A list of upcoming screenplay contests, rated by screenwriters and sorted by deadline. Find the best contest for your screenplay or television script.
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Final Deadline: 09/20/2018
To discover innovative, marketable, high-concept projects for studio-level development, including feature screenplays, TV material, and media content.
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Final Deadline: 09/26/2018
Stage 32's screenwriting contests have gained a reputation as some of the "most worthwhile screenwriting contests to enter." The reason for this is simple: We provide unparalleled access to industry executives and work directly with our winning writers in an never ending quest to help them find success.
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Final Deadline: 09/30/2018
The universe is an infinite expanse of limitless possibility, teeming with unknown worlds and untold stories. The blank page opens, a white inexhaustible void, punctuated only by the monolithic black cursor. What wonders lie in its indefinable depths? Other Worlds is dedicated to fostering and promoting creativity in Science Fiction at every stage of development, so we are proud to announce our annual SciFi Screenwriting Contest is now currently open and accepting submissions! The contest runs concurrently with the film program, and will award prizes for the top feature, short or teleplay.
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Final Deadline: 10/01/2018
The Vancouver International Women in Film Festival Screenplay Competition accepts English-language feature screenplays written by women. The festival is a forum for collaboration and networking with other screenwriters and filmmakers who contribute to the visibility of women through the ongoing practice of their craft. We encourage you to submit a feature film script of any genre, challenging the perceptions of what stories women write, and what we want to see.
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Final Deadline: 10/01/2018
The Middlebury Script Lab invites applications for its 2019 fellowships. Our tuition-free program provides emerging screenwriters a place to focus intensely on their craft with the support of accomplished industry professionals. Six emerging screenwriters — the Fellows — will be invited to spend one week at Middlebury, in the Champlain Valley of Vermont.
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Final Deadline: 10/03/2018
Our panel of Hollywood industry professionals is looking for the next great drama and comedy TV pilots for network, cable and online platforms! Accepting web series and non-traditional series pilots as well. Three winners will receive cash awards and introductions to industry professionals. The Industry Jury: This year's jury is our best one yet! Our industry judges are looking for fresh voices in comedy and drama writing for television and web series! Our mission is to connect great TV writers with great TV producers, managers and development executives.
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Final Deadline: 10/04/2018
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 2018 Big Apple Film Festival. An additional 4 finalists will receive cash awards and complimentary full access badges to the 2018 Big Apple Film Festival.
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Final Deadline: 10/09/2018
We don't offer any of the usual screenplay contest smoke and mirrors. No coverage from someone being paid $10 per script (please ask Mom). No cash (please ask Grandma) or writing clinics from gurus who have never sold a screenplay (Dad?). What our winners do receive is: INDUSTRY ACCESS AND INDUSTRY READS.
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Final Deadline: 10/10/2018
To introduce writers to the decision makers of traditional broadcast television, the cable market, and multi-media outlets. Competition winners will have the chance to get their material read by experienced production companies.
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Final Deadline: 10/10/2018
The Creative Screenwriting Screenplay Contest is looking for the next great feature or pilot. The Grand Prize Winner will receive $5,000 in CASH as well has have their script optioned by Producer Danny Roth (The Hurricane Heist, LBJ, The Year of Spectacular Men.)
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Final Deadline: 10/15/2018
Diverse Voices strives to provide a contest that is purely focused on promoting and encouraging diverse voices in Hollywood. The contest encourages stories that are told from perspectives that are often underrepresented in Hollywood today. This includes writers of color, women writers, writers with disabilities, writers over 40, writers in the LGBTQ+ community, and any other voices and stories that are currently underrepresented in Hollywood.
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Final Deadline: 10/20/2018
Breaking Walls is a contest for thriller screenplays with contacts at established Hollywood literary representation and production companies who have agreed to consider the full winning script and the top finalists' loglines. Well-written thrillers are always an excellent way for writers to show Hollywood pros a combination of commerciality, unique voice, and a clear understanding of effective feature film narrative.
