Wanna' read along? Here’s a machine-generated transcript you can use. Yes...expect a few mistakes, especially with funky industry terms, interesting names and tagging whoever's talking. If something sounds weird, trust your ears. But...sometimes that really is what we said!
Biagio: Hey, everybody. She’s joke.
Joke: He’s Biagio.
Biagio: We’re married. We make unscripted film and television and want to help you do the same.
Joke: Hopefully by teaming up with us.
Biagio: Well, welcome to episode 64. And yes, I’m once again slacking it, slacking it, being a slacker, being slack. No music, no fancy voice over this week.
Joke: Say we just get to the good stuff.
Biagio: In our last podcast we said, hey, if anybody has any questions, reach out to us, let us know. And Joan Tankersley hit us up on Twitter, which you can also do at Joakim Biagio. And she asked a question about casting agreements. She wanted to know if casting agreements should be put together pre pitch or post pitch. This is actually a really good question. So I think we want to attack this from a few different angles because honestly this is something that you need to think through based on your project. And it’s something that you could end up spending very little time and money on or going broke trying to put together. So, so.
Joke: So this is a great question because it’s not a simple answer. And therefore we can fill a whole podcast with it.
Biagio: Yes we can. Way to go, Joan. All right. So first off I want to start with something that many of you who listen to the podcast know. We always encourage, especially new producers, to base a show, a show pitch on a real person, place or thing, a real person being at the top of the list. Now, that said, there are some shows that don’t need casting agreements. If you were pitching, say what you truly believed was the next survivor or you truly believed was the next American Idol. Oh, and please don’t. But if you if you must, if that was the kind of show you were pitching, you would not go out and put together a bunch of casting agreements with a cast first. Correct?
Joke: Correct. However, we always say that if you do pitch a format, it is good to attach some kind of asset to it, right? So whether it is, let’s say as an American Idol, let’s say you have, you know, the next big or you have Universal Music attached and they’re going to give a big contract to the winner. You want to get that somewhat in writing, right?
Biagio: Or say you had the next Simon Cowell right. Say Simon Cowell said I want to do the show with you.
Joke: Sure. Like then you would have a casting agreement because he would be on camera. I’m talking about even if you even if you have some asset that’s not necessarily on camera but is providing either a prize or, you know, access, you know, let’s say you got the white House, you know, we need it’s good to get something in writing now, I think. And maybe I’m jumping the gun.
Biagio: Probably.
Joke: Well, then I’m going to shut up. Then you keep going.
Biagio: No, no, no, it’s okay, it’s okay. I just I wanted to back up before we get too deep into it, but just saying that some shows need casting agreements in some down. So you would never go out and say, put together a whole cast of Survivor or American Idol. But if you were going to have a host or somebody that was attached, you might want to do a casting agreement with that person. Shows what you would definitely want to consider. Casting agreements would be like follow docs or docu soaps, or if you actually found someone that could be, you know, your Chef Ramsay in your next Kitchen Nightmares, then you would want to do a casting agreement. Now we’re throwing that word around quite liberally. But what is a casting agreement. What do you write down in a casting agreement. Why do you need one joke. Help me out.
Joke: Okay, so we’re using the word casting agreement because that was a term that was that John used. Correct?
Biagio: That’s correct.
Joke: Okay. So what we usually call these are shopping agreements with cast. And so what they entail and the kind of agreements we make with a cast, a shopping agreements. And it pretty much comes down to you agree on a term, what about six months, nine months, a year or longer, but usually never over a year, that they give you the exclusive right to shop the TV show that they would star in or be a part of. Right? So that’s the shopping agreement. And it doesn’t negotiate price. It usually says, you know, depending on the network, you know, the network will probably make a talent deal directly with you and you will do so in good faith. And, you know, not stop the, you know, the the project or stop the project from moving forward. You know, obviously you will get a credit in accordance with the other people that appear on the show and, and, you know, and some legalese, but but it really is an agreement between them and the producer saying that this producer has the exclusive right to shop a TV show with them for the set period of time.
