After being introduced by Coverfly, Alessandro Guarino signed an option agreement for his feature METASTASIS with an acclaimed horror director, then signed with two literary agents in Canada, as well as one US-based literary manager.
We caught up with Alessandro to talk about his unique triple success story.
Early Roadblocks
The overwhelming quantity of festivals active now and their entry fees. That can surely be the first gap to surpass, and you need to be cunning and realistic.
There are so many possibilities out there, but you need firstly to understand who you are as a writer, and what type of audience you’re trying to conquer with your stories. The answer is not granted and it’s a journey aside, but this helped me to make the right decisions on what competitions I thought would be more interested in my voice and stories.
Breaking Through
When Travis Stevens approached me to option my feature film, METASTASIS, I started to see the first sprouts. Subsequently, always thanks to Coverfly, I met with Kulbinder Saran Caldwell and Charanpreet Chall from RealLIFE Pictures, and Seth Nagel from 5X Management, gaining representation in both Canada and US.
The most important thing for me was seeing this fire burning in each of them, as strong as it was burning in me. The desire to get back on moving, to create art, to tell stories, to share our experiences, to soften this chaotic moment around us to heal together.
"Trying to focus during a pandemic has not been an easy task, for anyone really. In this surrounding chaos, one of the few things I had the power to control was my writing skill. I decided to use this uncertain times to build certainties."
How Did Coverfly Help?
Coverfly helped me in filtering up these competitions without having to dig one after another. The platform is just so intuitive and has already some of the best competitions out there, connected to a point system that, with each success, creates the solid base to break in the industry.
Let me say, though, that the real core are the people behind it, the way they support writers and do everything they can to build a human relationship to connect you to the right fit... and it’s completely free!
What's Next?
I’m writing my 4th feature film and hopefully it will push some boundaries here and there. There’s just so much that I want to talk about, and I will.
Unfortunately, the real horror is outside our door, those episodes of racism and hate against the communities is scarier than any horror movie! I have to write, I want to write, because it’s a great way to exorcise those feelings.
