Until Feb. 16, aspiring directors are encouraged to join this contest which Burnett promises to be the next battleground of filmmaking ideas and challenges to be overcome by 16 finalists from all over the world. At stake is a million–dollar development deal from Dreamworks and, eventually, the chance to be part of the biggest Hollywood productions in the biggest money–making entertainment industry in the world.

Below is an interview of Mark Burnett on the history of "On the Lot," his thoughts on reality TV and its multi-billion conquest of television industry.

MARK BURNETT: "The core concept for this came from a number of meetings with Steven Spielberg, just talking about the industry in general, and the fact that I have some other projects with Dreamworks, and discussing various reality shows, and the search for talent. Add to those conversations the fact that everybody on this phone call right now, all of you experienced journalists, couldn’t tell me categorically how the TV business will look in five years time. No one knows whether you’ll be watching television on the computer or what you’ll be doing. However, everybody on this call could bet that in five years and 10 years time, we’ll all still be going to movie theaters, in a dark room, with 200 other people and watching movies on the big screen.

The movie industry is probably gonna grow barely much unchanged except for the actual content. The distribution system will remain the same. Television we’re not sure what the distribution system will be. Then you add to that fact, all of us, whether we’re professionals or not, think of ourselves as armchair movie critics. We all have opinions about the movies. And therefore, here you take, we all love movies, we all go to the movies, we’ve all grown up on the movies, we all want to be Steven Spielberg—if truth be told—and here’s a chance to watch people as armchair film critics, criticizing or applauding these young filmmakers as they’re making their work each week up on the big screen around the world, and we’re watching. Really, it’s a talent contest of sorts, except for it gives everyone at home the chance to really vote and really be an armchair film critic. "

"Finding talent is the most important thing in terms of film, television, music. And here we have an opportunity to find great talent. I feel that although one person will win and move On the Lot working with Steven Spielberg at Dreamworks, the others who necessarily didn’t win could easily be discovered. In fact, part of the arrangements for putting on this show is to, you know, we have the option to work with any of them. And I feel that we are going to find some exciting young talent."

"We’re still sifting through. Literally, last week alone, over a two-day period, I know over 1,000 films we’re received. Imagine, 1,000 films were received. Just really want to get the word out."

"There’s no quota involved in this. We just can’t do that. We’re looking for the best. The good news is that we’re very open-minded to choosing anybody who is good. And so, I sincerely hope—honestly there are incredible Asian filmmakers, we know that. Not just Ang Lee and John Woo who are famous. There’s Wong Kar Wai from Hong Kong, much less known, obviously. And then, there’s some great Japanese directors currently, Hayao Miyazaki and Takeshi Kitano. These great directors from all over Asia. I’m just really, really hoping we get an opportunity. We can’t put quotas on it. It doesn’t work that way. It’s an art form and, therefore, we treat everybody as artists. I mean, selfishly, for me, I really, really hope there’s a couple of Asian directors because it celebrates the global state of the film industry, which is a global business. And you know the American films now, the foreign box office are obviously far greater and more important than the American box office, which if you go back 15 years, it’s the reverse. In this global economy, we no longer. For example, I believe this year, ‘Pirates of the Caribbean 3’ opens day–on–date around the world, everywhere at the same date. It’s current. Shows you the global nature, and that’s why it’s important as a serious producer of a serious project like this, which will be fun, don’t take it…seriously, we want to celebrate the global nature of our business."

"I’ve known Steven [for] two or three years now. I’ve produced a show called ‘The Contender’ with Dreamworks, with Jeffrey Katzenberg. Steven came to the set from…and therefore technically, I guess, in that show we are partners, in ‘The Contender.’ And I have a couple of other projects with Dreamworks and had gotten to know Steven and now to be finally working with him is incredible. I mean, it’s very easy for me to say I’ve continually been in awe of Steven, and he’s very, very hands-on with this project. We are working together on it every week. It’s a very important project to us. And we feel that we have a very big opportunity here to make something wonderful because so many people want to make films and the tools are so more readily available, technologically, now. It’s a great opportunity and we’re really hoping to give that chance to some people who deserve it."

"No, is the simple answer. If you look at last year, the Academy Awards, with Crash, which had a -million budget, and many movies with over a 0-million budget didn’t get anywhere. And probably one of the favorite movies for this year is Little Miss Sunshine, another very small budget, and the movie The Queen, a very small budget. Of the top 5 nominated movies, I think, this year, only one is a big studio movie."

"Thank you, every one, and remember that the deadline for the application is February 16. And I really, really hope that your words inspire some people to take a risk and represent themselves and send in their movies. They can go to onthelot.com which is the website where you can upload your films."

"Actually, they’ll get half a million dollars... and half a million dollars to buy scripts and hire writers and do the... It’s called a 0,000 discretionary fund plus half a million dollars wages."

"The real challenges are deadlines. Often times, one week it goes from script to shooting to editing and delivery. Very, very fun. Now, many of these filmmakers have previously been in things like 48-hour film contests, 24-hour film contests, one-week... They understand the deadlines because they have to turn things around fast. Only this time, the one big benefit, beyond exposure, is every film will have the ability, or every director will get to utilize a really good crew. So they’ve got a pool of actors, a pool of writers to work from, and equipment. It’s playing in the big leagues. It’s like going from, you know, beg, borrowing, and stealing the use of equipment to really shooting in the Hollywood style, and great fun for these people, you know, living in an environment with other filmmakers who are competition but I’m sure they’ll become friends, and living, eating, and breathing filmmaking. If you wanna be a director, it will afford the most fun they could imagine having."

"I am now actually actively working with writers to produce my first movie. So I’m working right now on some projects and I definitely want to be in the movie industry. I didn’t do this because of that. It’s a coincidence. I’m not sure if you actually know but I also agreed this year to produce the MTV Movie Awards. So three things to add on for me. I’m working on my own film as a producer, the MTV Movie Awards, and On the Lot. So it’s kind of a big film year for me."