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Final Deadline: 10/25/2018
Top scripts will be considered by our industry jury of executives, writers, and managers who focus on the action and thriller genres: Jenny Wood, Elevate Entertainment Manager of Taylor Sheridan, writer of Hell or High Water, Sicario and Sicario: Day of the Soledado. Belle Avery, Appelles Entertainment Producer of The Meg, a big budget action adventure starring Jason Statham in theaters August 10th.
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Final Deadline: 10/29/2018
Our intention is to help open doors for the aspiring television writer. There are four categories you can submit to, which include 1 hour existing spec scripts, 1/2 hour existing sitcom spec scripts, original pilots, and reality programs. This competition is designed with the TV writer and crossover screenwriter in mind. The participants we have chosen to read the winning scripts are individuals from established production companies.
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Final Deadline: 10/30/2018
The 8th annual Richmond International Film Festival (RIFF) is a competitive festival that accepts feature and short screenplays, teleplays, and screens more than 120 international cutting edge film premiers making it one of the Mid-Atlantic's largest international competitive festivals. RIFF provides six days of industry panels, Q&As, industry mixers, live music performances, the FLOW Creative & Pitch Conference, and entertainment mixers that bring the spirit of Hollywood to beautiful Richmond, Virginia at the Bowtie Criterion/Movieland and the historic Byrd Theatre.
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Final Deadline: 10/31/2018
Open to writers of all levels and backgrounds, the StoryPros International's objective is to recognize, support and promote your work with financial rewards, software and services -- as well as providing an open door to industry professionals with guaranteed reads and promotion to our network of contacts. Past entrants and winners have gone on to representation, options, assignments and sales.
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Final Deadline: 10/31/2018
OUR WINNERS GET RESULTS Over the years, our contest winners and finalists have been signed, optioned, put in development, staffed and secured high level meetings with some of the top executives and companies in the film industry. Our track record with the Search for New Blood has been off the charts. Now we’re back with this incredibly popular contest designed to give our horror and thriller writers the chance to have their work exposed to some of the top execs in the industry! Our top 3 winners will get exclusive meetings with executives.
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Final Deadline: 11/01/2018
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: 11/01/2018
For 19 years SF IndieFest 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 year, we're rolling out a screenplay contest with the goal of expanding our filmmaker reach.
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Final Deadline: 11/02/2018
Cinequest voted Best Film Festival by USA Today Readers. The Cinequest Screenwriting Competition continues to empower global screenwriters through discovery, recognition and opportunity. Cinequest loves writers, and we welcome you to submit your screenplay or teleplay to our renowned competition. The Top 10 Finalists receive many empowering benefits including: All Access passes to the Cinequest Film & VR Festival and the exclusive Writers Celebration, plus exposure to leading industry players and inspiring luminaries.
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Final Deadline: 11/05/2018
Through personalized feedback from experienced industry professionals and other writers in the program, Screenwriting Fellows will gain the tools to revise and refine their scripts for production. The Screenwriting Lab also helps to further the careers of its Fellows by introducing them to film industry veterans who can offer guidance on both the craft and business of screenwriting.
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Final Deadline: 11/05/2018
The CineStory Foundation has always believed in helping writers find their voice. We’re entering a world in which the ways to tell stories are limitless. Those stories always begin with a blank page. Our goal with the TV/Digital Series Retreat is to assist writers, whether they long for the collaborative nature of Television or they dream of going out on their own to create their own web series.
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Final Deadline: 11/07/2018
Since 2009, Fresh Voices has distinguished itself as a screenplay competition designed to discover, empower and promote the next generation of storytellers, writers and filmmakers. As the name would suggest, Fresh Voices has done this by identifying writer's with a unique and memorable voice that demands to be read. Now in our ninth year, we have helped guide dozens of talented screenwriters to secure literary representation, option agreements and other work-for-hire writing assignments that have been the stepping stones to significant careers Will you be Hollywood's next success story? Enter now and let your voice be heard!
