Great post Scott. Here's my $.02. If you have reps and a fresh spec then the strategy will be laid out by them. You'll be involved, but this is their world and this is why you have them. You'll either divide territories (assuming producers respond to the spec and want to take it in to the studio) or if you have a big fish producer that loves it you might give him/her "the town." As far as attaching a producer early on... this can be good or bad so choose carefully. We just did this and it's been great, simply because the quality of this producer. She is crazy good with story, has a great reputation, loves our project so she's in for the long haul, and (this is key) she is willing to partner. I think you need all of these factors to consider doing this. 1)good with story. A rare quality believe it or not in a producer. Most of them know what they want, but have a very hard time in translation. If you are going to let someone into the process, make sure they have a great pov and can articulate execution specifics. And they need to be flexible since it's your baby. 2)Loves the project. How would you like to spend a year or more developing. Take it out. Get some passes and that producer jumps ship. Wait, let me clarify... they won't detach themselves in the off chance something happens with it, so jumping ship means no longer doing anything with it. Ouch. You want a motivated producer that's like a dog with a bone. They gotta believe. 3)Has a good or great reputation. Important for obvious reasons. 4)Willing/Looking to partner. Okay this is important. The ideal producer to develop with is one that is big enough to have a real rep and serious relationships (with other producers/directors, etc) but not so big they are unwilling to partner in which case all of your eggs are in one basket. The... let's just call this type of producer "boutique"... the boutique producer is smart with story, has the relationships so your getting past thresholds that sometimes your agent/mgr can't get passed, i.e. handing the script directly to Mike De Luca vs. three rungs down the ladder, but your boutique producer doesn't have thirty projects in development so yours is a high priority and doesn't get dumped the second the momentum phases. We're in the final stages of this process right now (script done, director attached, strategizing on partnerships, etc, about to go back out) and the producer we developed with is doing everything we hoped she would. But again, choose wisely.

Terrific comments, Brendan. Whereas the focus of my post was on a spec that is ready to go out, and you speak to that as well, you cover an area common to writers: working with a producer while developing a script. Sometimes this can happen when they propose an idea to you [this assumes they have read and liked your writing, you've had some movies come out or have some in production, you've developed a good reputation, etc]. But what you say is true: A good match with a good producer can be golden. Good luck with your project!

I used to wonder what a producer did, now I think I understand what they do in a lot of cases. Everything. They're the people who make movies happen and they take huge gambles. I don't know how they sleep at night. I imagine they mill through the Grecian 2000 to keep the stray greys at bay. For people who are practical in one sense (they get things done), personal commitment to a project must be paramount (pardon the pun) from the point of the producer and writers. Plus who doesn't want to work with people they like and who get what they're trying to achieve? @ Brendan nice to hear from a writer going through the process right this minute. Enjoying this series Scott, thanks for posting.

TQA, check out the update as it includes a guest article at TheWrap from producer Jon Landau.

and this fog rolls in. It was there one night, and the next night. We asked the locals about it and they said, “Oh, the fog? It’s here from November through February.” We thought, Oh my God, we’ll never finish this movie! I can empathize so much and I'm only putting together a mini short, working with no budget and without a cast of hundreds. I can't imagine the pressure on these guys. I may grow a grey beard yet and I'm a girl.

[...] Thursday, Scott Myers at GITS has rolled out another installment of “The Business of Screenwriting: Everything You Wanted to Know About Specs” series, now up to seven parts. I found “Part 6: Rolling Out a New Writer’s Spec [...]