WD 48-Hour Screenplay Throwdown: Summer ’21

SUBMIT TO THE LATEST SCRENPLAY THROWDOWN!

Get ready to rumble again! It’s time to throw down your screenwriting skills and see if you’ve got what it takes to be the last writer standing!

Enter the 48-Hour Screenplay Throwdown screenwriting contest to flex your writing skills and pit your quick script up against other writers in the WD community!

Ten finalists will get a chance to have their script submissions read & judged by professional screenwriter/showrunner Andy Bobrow (Community, The Last Man on Earth)

FREE to submit! Effortless to enter! And a fantastic opportunity to win CASH PRIZES to help support your writing journey!

SEMI-FINALISTS & FINALISTS HAVE BEEN ANNOUCED!

SUBMISSION GUIDELINES

In order for your script to be considered, please follow the guidelines below:

No matter what genre you choose to write in or what tone your story takes, your script submission MUST embody this Throwdown Theme.

HOW TO SUBMIT

TEN FINALSTS WILL WIN

  • $100
  • 1-year free WriterDuet Pro
  • Script Submission featured as a Readable Publish Link and read/judged by professional screenwriter Andy Bobrow

THE 1st PLACE WINNER WILL WIN

  • $500
  • A WriterDuet Pro Lifetime subscription
  • Feedback on Throwdown script submission from the featured judge Andy Bobrow

(The 1st Place Winner will receive these prizes instead of the Finalist prizes)

ABOUT THE FEATURED JUDGE

Andy Bobrow is a sitcom veteran who began his television career on the hit Fox series Malcolm In The Middle. Andy has written for some of the most popular and influential American TV comedies, including Community and Brooklyn Nine-Nine. Andy was also Executive Producer and Co-Showrunner of Fox’s The Last Man On Earth, and is currently Executive Producer and Co-Showrunner of Fox’s Bless The Harts.

QUESTIONS ABOUT THE CONTEST?

Reach out to us! help@writerduet.com

Terms Of Service

Your participation in this contest signifies your acceptance of the WriterDuet 48-Hour Screenplay Throwdown Contest terms and conditions below.

You must be at least 13 years of age to enter. If you are under the age of 13 you are not permitted to enter. If you are over the age of 13 but under the age of 18, entry into this contest and acceptance of any prize awarded in the event of a winning script requires you to have the consent of your parent or guardian. No purchase is necessary to enter. Void where prohibited.

WRITERDUET INC. reserves the right to investigate or reject your entry if you have misused the Service or have behaved in any way that we consider inappropriate, unlawful or illegal. In order to participate in this competition, you must also abide by the WRITERDUET Terms of Service and Privacy Policies.

Submitting a script

When you submit a script to the WriterDuet 48-Hour Screenplay Throwdown Contest, you promise that:

You own all rights, including copyright, to the entire script or have been authorized by its copyright owner to submit it to WRITERDUET INC.; The content of the script is not unlawful, defamatory, libelous, threatening, obscene, pornographic, harassing, hateful, racially or ethnically offensive, or fraudulent, and doesn’t encourage conduct that would be considered a criminal offense, give rise to civil liability, or violate any law, or would be otherwise inappropriate; The content of the script does not violate any other rights of any party, such as infringing a copyright or trademark, publishing falsehoods or misrepresentations about WRITERDUET INC. or any other person or entity, or violating another person’s right to privacy or publicity; No other party has a pending claim to the script that, if upheld, would render our Service or products, or those of our Partners, illegal or in violation of any party’s rights. You retain all your prior ownership rights in your submitted scripts. You agree that you will not suggest, directly or indirectly, that WRITERDUET INC. endorses the content of any script that you submit, including opinions, recommendations, or advice expressed by that script.

If you have questions about any of these agreements, you can contact us at help@writerduet.com.

WriterDuet is the new standard for screenwriting. It combines the power of cloud-based word processing with the necessity for industry-standard, secure, and intuitive screenwriting software.

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166 Comments

  1. Hi there~! I have two questions:
    1. Do we need a title page? If so, does it count as part of the page count?
    2. How are the pieces being judged? Is it a WriterDuet team, or will it be some kind of community-based thing where we all read each others entries?

    • Hi Cedar!

