing Contest: presented by Filmmakers Magazine and Write Brothers, is forming strategic alliances with the powers that be in Film, TV and Literary Publishing.
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Final Deadline: 07/31/2019
To make Hollywood more accessible than ever before to more aspiring screenwriters, 1st TV Script Writing Competition is forming strategic alliances with the powers that be in Film & TV, who are on the lookout for exceptional talent and TV scripts. The 1st TV Script Writing Competition is presented by FilmMakers Magazine. It wasn't that long ago that for a writer to get discovered he or she had to reside in or around Hollywood.
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Final Deadline: 07/31/2019
The Filmmatic Comedy Screenplay Awards were created to locate and expose up-and-coming comedic screenwriters, as well as to empower and educate those talented writers still waiting for their invitation into the mainstream film and television industries. Competition is open to comedic feature-length and short works, screenplays and teleplays.
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Final Deadline: 08/15/2019
Founded by longtime residents and movie veterans alike, the Sherman Oaks Film Festival looks to showcase the best undiscovered movies in the heart of Los Angeles. The neighborhood that was home the mall in Fast Times At Ridgemont High deserves a world class film festival! The Sherman Oaks Film Festival has a category for unproduced screenplays of any length, feature or short or in between.
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Final Deadline: 08/18/2019
Our Director of the Screenplay Competition is a working writer himself. We carefully select our Judges and try to assist the screenplay winners in their journey to sell their manuscripts. Exposure is half the battle. Our priority has always been the writer. Read our reviews on FilmFreeway and you'll see what past writers and filmmakers think of our competition.
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Final Deadline: 08/20/2019
New York New Stories Screenplay Contest is an exciting new script competition seeking submissions in the following categories: Short Film, TV/Web Pilot. New York New Stories is dedicated to discovering and celebrating the work of screenwriters from all backgrounds and all levels of experience. Our mission is to elevate unique and creative stories that are ready to be told.
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Final Deadline: 08/30/2019
The objective of the Moondance International Film Festival is to inspire, motivate, promote and encourage the best writers & independent filmmakers, from every country in the world, and to inspire a greater understanding about the vital role of the arts in enhancing creativity, community spirit, and the preservation of our cultural heritage.
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Final Deadline: 09/21/2019
Welcome to the WRPN Women's International Film Festival, where distribution and feedback opportunities abound for films made by women, or films that carry subject matter relating to concerns particular to women's issues. WWIFF is a sister festival to the Depth of Field International Film Festival, a FilmFreeway “Top 100 Reviewed” festival alumni.
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Final Deadline: 11/01/2019
We are all about giving agents, showrunners, and executives exactly what they now are looking for: Spec pilot teleplays that showcase you, the new writer operating at your very best. If the suits love the writing of a spec pilot, they have the best reason in the world to trust the writer to come through in the development process. A strongly-written spec pilot shows you’re ready for the gig.
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Final Deadline: 11/01/2019
Cinequest voted Best Film Festival by USA Today Readers. Cinequest voted Best Film Festival by USA Today Readers. The Cinequest Screenplay Competition empowers global screenwriters through discovery, recognition, and opportunity. Cinequest loves writers, and we welcome you to submit your screenplay or teleplay to our renowned competition.
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Final Deadline: 11/07/2019
Since 2009, Fresh Voices has been proud to provide a microphone to exciting new voices that deserve to be heard and memorable stories that must be told. Now celebrating our big 10th Annual Screenplay Competition, we are grateful to have had the opportunity to help guide dozens of talented writers to secure literary representation, option agreements and other writing assignments, providing the stepping stones and advancing the careers of many of our winning writers.
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Final Deadline: 11/11/2019
In 2019, the Omaha Film Festival was recognized as one of the 50 Film Festivals Worth the Entry Fee by MovieMaker Magazine. The Omaha Film Festival celebrates the artistic, educational, and historical importance of motion pictures. It gives independent film artists a platform for sharing their work and creating a dialogue with the community.
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Final Deadline: 12/01/2019
For 21 years the San Francisco Independent Film Festival has developed a great reputation for filling theaters, getting press, and throwing great parties. Films at our fest regularly get Variety reviews, picked up at other fests, and find rabid groupies following the makers around town demanded autographs and buying them drinks. This is our third year hosting a screenplay contest with the goal of expanding our filmmaker reach.