Biagio: Right. So, so what’s really important about that, right, is we’ve talked about many times before in this podcast is that you don’t just pitch an idea. Oh, gosh, you all know by now we don’t want you to just pitch ideas. You pitch a package, right? And part of packaging your show up, one of the biggest parts is coming with talent. So when you have some sort of agreement between you and the talent, it could be a handshake agreement. It could be a really expensive contract you paid lawyers to write up. Either way, it’s you saying, hey, I put together this talent, this is what I’m bringing the show, and this is why I’m valuable. So having some sort of piece of paper between you that says that the talent is allowing you to pitch a show about them is important and it is helpful.
Joke: And the main reason it is helpful is let’s say you pitch us a show about Joey. I’m just making up names now and we don’t know Joey. We haven’t talked to Joey, but you showed us some footage of Joey or a YouTube link of Joey, and you told us a nice story about why Joey’s show would be a great show. And we we agree. We really liked Joey and that’s great. If you can provide us with any kind of proof that you’ve actually talked to Joey, that makes this a way better beginning of a business relationship, right? So if you can say, look, and I have Joey’s, you know, talent agreement or casting agreement or shopping agreement, whatever you want to call it, then then that obviously goes a long way. I think the most important part is one it attaches you to Joey, to the talent. So if you didn’t have any agreement and this is not something we would do, but other companies might be like, oh great. Do you have an agreement with Joey? No. Oh, cool. And then those companies might reach out to Joey directly and sign Joey and cut you out of it. Again, not what we do. Not saying lots of other people do this, but one of the reasons you want to do an agreement is so that you are protected and you are connected to that piece of talent because you’re the one who found them, and you are the one who is shopping them around. That’s why we call them shopping agreements.
Biagio: Yeah, and listen, I don’t want to sound naive or pretend that you’re naive and think that that never happens. It does again. Like you said, it’s not the way we work. And by the way, we’ve had people, pitches, shows where they don’t have a formal casting agreement with their cast, but they but, you know, they have a verbal agreement or they’ve obviously worked together. And that’s fine because we have no interest in taking someone’s talent from them and doing it. We’re looking for partners, you know, from this podcast. We like to work with young aspiring producers. That’s what we’re about. That’s not what everybody is about. So having that extra piece of paper can protect you, especially if you’re pitching somewhere else or in a pitch pit, or for some silly reason, you’ve decided not to pitch to us. Now, that said, aside from tying the talent to you and helping you create a package, there’s another very important part of whatever that casting agreement is or shopping agreement is is it clearly defines for your talent. And Joe touched on this a little bit before what it is you’re asking of them. So a lot of times, you know, someone might not realize it could take a year or longer to go out and pitch a show, to shoot a tape, to do everything. So sometimes you just want to sit down and put that on paper. Everything you talked about, like for instance, say you discovered a great shop, you know, in your local town that you think would make an amazing reality show for Esquire, whatever. So you sit down with them and you say, hey, listen, you know, this is what I’m thinking. I’d like to put together a little tape. We’d like to pitch you to joke and Biagio, you know, or joke productions and see if there’s a show to be had there. Then we’d like to take that show around to different networks and see if anybody would be interesting in picking it up. At that point, a network would probably deal with you directly. This could take a year. Are you cool doing that or are you cool giving me sole permission to try that for this period of time? Those are the things you talk about and you write down on a piece of paper, so there’s no misunderstandings. So in addition to creating a package and showing that you’re valuable, you’re also just excuse me, communicating with your talent. So you guys are literally on the same page. So now joke is a is a lawyer necessary?
