How much does a screenplay cost

A short film, a feature film and a season of a series are three crafts with the same word in front. The volume changes — ten pages against a hundred against five hundred — but above all the groundwork changes: a series needs a structure that holds for seasons, and that structure is designed before a single line is written.

Writing from an already solid treatment is one job. Starting from a two-line idea is another, and it includes all the building work that in the first case is already done.

That is why it is worth asking for a separate quote for the outline and the treatment: you spend less to find out early whether the story holds up, and you avoid paying for a hundred pages built on a structure that couldn’t stand.

A screenplay isn’t finished at the first draft, and every round of rewriting takes time. Rounds should be agreed beforehand and put in writing: “until you’re happy” isn’t an agreement, it’s a postponed misunderstanding.

Two or three rounds are the norm. Beyond that, the problem is usually no longer the script.

A job that has to fit a tight deadline costs more, because it takes up all of the writer’s time and rules out other work. It isn’t an arbitrary surcharge: it is the price of exclusivity.

This is the item most often left unsaid, and the one that matters most. Being paid to write a text whose ownership stays with the author is one thing; assigning the rights to a production is another.

They belong in the contract together with the fee, not afterwards. In Italy, copyright law on cinematographic works recognises the author of the story and of the screenplay as a co-author of the work: it is a position that can be negotiated, not a formality.

It says what is delivered (which documents, roughly how many pages), when, how many rewrite rounds are included and what happens to the rights. If one of these four is missing, it isn’t a quote: it’s a number.

And it says how payment works: usually in instalments tied to deliveries, not all at the end.