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Final Deadline: 11/07/2018
Submissions are now open for the Athena IRIS Screenwriting Lab. The lab is designed for female writers who have not yet had a feature-length fictional script produced. Screenplays must include one or more strong female characters in leadership roles at the center of the story and must be feature-length narratives.
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Final Deadline: 11/08/2018
From the start, the competition has leveraged our deep relationships with Hollywood’s top agents, managers, producers, and executives and consistently assembled a “who’s who” panel of 25 judges for each and every competition. This year is no exception, with judges participating from Paradigm, APA, Energy Entertainment, Circle of Confusion, Di Novi Pictures, Bellevue, and many more.
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Final Deadline: 11/09/2018
The Destiny City Film Festival was founded in part because we want to show great movies. And we know that at the heart of every great movie is a great story – one that is destined to inspire and entertain. Screenplays are the foundation of every memorable film, and we are dedicated to supporting the writing community and the stories they create. Thus, we are thrilled to host Tacoma’s first short screenplay competition! We know that the Northwest film community is chock full of talented writers, thinkers, and artists.
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Final Deadline: 11/15/2018
Created by Dr. Ted Baehr, founder, publisher and executive producer of MOVIEGUIDE® and founder and chairman of the Christian Film & Television Commission, and Dr. Jack Templeton, the primary purpose of the prize is to further the influence of moral and spiritual values within the film and television industries. Seeking to promote a spiritually uplifting, redemptive worldview, MOVIEGUIDE® announces the Kairos Prize that will help inspire first-time and beginning screenwriters to produce compelling, entertaining, spiritually uplifting scripts that result in a greater increase in either man’s love or understanding of God.
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Final Deadline: 11/15/2018
We are looking for innovative and compelling storytelling, for characters that surprise and challenge you, for words that pop off the page, and for narratives that twist and turn like a country back road. This year we’re accepting both feature scripts and pilot scripts; you’re more than welcome to submit in both categories.
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Final Deadline: 11/16/2018
Willamette Writers invites you to submit your web series pilot for our script to screen competition. The web series script should be 7 pages maximum, in standard screenplay format, with 1-4 speaking characters. The pilot should have a beginning, middle, and end, and be aimed at a general audience. After an initial round of judging in Portland, Oregon, 10 finalists will be chosen by our industry professionals in LA.
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Final Deadline: 11/17/2018
We believe independent filmmakers deserve to get recognition for the hard work they put into their projects. That's why every eligible entry into the North American Film Awards (NAFA) receives an official nomination laurel and consideration into the award category the entrant submitted to. With over 20 award categories, it is also possible for entrants to receive multiple nominations for unlimited projects.
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Final Deadline: 11/30/2018
Filmmatic coined a slogan, "Hidden screenplays never get produced". As writers, we spend a lot of our precious time crafting unique scripts, yet we hardly ever employ an equal level of passion when attempting to get our work into the "right hands". The exposure and prestige one can gain from placing or winning a screenplay competition is invaluable, but what do you say this time around we also get you PITCHING! Let's get proactive, let's pick a production company that makes sense for our project, tell them we were a Pitch Now Finalist or Winner, and get them to review our work, now not later ;) All 100 finalists will be able to pitch to a studio or production company of their choice via Virtual Pitch Fest! The competition is open to feature-length and short works, screenplays and teleplays.
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Final Deadline: 12/01/2018
SUCCESS! We say we are looking for a film to produce and we mean it. Our 2017 winner completed principal photography in May 2018 and is in post-production! "Becoming" by Omar Naim won our Grand Prize and is going to hit the screens with Omar himself directing! We will keep sharing updates on "Becoming" as it progresses.. Circus Road wants to find a great project to produce.
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Final Deadline: 12/01/2018
Now accepting Features, Shorts, Pilots and Docs! Every 6 months, at least one filmmaker will be awarded this production grant of up to $30,000 in production funds. We announce the winner(s) 6 weeks after each final deadline. We are accepting applications from around the world (in English). Whether you have a simple screenplay or a film, pilot or documentary that’s already in production, we want to consider your short screenplay or in-production short film project.