      1. You do need a title page but it doesn’t count toward your page total.
      2. The WriterDuet team will determine the finalists and then our guest judge will select the ultimate winner.

  2. I’ve written my script in FinalDraft 12.
    I’d like to upload a PDF I can create in Final Draft. Is that possible?
    I listened to your How To video, but it is NOT clear to me.
    (1)   Must I write my 4-page script in WriterDuet?
    (2)   How can I upload my PDF from Final Draft 12 into your form?
    (3) Can I cut-and-paste my 5-page document into your “Write Your Script” section?
    PLEASE EXPLAIN….or give me a phone number I can call in the next few hours.
    Thanks.
    Jacob Goodwin

    • Hi Jacob!

      You actually don’t need to write your submission in WriterDuet. This link will take you to 1:04 of the video, which has the instructions you need: https://youtu.be/N0JZ1stJuqc?t=64

      At read.writerduet.com you can upload a PDF in the left sidebar. After you upload your PDF, in the same side bar you will see the share link you need to submit for the contest.

  3. Accidental import problem:

    I imported my script from Final Draft and it counted a sound effect as a character. Did not notice this until after submission. Can I resubmit or is it too late?

    • Hey Malcolm, as long as the sound effect doesn’t have any dialogue there won’t be an issue.

      If you need to resubmit, just make sure you send a new Publish link to help@writerduet.com by the deadline 11:59PM PST and explain that this is an amendment to your previous submission.

  4. Apologies if I already commented, forgot to check the notified when replied. But I wrote the entire thing in Final Draft and imported it to Writer Duet. It accidentally made one of my sound effects a character (effectively making 3 of them). Is it possible to resubmit, or is it too late?

    • Hey Malcolm, as long as the sound effect doesn’t have any dialogue there won’t be an issue.

      If you need to resubmit, just make sure you send a new Publish link to help@writerduet.com by the deadline 11:59PM PST and explain that this is an amendment to your previous submission.

      • Unfortunately it took my action line and attached it as dialogue, but I have already corrected it, and I will be sending that link within the next few minutes. Thanks for the reply!

  5. Hi. Thanks for the opportunity and the free contest! When will decisions be made and announced?

    • Hi Steven! So jazzed to hear that enjoyed the Screenplay Throwdwn! Depending on the number of scripts submitted, the process of selecting the 10 Finalists may take longer, but we’re hoping to announce the Finalists no later than June 28th. The Winner will be announced a few days after, as our featured judge needs time to read/consider each of those finalists carefully before deciding the winner.

  6. Hey there. I finished my script and tried to submit it, following the instructions as in the video. However, when I opened the Link it generated for me, the pages were blank, Only “INT.” was written on it. How do I fix this, and can I resubmit?

    • Hi Alex! Shoot our Support Team a message and they’ll help sort things out! help@writerduet.com

  7. Sent in but no confirmation. I had to send in again but no confirmation still.

    Is that normal?

    • Hi Chinatu! You should have received a receipt of your submission to the email address you listed in the submission. That said! It looks like we did receive your script submission on our end, so you’re all set!

      • Thanks. It is resolved now.

      • Saw it in the spam folder. Just in case anyone has the same issues.

  8. I changed up some of my writing last minute but it won’t update on the document we get sent to by using the link we create to turn in the script. How can I fix this? I want to turn in the script I edited last minute instead.

    • Hi CJ! Reach out to our Support Team with an update WriterDuet Read publish link and they can help update your submission! If you’re having trouble updating that publish link, let them and they can help troubleshoot – just make sure to give them the steps of you originally created it (directly from the “Share ” button in WriterDuet or by uploading a PDF to read.writerduet.com).

  9. Hi, I just wanted to make sure my submission went through. When I click on the “Submit a WriterDuet Read Publish Link,” I get a screen with an error message. Thanks!

    • Hey George! We see that your submission was entered, but it looks like you may have deleted the initial WriterDuet Read publish link that you created by unchecking the box next to “Publish link” in the app. Can you go to the “Share” button and check the box next to “Publish link” again, copy that new publish link, and send it to our Support Team at help@writerduet.com ? That way, they can get your submission updated ASAP.

      • Yes, I’ll do that! Thanks!

  10. How many scripts can we enter?

    • Hi Tyreece! For this specific contest, only one script can be submitted for consideration.