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Final Deadline: 12/15/2019
The BlueCat Screenplay Competition, now in its 22nd year, is accepting submissions for its 2020 competition. Founded in 1998 by award-winning writer Gordy Hoffman, BlueCat has supported thousands of screenwriters through written analysis provided to all entrants, many of whom have gone on to successful careers in the film and television industry.
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Final Deadline: 01/23/2020
We are Women Who Write and our goal is to be the world’s foremost screenwriting competition for women. We want to support female writers and producers of all shapes and sizes, but we don’t just want to support female writers. We want to be a springboard for your success. We want to forge a festival that will discover and recognize the best emerging female talent and the most original female voices from around the world.
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Final Deadline: 01/07/2019 (expired)
The Nantucket Film Festival - unique in its dedication to supporting and promoting the art of screenwriting - launched the Showtime Tony Cox Screenplay Competition in 1996. The Festival's screenwriting focus was inspired by Nantucket's rich history as a writer's retreat and is one of the main reasons for the event's distinction as an important cultural institution.
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Final Deadline: Contact contest for deadline info.
Industry exposure, WGAw writer assistance in polishing winning scripts and $15,000 in cash prizes for up to 19 finalists.
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Final Deadline: 04/29/2019 (expired)
Scriptapalooza was founded in 1998 with the goal of helping as many writers as possible through the competition. We have over 90 production companies, agents and managers reading all the entered scripts. (A complete list of participants is on Scriptapalooza's website.) We actively push the Semifinalists, Finalists, Runners-Up and Winners for a full year with the intention of creating opportunities for the writers.
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Final Deadline: 05/15/2019 (expired)
The Ultimate Runway Now in our 25th year, the Austin Film Festival has been catapulting writers into life-changing careers for over two decades. Whether your dream is to sign a contract, land an agent, learn from an industry icon, or take home the coveted Bronze Typewriter Award, it’s simple: you can’t win if you don’t enter.
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Final Deadline: Contact contest for deadline info.
We champion the struggling independent Auteur who literally does it all or who gathers a close team who contributes what's needed to get their movie make. By having in attendance, mediamakers from all across the U.S. and Canada and by bringing in experienced and award winning directors, screenwriters, actors, cinematographers and stunt professionals to conduct workshops and discussion groups, thus sharing their knowledge, we are paving the way for an independent movie explosion in Oklahoma.
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Final Deadline: Contact contest for deadline info.
After several years of hiatus we are proud to bring back LA Shorts screenplay competition. Finalists are invited to attend a table reading of the script for a live audience during LA Shorts Fest. The readings are performed by professional actors and actresses in front of an audience, who will vote on their favorites. These votes, along with the scores of the readers, determine the winner.
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Final Deadline: Contact contest for deadline info.
To assist the aspiring screenwriter in realizing his/her dream of becoming a professional screenwriter. To eliminate industry chokepoints that stifle creativity and impede screenplay access to managers,agents & producers.
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Final Deadline: 05/15/2019 (expired)
The PAGE Awards competition was established in the fall of 2003 by an alliance of Hollywood producers, agents, and development execs. Our goal: to discover the most exciting new scripts by up-and-coming writers from across the country and around the world. And due to the success of our winning writers, the PAGE Awards competition has rapidly become one of the most important sources for new screenwriting talent within the Hollywood community and worldwide.
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Final Deadline: Contact contest for deadline info.
The mission of the Screenwriter's Challenge is to discover and support a new wave of talented storytellers from around the world. The Challenge is organized by NYC Midnight Movie Making Madness, LLC. NYC Midnight aims to provide the prizes and exposure necessary for writers to take their next big step towards writing professionally.
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Final Deadline: Contact contest for deadline info.
The Eerie Horror Screenplay Competition offers beginning, aspiring and veteran screenwriters in the horror genre a chance to have their work recognized by people in the industry and beyond and to provide recognition and exposure for screenwriters in the horror, science fiction and suspense genres. The finalists and top 3 winning screenplays will be announced on all Eerie Horror Film Festival websites and winner's information will be forwarded to industry professionals for consideration.
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Final Deadline: 05/08/2019 (expired)
To recognize excellence in screenwriting of shorts and features in a wide variety of genres.