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Final Deadline: 12/05/2018
Barnstorm is not just a screenplay competition, its goal is to help you develop your script for production. Every submission receives a letter of analysis from an industry professional and finalists receive a one-on-one consultation with a feature film producer as well as heaps of other rewards. THIS SEASON, RECEIVE YOUR FEEDBACK WITHIN TWO WEEKS OF SUBMISSION.
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Final Deadline: 12/12/2018
The Military Script Showcase recognizes and showcases feature screenplays and television scripts that feature military stories.
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Final Deadline: 12/16/2018
The BlueCat Screenplay Competition, now in its 21st year, is accepting submissions for its 2019 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: 12/17/2018
We want to see the best short screenplays from around the globe.
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Final Deadline: 12/17/2018
To discover the best un-produced short screenplays by talented writers and present their work to LEADING INDUSTRY PROFESSIONALS.
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Final Deadline: 12/21/2018
$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: 12/21/2018
The Boomtown Film and Music Festival accepts Short (44 or less pages) and Feature (45+ pages) screenplays in any genre! Submit on Film Freeway!
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Final Deadline: 12/31/2018
The Oregon Short Film Festival is a showcase of independent short films from around the world. We accept short screenplays of all genres that are 30 pages or less. Comedy, Dark Comedy, Drama, Science Fiction, Horror and anything else that is well written with good character development is eligible.
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Final Deadline: 01/12/2019
The First 10 Pages Script Competition recognizes and showcases exceptional feature and television writing in all genres.
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Final Deadline: 02/04/2019
The fellowship program was developed to honor dedicated writers and to help further their creative process and skills. Writing in itself is a journey and we would like to facilitate the process by giving the fellows the opportunity to be surrounded by like-minded professionals and individuals. Application Requirements: Completed application and fee.
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Final Deadline: 02/13/2019
Founded on September 15, 2012, the International Christian Film Festival is one of the largest Christian Film Festival in the world. Our goal is to help filmmakers get to next level. This is the premiere choice for faith-based, family-friendly films and documentaries.
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Final Deadline: 02/14/2019
We are a team of artists that want nothing more than to support the next generation of filmmakers and screenwriters from around the world. Specifically, those storytellers that passionate about telling stories about our communities in the U.S. and abroad, from inner city Atlanta, LA, New York, Oakland, Detroit, Chicago, and Milwaukee to Africa, Brazil, and the Caribbean, to Wall Street and the streets of London to the NBA.
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Final Deadline: 02/14/2019
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: 02/28/2019
The Houston Comedy Film Festival is a unique forum for comedy filmmakers from all over the world to showcase their creative works in Houston, Texas. We are looking for fun comedy short and feature length screenplays with great characters, funny situations, clever dialogue and plenty of laughs.
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Final Deadline: 02/28/2019
Nice International Film Festival in our 8th Year held a few days before the Cannes Film Festival in the South of France. One of the greatest festival in the world to help filmmakers find a market to support their aims with people attending that can give good solid advice to work with established film industry professionals if you wish, screening, meetings, networking, world famous international awards ceremony, just some of what we have created over the years a unique festival with our other festivals a real platform for filmmakers to meet, network, do business festival week.
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Final Deadline: 02/28/2019
Welcome to the Edinburgh International Screenwriting Competition. We are the world’s foremost screenwriting competition dedicated to the odd and insane. Because as Jack Kerouac once said, “the only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars and in the middle you see the blue center light pop and everybody goes “Awww!” Our aim is to launch the careers of cinema’s most original screenwriters by creating the world’s most prestigious screenwriting competition.
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Final Deadline: 02/28/2019
As one of the few screenwriting competitions for the LGBTQ community, our aim is to discover and recognize the best emerging talent and most original voices from our community in film and television writing from around the world. We are proud to be LGBTQ and even prouder to support the LGBTQ community. Members from our community have long been known for being the best artists in the world and we want to not only recognize them for that, but to support them in being talented as well as a member of our community.
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