d the checks coming in. It is not enough merely to send
out your script; it must be sent to that editor who is in the market
for the kind of script you have written. As one editor has said,
"Don't send a Biblical photoplay to a firm that makes a specialty of
Indian and cowboy subjects."

Your first care, then, should be to have as complete a knowledge as
possible of what every company is doing, what kinds of stories they
need at the time, where their field-companies are working, and, above
all, what kinds of scripts certain companies positively do _not_ want
at _any_ time. For of course, there are companies with definitely
fixed policies, besides concerns that announce from time to time that
they are unable to use stories of this or that sort.

The most important aids to a thorough knowledge of the photoplay
market are the different moving-picture trade-journals and the
magazines published exclusively for writers.[61] By studying them you
will equip yourself with a first-hand knowledge of what the different
studio editors need, and so be on the right road. Don't take a
gambler's chance by sending out your scripts without knowing precisely
what is a good prospect.

[Footnote 61: See Chapter XIV.]

In almost every one of the foregoing chapters we have raised points
that bear upon the selling of your story as well as affect the
particular part of the script then being discussed. To repeat one
instance, you were advised not only to satisfy yourself that a company
is in the market for society stories, but to look into the nature of
the stock-company producing their plays. If the company you select is
one that features a woman in most of its picture-stories, and yours is
a photoplay with a strong male lead, you would be unwise to submit it
there. True, it might be accepted and one of the studio writers
commissioned to rewrite it in order to give the "fat" part to the
leading woman, but your check would be proportionately smaller to
compensate for the rewriting--you would, in fact, be paid little more
than if you had sold the bare idea.

In submitting your script to a given company, do not address it to
individuals, unless there is a very good reason for so doing--and
there seldom is. Address your letter either to the "Editor, Blank Film
Company," or to the "Manuscript Department." Most useless of all is
the practice of sending to some person who is known to be associated
with a certain company, without knowing just what