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Final Deadline: 01/18/2019 (expired)
The purpose of the Big Apple Film Festival Short Script Competition is to discover an engaging, innovative and purposeful short script to develop and produce into a short film that will premiere at the Big Apple Film Festival. An additional 4 finalists will receive cash awards and complimentary full access badges to the Big Apple Film Festival.
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Final Deadline: Contact contest for deadline info.
This festival is the first of its kind to put the spotlight on film comedies by women. Its goals are to raise the profile of female-generated humor, to give recognition and support to the women making it, and to be a locus of networking and community building.
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Final Deadline: 09/17/2018 (expired)
Each script must be written in the same genre and style that would have been suitable to conform with episodes for either THE TWILIGHT ZONE or NIGHT GALLERY. More specifically this means displaying traits of either a horror or a science fiction genre, while exhibiting strong traditional or contemporary social themes. Serling taught at Ithaca College from 1967 until his death in 1975.
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Final Deadline: 12/21/2018 (expired)
$15,000 in Cash Prizes. $10,000 1st Place Cash Prize for Feature screenplays! The Vail Film Institute launched the Vail Film Festival Screenplay Competition in order to find and foster the next generation of the film world's most innovative and creative screenwriters. With the realization that every great film needs a great story, the festival is dedicated to supporting talented screenwriters by utilizing the resources of the Vail Film Festival to foster the winning screenwriters through networking opportunities, and film industry access.
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Final Deadline: Contact contest for deadline info.
The screenplay contest is part of the annual film festival run by the Guild of Italian American Actors (GIAA - see www.giaa.us). The goal is to provide recognition to writers of top-quality short screenplays, as will as short movies.
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Final Deadline: 04/10/2019 (expired)
Creative World Awards (CWA) is an international screenwriting contest that is well known for having the writer's interest at heart when it comes to development and industry promotion. Production: CWA brings an exciting production opportunity to the Grand Prize Winner. This year’s winner will have a short version of their script produced by The MIX, and the film will then get a guaranteed premiere at the Richmond International Film Festival.
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Final Deadline: Contact contest for deadline info.
The Canadian Short Screenplay Competition, administered by Year of the Skunk Productions (Regina), and established in 2008, is the premiere script contest for short film screenplays. With over $50,000 in prizing, CSSC is the single-most competitive, prestigious, short screenplay festival in Canada open to international writers, a champion for screenwriters everywhere and a launching pad for writers' professional careers.
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Final Deadline: Contact contest for deadline info.
The London Independent Film Festival is dedicated to showcasing new emerging film talent.
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Final Deadline: Contact contest for deadline info.
Have you ever asked yourself "How will anyone know how good my screenplay is, if it never made into a film?" Here is your chance to see your screenplay brought to life. The winner in each category will receive a custom certificate or festival plaque. Also, winners are eligible for IMDB credit as this competition is an IMDB qualified event.
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Final Deadline: 05/02/2019 (expired)
The Table Read My Screenplay – Screenplay Contest will help you to propel your screenwriting career forward with a transformative Table Read showcase experience, an opportunity to confidently pitch to a range of over 200 industry professionals with the title of “Grand Prize Winner” at the 23rd Annual Hollywood Pitch Festival, and a support mechanism for layering a long-term career with an invitation to be a part of the elite ISA Development Slate.
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Final Deadline: Contact contest for deadline info.
Each year, at our exclusive Awards Ceremony and Filmmakers Dinner, the California Film Awards recognizes excellence in filmmaking in several competition categories with the prestigious California Film Awards. The Official Jury will award deserving films, filmmakers, and writers in the following categories: Best Picture, Screenplay, Directing, Actor, Actress, Art Design, Cinematography, Editing, Animation, Short Films, Feature Narratives, Documentaries, Foreign Films, Music Videos, Experimental Films, First-Time Directors, California Films, and Student Films.
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Final Deadline: Contact contest for deadline info.
Filmshift is committed to advancing the craft of screenwriting as well as the progress of independent screenwriters themselves through our annual screenplay competition. We offer awards including Final Draft screenwriting software, InkTip access awards, and a variety of awards from Script Pipeline . We accept both feature-length and short film scripts of all genres and styles that tell strong and original stories.
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