Joke: Listen, I’m not going to be the one to tell you don’t get a lawyer for a legal agreement. That would be bad legal advice. However, I think that depending on where you are in your career and and who are you taking it to and all of that stuff, you know, look, Biagio said, we’ve had people come to us with talent where they didn’t necessarily have formal talent agreements, and, you know, we’ll make a deal with them as a producer and then we’ll have the talent signed a shopping agreement straight with us. And sometimes, you know, as Basra said, it’s more of like the producer brings us a piece of talent, and the talent has kind of a napkin, you know, deal with them where, you know, our lawyers are like, well, that talent agreement will hold. So, you know, we’ll say, okay, you sign us, you sign with us as a producer agreement. And part of your producer agreement is that you get your talent to sign a proper talent agreement, talent shopping agreement. And then, you know, we get you that, that information. So again, it’s not there’s no I wouldn’t necessarily go spend a ton of money on trying to get talent agreements. They’re really more one to solidify the relationship you have with the talent, so that if a third party producer were to contact the talent directly, that the town is going to be like, wait, wait, wait, you know, I already have a producer and you should talk to that person and vice versa. You know, so I think it’s just, you know, it’s sure. Get a lawyer if you can afford it. If you have a standard talent agreement, you can find somewhere. You know, again, the main thing that is in there is that the talent agrees to give you a window of time where you are the one person exclusively allowed to shop them for a TV show.
Biagio: Also, just use common sense. Is is your talent your parents because they own the wackiest shop in town, you know, is it somebody? Is it a family member?
Unidentified Voice: Do they like you? Do they like you? Don’t get a lawyer.
Biagio: I mean, just, you know, it’s again, on every show, you have to decide on every idea. You have to decide how many resources you’re going to put into it and risk versus reward. So I think that ultimately, you know, putting together a formal casting agreement, I think deciding on that level of formality really depends on your level of comfort and trust you. You have with your talent. And I would say the bigger and more elusive the talent and the less you know them, the more important. A formal casting agreement or shopping agreement is.
Joke: And that’s again going back to, you know, if we talked about a big asset, if it’s a big corporation or a big access or something, you want to make sure that the person telling you you have the access is the person actually legally allowed to give you access, right? So let’s say if it’s the white House and, you know, you know, someone who works the gate there and they’re like, yeah, totally. You could 100% come and film here. Yeah. Get that in writing, because that person probably does not have the right to give you that access. So, you know, it’s just like Vijay says, it’s common sense and and the idea of agreements, of all agreements is to have a better understanding of the business relationship that you’re forming. So as long as you and your talent are on the same page, that’s the most important thing.
Biagio: So coming back to Jones original question, you know, casting agreement pre or post pitch, you know, in general have some kind of agreement before you pitch your show, whether that’s a handshake or a verbal agreement or you’ve gone through the trouble to, you know, hire a lawyer and do something more formal, make sure everyone’s on the same page before you pitch your show. The flip side of this, as Joe alluded to earlier and I will link to I’m going to link to a lot of other podcast episodes from the show notes, and this one which you’ll be able to find out producing unscripted 064. But another big thing to keep in mind is you cannot pitch what you don’t have. And like Joe alluded to earlier, a lot of times we’ll get pitches and we’ll be like, wow, this is great. A wait a minute, you don’t actually know Obama. You’re just pitching a show at the white House or oh, wait a minute, you don’t actually know this rock star you just pitched us. You’re just sending us YouTube videos. Like having that.
Joke: Sometimes it’s not even anybody famous. I mean, listen, I could be frank. Nobody’s really pushing us white House shows anymore, so that’s good.
Unidentified Voice: That is good.
Joke: But, you know, sometimes we’ll get these links to YouTube videos and we’re like, oh, this person would make for a great show. Sure. Possibly. Do you know them? No. Have you reached out to them? No. Okay. Well, they might be in a deal with another producer already, you know. So so you should at the very least have the conversations with the people you’re pitching to make sure that one, they are available to be pitched to, that they’re even interested and want to be pitched in. Three, that you’re the person they want out there pitching them. So you have to get those ducks in a row before you go and pitch somebody what are or not. At that point, you feel the need to have a full legal document, or whether you feel you have a good enough relationship with this person and everyone’s on the same page, and, you know, you can write a couple emails back and forth confirming that you know you’re going to work together. You know that I’m leaving up to you.
