Screenplay Festival

Screenplay Festival features the following categories:

Movie Scripts: Action/Adventure, Comedy, Drama, Thriller/Horror
Television Scripts: Half Hour, One Hour

One of the highest rated screenwriting competitions online, Screenplay Festival offers writers an honest opportunity to get their work the recognition it deserves.

The competition’s six categories -- Action/Adventure, Comedy, Drama, Thriller/Horror, TV: Half Hour, TV: One Hour -- ensure that a truly wonderful script is not punished or ignored because it is in a genre that does not usually win awards. It always seems to be “important dramas” that win the accolades. In the real world, people love comedies, action pictures, thrillers and horror flicks as much as they love dramas. Writing for a fun genre should not forbid a writer from having their talents acknowledged.

It is with these policies that Screenplay Festival greatly assists legitimate agents, producers, directors and investors. By allowing them to view the Grand Prize Winners and Honorable Mentions from each category, Screenplay Festival goes out of its way to get winning scripts into the hands of professionals who will make something happen for that script.

Screenplay Festival Award Winners will receive the following Prizes:

Cash:
Movie Scripts: $500.00 Grand Prize in each category.
Television Scripts: $500.00 Grand Prize in each category.

Honorable Mention winners do not receive a cash prize.

InkTip
Our sponsor InkTip account will provide our Grand Prize winners with 4 months of InkTip Pro! Pro benefits include:
- Your Scripts Available to Filmmakers
Pro members can make their scripts available to vetted filmmakers on InkTip. These filmmakers search for scripts and writers every day with the intent to option, produce, and/or hire writers.
- Weekly Pitch Requests
Every week, filmmakers tell us what they're looking for, and we pass that information along to you in the form of submission opportunities: 6+ per week.
-Pitch to Page Contest
Unlike other contests that only focus on one aspect of screenwriting (the script), Pitch to Page examines your complete package from your pitch (logline) to your synopsis and script because writing an excellent script can only take you so far if you cannot pitch it. Entry into Pitch to Page is free for Pro members. Every few months, Pro members can enter a script listing into the contest. Some contests are genre specific or have specialized themes. Prize packages include free IPM membership, a logline featured in our exclusive industry newsletter, script coverage, and more.

Virtual Pitch Fest
Grand Prize winners receive 3 Pitches on VPF, the platform for TV/Film professionals seeking scripts and writers to represent. With VPF, writers can submit Written Pitches to 500+ networks/studios, producers and agents with the assurance of a guaranteed response. Honorable Mention winners receive 1 Pitch on VPF.

Live Awards Ceremony
Every Grand Prize Winner and every Honorable Mention winner in each category will be announced at a live ceremony in Los Angeles!

Screenplay Festival has established the following rules for the competition:

Standard title page with author information is preferred.

All writers of submitted material must be 18 years or older, including co-authored material.

Screenplays written by teams of two or more writers are eligible for Screenplay Festival. Any award won by a co-authored script will be divided evenly among the writers listed on the entry form.

Screenplays that are currently optioned or have been produced are not eligible to compete in Screenplay Festival.

Screenplays must be the original work of the author.

Screenplays adapted from other sources that were written by other authors (such as but not limited to books or plays) are not eligible to compete in Screenplay Festival, regardless of the source author’s permission.

Screenplays adapted from other sources that were written by the author of that source are eligible to compete in 100 Screenplays.

Screenplays adapted from source material that is in the public domain are eligible.

Submissions of new drafts or corrected pages will not be accepted.

Screenplays must be submitted in English.

A writer may enter more than one screenplay; however, a separate entry form and fee are required for each script submitted.

Overall Rating

Quality

Value

Communication

Hospitality

Networking

Greg Dorchak

For the money, this is a great competition, allowing writers to submit in numerous categories, instead of just one lump winner. They had a rough time with the fires and had to postpone the winners announcements, and also had to cancel the in-person awards ceremonies, but they kept it going nonetheless! Kudos to the team, recommend this festival highly.

March 2025

Helpful

Response from festival:

We have not gotten an email from you since your Jan 15 reply to our email asking people if we should try to reschedule the awards ceremony that was delayed due to the fires. Your reply was thoughtful and kind.

We never saw a reply to our Jan 21 or Feb 5 emails where we informed you of your win and asked for info to send you the plaque and prize money. We checked our Spam folder just now and saw nothing.

The one thing that we can explain is that the phone number that you got from our website is wrong. There was a typo! Our apologies for that. The person who has what used to be our Google Voice number is probably very confused by the message that you left.

We cannot explain what is going on here. But we will try sending you another email right now and perhaps you will receive it, click reply, and then we will get that reply.

We are hoping this works out!

By the way, after 22 years we are done. Your 1-star review is not why we replied, as this screenwriting contest is officially retired. But we were excited to hear that you are still alive and hope to wrap things up the right way.

The Screenplay Festival Team
John Rutter

Given the challenges in LA in January, the staff at the Screenplay Festival did an incredible job bringing the 2024 contest to the finish line.

I'm thrilled that two of my TV pilots resonated with the readers and were nominated as finalists.

Regards,

February 2025

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Kevin Brunner

Honored to have my feature screenplay Mary Mary Quite Contrary as an award winner. Thank you.

January 2025

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Sean Roper

I am deeply honored to see “Means & Methods” was selected as an award winner. Many thanks to the entire team for their efforts to put on the awards ceremony and for polling the finalists for their input. It was a privilege to be considered by such a caring and compassionate crew. I look forward to next year’s return.

January 2025

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Keith Roenke

Wonderful group of true film lovers. We are honored and excited that our Horror script "Breezy Point" is selected as a finalist this year. Thank you Screenplay Festival.

January 2025

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