Here’s the thing no one tells you at your first general: screenwriting sometimes feels exactly like a pyramid scheme.
You pay (in time, money, and sanity) to get in at the ground floor. You’re promised big rewards if you just “keep at it.” And every level above you swears they’re this close to a big payout, while quietly living off their spouse’s dental insurance.
Sound familiar? Welcome to the writer economy.
Step 1: The Buy-In
Pyramid schemes ask you to invest cash up front.
Screenwriting asks you to invest years of unpaid labor, Final Draft software, and networking lunches.
Real Advice: Track your “buy-in.” Add up what you spend yearly on contests, coverage, software, and “networking events.” If the number horrifies you, cap it. You don’t need to go broke chasing legitimacy. A script costs time, not $1,500 in screenplay competitions.
Step 2: The Peer Circle
Pyramid schemes push you to build a “downline.”
Screenwriters build writing groups. Not to rope people in, but to survive the madness together.
Real Advice: Writing groups are one of the few non-scammy parts of the industry. They give you deadlines, honest notes, and a sense of community in a job that’s 90% rejection emails. The trap isn’t the group itself, it’s getting stuck in workshop purgatory. If you’ve been rewriting the same script for three years based only on peer feedback, it’s time to graduate and actually put it in front of reps, contests, or producers.
Step 3: The “Someday” Payoff
Pyramid bosses dangle yachts.
Hollywood dangles “we love your writing” meetings.
Real Advice: Expect long stretches with no money. Build a buffer. A boring savings account with 3–6 months of living expenses is the difference between continuing to write and taking a day job you hate. Your pyramid might be made of rejection letters, but your rent can’t be.
Step 4: The Celebrity at the Top
Pyramid schemes show you one person who got rich.
Hollywood shows you Diablo Cody.
Real Advice: Don’t compare your Chapter One to someone else’s Netflix overall deal. Their path isn’t repeatable. Focus on diversifying your income (staffing, freelance coverage, copywriting, teaching, even gasp OnlyFans if you want) while writing your passion project. Treat screenwriting like a volatile startup in your portfolio, not your only 401(k).
Step 5: The Exit Strategy
Pyramid schemes collapse. Scripts get shelved. You need a way out that doesn’t involve selling essential oils or becoming a YouTube reaction channel.
Real Advice: Decide what “enough” looks like for you. Is it selling one script? Getting staffed? Writing a spec that becomes a calling card? Define your win conditions early so you don’t stay trapped in the pyramid forever, endlessly “waiting on notes.”
Bottom Line
Hollywood can feel like a pyramid scheme… but at least this one gives you a shot at telling your story. Unlike MLM vitamins, your “product” has real value. Writing groups, side hustles, weird residual checks, they’re all just scaffolding for the real work: putting words on the page until someone pays you for them.
The pyramid’s base is wide, the top is narrow, but there’s room up there, and the view is worth climbing for.
XO
Eden