Write, write, write

You may want to write a romantic comedy, then a psychological thriller, then a family drama. If all of those feel right and if you're actually good at writing in those genres, or you just feel like exploring, then go right ahead and have fun! Write to your heart's desire in any world you choose ... but know that, as a fresh writer, you won't exactly increase a producer's faith in you.
   

It's Black, Shane Black, genre writer.

Let's face it - even when you're produced, when you have the successes to back you up, producers will still worry (it's part of their job description). Producers will always feel more comfortable with what they know (or perceive to know), with anything that, in their mind, minimizes their risk. Let's say you're the producer. If Shane Black drops "The Last Boy Scout" on your desk after creating "Lethal Weapon", you'll feel pretty damn comfortable. But if the Shane-ster comes to to you with a cross-country romantic love story that ends with Meg and Tom meeting at the very end on top of the Empire State Building ... you'll worry!

Producers want Shane to do the Shane thing, Nora to do the Nora thing and Charlie K to do his amazing whatever-it-is-he-does thing. That's the producer's comfort factor. We're all creatures of comfort, of course. So it should be easy enough for us to understand producers. Let's assume a producer is looking for a fresh voice, a strong voice - he looks for a brilliant, hungry writer to turn his idea into a thriller screenplay. Do you think he'll pick the writer who's written ten thriller specs or the one who's written one of every genre?

And if you argue that the jack-of-all-trades may be far more brilliant, that his thriller script may be the best by far, that the strength of his writing is clearly superior ... frankly, even then that writer will remain the tough sell - simply because he appears to be all over the place, he appears to be amateurish, he appears to still be searching for his true voice. Appearances matter. When that door opens, when the producer's ready to give you a shot, when the network calls, you want to be sure you look as professional as you possibly can ... identifying yourself as a crack in a particular genre definitely helps.