If you only pay attention to the news of massive spec sales and mammoth overall deals, you might see becoming a screenwriter as a way to get rich quick. But it’s hardly as simple as that. Screenwriting is one of the most challenging paths into the entertainment industry, and making money off your way with words is complex. Here, we break it all down.
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There are numerous ways that a screenwriter can get paid. The list includes:
- Options: A producer pays a writer for the exclusive right to shop their script around and attach talent. These deals are almost always specified for a certain amount of time.
- Spec sales: This is when a writer sells an original screenplay to a producer or studio. Unlike an option, the rights transfer to the buyer for good.
- Overall deals: A writer agrees to exclusively develop projects for a studio or streamer for a specified period of time. These deals are highly lucrative and extremely rare, only coming after a creative becomes a money-making name unto themselves.
- Writing assignments: This involves coming aboard a project that the writer did not originate themself, often for tasks like rewrites, outlines, and punch-ups.
- Writers’ rooms: For television, writers are hired to work in the writers’ room for the duration of the season; they typically receive an additional fee on top of their salary for penning an episode.
- Residuals: According to the Writers Guild of America, residuals are “compensation paid for the reuse of a credited writer’s work.” This includes situations like an episode of television airing in syndication or a feature film being released on DVD.
What variables contribute to a screenwriter’s pay?
First, of course, is your experience and notoriety. Top-level, name-brand screenwriters can fetch millions of dollars for their work because they have a proven track record of box office success.
Your union status also impacts your pay. Becoming a member of the WGA and working on union projects means you are guaranteed the minimum payments that the guild worked hard to obtain during the 2023 writers strike.
Another factor is your credits. The amount of money you make for a single “written by” credit will be smaller than if you also negotiate, say, an executive producer credit on a project.
Beyond all these factors, each individual deal you (or your representation) make will likely be different. Selling a screenplay to an independent producer will net you less than selling to Universal Studios. Your salary as a first-time staff writer won’t look like your salary as a showrunner. Part of the challenge of screenwriting as a career is the lack of long-term stability, and knowing that your pay will fluctuate in a “What have you done for me lately?” industry is vital.
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Under the WGA’s 2023 Theatrical and Television Basic Agreement, feature screenplays are divided into projects with a high budget ($5 million or more) and low budget (less than $5 million).
H3: High-budget screenplay minimums
- Original screenplay + treatment (i.e., a detailed summary, written in prose): $170,655
- Original screenplay: $125,023
- Non-original screenplay + treatment: $147,920
- Non-original screenplay: $102,288
- Story credit or treatment: $45,470
- Rewrite: $45,470
- Polish: $22,736
Low-budget screenplay minimums
- Original screenplay + treatment: $90,904
- Original screenplay: $61,064
- Non-original screenplay + treatment: $79,542
- Non-original screenplay: $49,702
- Story credit or treatment: $29,826
- Rewrite: $29,826
- Polish: $14,924
Under the union agreement, a TV staff writer working in a writers’ room on a week-to-week basis will make a minimum of $5,935 a week.
The minimum payments for individual TV scripts are complex, and depend largely on runtime and the type of network. “Network prime time” includes ABC, CBS, FBC, NBC, Pay TV, and Tier 1 SVOD services (between 1 and 5 million subscribers) like AMC+ and BET+. “Other than network prime time” would include the other three tiers of SVOD services, which encompass Apple TV+, HBO Max, Prime Video, Paramount, Peacock, Disney+, Hulu, Netflix, and Spectrum Originals.
Network prime time minimums
30 minutes or less
- Story: $10,601
- Teleplay: $22,802
- Story + teleplay (a TV script): $31,793
60 minutes or less
- Story: $18,658
- Teleplay: $30,764
- Story + teleplay: $46,759
90 minutes or less
- Story: $24,296
- Teleplay: $44,325
- Story + teleplay: $65,788
120 minutes or less (episodic)
- Story: $33,287
- Teleplay: $56,867
- Story + teleplay: $86,561
120 minutes or less (non-episodic)
- Story: $36,329
- Teleplay: $62,058
- Story + teleplay: $94,611
Other than network prime time minimums
30 minutes or less
- Story: $7,464
- Teleplay: $12,121
- Story + teleplay: $18,657
60 minutes or less
- Story: $13,565
- Teleplay: $23,491
- Story + teleplay: $33,913
90 minutes or less
-
Story: $20,387
-
Teleplay: $36,132
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Story + teleplay: $50,965
120 minutes or less
- Story: $26,714
- Teleplay: $47,930
- Story + teleplay: $66,789
In conclusion: Yes, screenwriters can easily make six to seven figures a year working on feature scripts, in writers’ rooms, or in a myriad of other situations. But it’s a career that is not for the faint of heart. It often takes a long time—and years of unpaid or unrealized work—to carve out that sort of financial stability. It requires a lot of resolve and, of course, luck. But if you know all that and are still determined, that’s a great sign. Good luck!