  11. I just submitted mine but forget to enter in the title page with the title and my name, is that a problem?

    • Hi Lydia! For this contest, the title page requires both a script title and your author name. Once you edit your title page document, go to the blue “Share” button and select “Update published version” to ensure those changes are updated for your submission.

  12. When I got to the link I created for the script, the title page is blank, even though I entered the title and author in the Title Page of the project. Any idea what could be happening?

    • Hi Anthony! It looks like you may have created your WriterDuet Read publish link while viewing your title page document. Can you go to the “Share” button and uncheck the box next to “Publish link”? Then, open the document you wrote your script in (not the title page document), go back to the “Share” button, and check the box next to “Publish link” again?

      That way, you can create a new publish link, copy it, and send it to us at help@writerduet.com so we can update your submission ASAP.

  13. Does text messaging count as dialogue? If so, that means I have three speaking characters…

    • Hi Julia! So long as those text messages were not written as dialogue line or spoken aloud by a character, those characters won’t count towards your 2 speaking character limit.

  14. Are we allowed to use pseudonyms?

    • Hi there! If you would like to use a pseudonym for your author name on the title page, go for it!

  15. The pdf upload page freezes while converting file so I can’t get the share link. I will email the pdf to help@writerduet.com.

  16. Thanks =)
    This was fun.

  17. Hello. I had a hiccup submitting my 48-hour contest script. I created a shareable link of my script and submitted it to the contest, but for some reason it saved an earlier draft of mine. I went ahead and logged out of my account and then logged back in again, and did another save of my script and it worked fine. I ended up submitting two scripts, though. The first one (which is over 4 pages) should be discarded. The second submission is the only script I would like to have considered for the contest. Is there another email I should be contacting, or am I okay here? Thanks for your help. That was a fun writing exercise! Best, TB

    • Hi Tom! Our Support Team just reached back out to you about your submission, so you should be all good! So glad to hear you enjoyed creating for the Screenplay Throwdown!

  18. Dear WD team,
    I submitted the script a few hours ago… Everything good.
    But now I’m thinking about the fact the entire script might not follow the theme.
    I mean, does a person of whom we just don’t know the name or the story count as a secret identity? I dunno and I don’t believe so. Am I right?

  19. Kindly confirm if you received my submission since I never got an email.

    • Hi Mike!

      We’ve got it! Looking forward to reading it.

  20. Hi, I buggered my link but fixed it, and sent the fixed one to the support team email. However, I failed to notice that the ‘fixed’ link was actually very out-dated, and have now sent a correct link to the support team email. However, I have not received confirmation that this has been received. What should I do?

  21. Hello again. Now that submissions are closed, may we know how many entries you received for the Throwdown? Thanks again so much for hosting this competition!

    Steve

    • Hi Steve! Thanks for being a part of this! We received over 900 submissions!

      • Oh my stars!

      • Hi again! Just wondering if there has been any update on when finalists will be announced for the Throwdown. Thanks in advance!

        Steve

  22. Hello, I sent in a link with my first submission but when I received the confirmation email and pressed the link I’d submitted it asked me to sign in to open it.
    So I did another submission (Same screenplay) and this time the link on my confirmation email did go through. Not sure why that happened and hoping all links did what they were supposed to do. 🙂

    • Hi Taryn! Reach out to our Support Team at help@writerduet.com with the email address you used to submit to the contest, and they’ll help sort things out with you!

  23. Is the bonus Reddit contest going to be held again this year as well?

  24. I had such a blast this time and during the previous. Though my last entry didn’t make it on the short list, I wrote it so I could shoot it myself. The final film has been really well received at local screenings and was a finalist in the Stockholme City Film Festival!

  25. This contest was fun! I saw your post on Reddit. If I post my submission, and it wins…does that affect my chance of winning your Throwdown? Because the prize is the same…

    Just curious. Thanks.

    • Hi Karen! Not at all! The bonus reddit contest is completely separate. Good luck!

  26. Thanks to WriterDuet! You guys are a great team and I love the software!

  27. When should we hear about the finalists?

  28. So… Today Is The Day?

    • I don’t think they’ll release finalists today. For what it’s worth, the February throwdown took about a month after the initial deadline for them to release finalists/winner.

  29. Any update on finalists?

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