Biagio: Yeah. So to wrap up again, I’m just going to start with Jones question and recap a couple of things. Casting agreements pre or post pitch. You want to have some sort of agreement before you pitch number one to protect yourself. Number two, so that you and the talent are on the same page about what it is exactly you’re doing together. And number three, to prove to people like us that you actually know the people you’re pitching. So there you go. If you have a question, by the way, that you would like us to answer on this podcast, we are now 64 episodes in and we’d love to, like we did today for Joan, you know, answer your specific questions. You can hit us up on Twitter at Joke and Biagio, that’s joke A and Biagio. Or you can head over to Producing unscripted and find the contact form, which at the moment isn’t super easy to find, but but you can find it if you if you spend a minute or.
Unidentified Voice: So.
Biagio: It’s in, it’s in the menu. It’s under the about menu somewhere in there. So probably the easiest. Just ask on Twitter. Boy. Yeah. Can you tell that I’ve just been busy with other things?
Unidentified Voice: Well.
Joke: What if they don’t even. What if they don’t tweet like, I mean, you know what’s what.
Biagio: Well just go to producing unscripted.
Unidentified Voice: Com.
Biagio: Hey, I’m looking right now if you go to if you go to producing unscripted com and then you go over to underneath about then the third dropdown says contact. So that’s not hard to find.
Joke: You click that.
Biagio: When you click on contact you get a nice little form that says whatever you do, don’t put your shows here because that’s not how this works. But you could just fill out a little form and it’ll send us a nice email and just make the make the subject of your form something like podcast question or question for the podcast or something. So we know what it is you’re asking and that’s it. See like so easy. Of course if you’re new to the podcast, as you know, I joke and myself, we make television shows for a living, we podcast as a hobby, and the reason that we do it is we enjoy finding young, aspiring producers who have no idea how to break into the unscripted television business, just like us oh, so many years ago. Remember that jokey when we were young and I was skinny?
Unidentified Voice: It was a.
Biagio: Long time ago. Joke is still skinny, for the record, and I’m working my way back. I can.
Unidentified Voice: Put you back on the round the noodles diet if that’s what it’s going to take.
Biagio: I don’t think the ramen noodles diet necessarily lends itself to weight loss, but anyways.
Unidentified Voice: It is when.
Joke: You’re when you’re only.
Unidentified Voice: Eating three packets a day.
Biagio: That’s true, that’s true. But anyways, my point being that, you know, we do accept pitches as long as you pitch through our portal. Really easy to find out how to pitch to us. Just Google how to pitch a reality show. Our and our our free ebook pops up number one and Google. You can also head on over to producing unscripted 030, which is just one giant cheat sheet on how to pitch shows to us. In a nutshell, it involves signing up for the newsletter and following the directions, and you’d be amazed how many people can’t follow those simple directions, but not you, because you’ve listened to the podcast and you’ve clearly proven you are among those who would like to work in the unscripted television industry. So we’ll be back in two weeks. Maybe there’ll be music and voiceover next time. Maybe not.
Joke: Wait, isn’t two weeks from now like Thanksgiving weekend?
Biagio: If two weeks from now is States giving weekend, then we’ll be back in four weeks. You’ll just have to stay tuned in to see you never know. But normally we do episodes every two weeks. The holidays can disrupt things, so if we miss an episode, we’ll be back two weeks later. Regardless, we look forward to hearing from you. If you are interested in breaking unscripted television, we do hope you’ll sign up for our newsletter. Follow the directions and you know and pitch us some concepts, some packages, not just ideas. And you can learn all about that by reading our free e-book, How to Pitch a Reality Show. So that’s it. I’m done talking joke. Any any parting words of wisdom?
Joke: Know you guys have a great day week evening? I’m not sure when you’re listening to this, but I hope you’re enjoying your life.
Unidentified Voice: Hope you enjoy it. Thanks, Joe Tankersley.
Biagio: For answering the question this week.
Unidentified Voice: And by by everybody. Bye bye.
