MovieMaker’s 15 Submission-Worthy Screenwriting Competitions of 2019, Presented by Coverfly

Humanitas has gravitas. A non-profit organization that has been promoting writers for over 40 years, it has several eminent screenwriting competitions including New Voices.

Humanitas asks that a script challenge us to use our freedom to grow and develop, confront us with our individual responsibility, and examine the consequences of our choices.

For its New Voices program, any genre is accepted as a feature screenplay or a 30- or 60-minute pilot. Up to five winners spend three months developing their script with a mentor before Humanitas sends it to a partnering studio or network executive.

Executive Director Cathleen Young says, “Writers need to write a bunch of bad scripts so they can learn to write good scripts.
If a writer doesn’t have multiple scripts in his or her portfolio, it’s hard for me to take them seriously.”

Young adds that the key thing is writing to the end, not editing as you go along: “Keep writing. Don’t get stuck endlessly rewriting the first act or the first chapter. Tell a story that is true and authentic to you and keep at it until you get it right.”

Writer Daniel Stiepleman breaks on the set of On the Basis of Sex. His screenplay is based on the life of his larger-than-life aunt, Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and won him the Humanitas Prize Drama Feature Film Award in 2019