The first form, a contraction of the word, is widely used to indicate that the same character is speaking after an interrupting bit of scene description. Almost every screenplay you read will have it.

Most screenwriting software will automatically generate the (cont’d), and you should let it. It’s standard, and particularly useful for actors. It’s your choice whether to have it be uppercase; (cont’d) or (CONT’D) are both fine. Pick one and stick to it.¹

A related situation happens when a block of dialogue needs to extend off the bottom of the page. Screenwriting software will offer to put a (more), with a matching (cont’d) on the next page. Let it — though you might also consider tweaking the lines so that the dialogue doesn’t break there.

A second form of continued happens when a scene spans across multiple pages. If a scene continues off the bottom of a page, most screenwriting software will offer to put CONTINUED: at the top left of the next page, next to the scene number.

You don’t need it. Turn it off.

The only time to use these continueds is when you’re headed into production, complete with a shooting schedule and scene numbers. They help reduce confusion when you have colored revision pages. Beyond that, they’re clutter. Get rid of them.

The final form of continued happens in scene headings. Some screenwriters use CONTINUOUS to indicate that action is ongoing despite changes of location:

I’m not a big fan of this use of continuous, because it’s all to easy to forget what time of day it’s supposed to be. In the (rare) cases in which I need to clarify that the action from one scene to the next is continuous, I put it in brackets.

1. You may run into situations in which a character is both speaking and giving voice-over in a scene. Your software might try to flag those voiceovers as continuations of the character’s normal dialogue. Don’t let it.

1. Print it out.

There are mistakes you’re only going to catch on paper. So print it. I like to do two-up (side-by-side) printing to save paper, but your eyes might prefer full size.

Circle mistakes with a colored pen so you’ll see them. In addition to typos, look for any bit of redundant description or needless fluff. You can almost always squeeze a page out of a 120-page script.

2. Make changes all at once.

It’s tempting to fix mistakes as you catch them, but you’re likely to miss things if you’re constantly switching between error detection and error correction. Sit at the computer and go through page by page, fixing each problem you’ve found. As you go, you may spot ways to improve page breaks and other formatting niceties.

3. Fix the title page.

This is the step I often forget, resulting in mis-dated drafts and re-exported .pdfs. If I’m doing multiple versions of a draft — for example, one with starred changes, one without, I’ll make sure the title page indicates this.

4. Save this draft and email it to yourself.

Yes, you should have multiple backup strategies. But the self-addressed email will always work, and can be accessed from wherever you find yourself.

5. Export a .pdf — then check it.

These days, you almost always “hand in” a draft as a .pdf by email. But make sure it actually looks right, complete with title page. If you’re friendly with the assistant on the other end, ask her to check if there’s anything you’re at all worried might print strangely, such as a title page font¹ or starred changes in the right margins.

1. Yes, you can use a font other than Courier for the title page. But I rarely do anymore.

– Michael
Washington D.C.

The image comes from stock.xchng, a photo by Marja Flick-Buijs of the Netherlands. I did the type myself. The face is Myriad.

Because Amazon scales the artwork incredibly small for some views, I fattened the type used on the Kindle version so that it would remain legible.

How on earth do you format something like that in Final Draft? The few screenwriter friends I have are similarly perplexed by this, simple though the answer may be.

– Tim
Brooklyn NY

Pretty much answered here: Formatting text shown on screen. ¹

First off, if you’re doing it “at least three times,” you’re doing it too much. Audiences don’t go to movies to read. Limit yourself to once, and keep it short.

If a character reads the note aloud (either on-screen, or in voice-over), just keep the text in his dialogue block. You may want to italicize it for clarity.

If the audience needs to read it, try using dialogue margins with no character name — if your screenwriting software will allow you. Otherwise, break it into lines roughly the width of a dialogue block and center them. Again, italics may help.

A sharp-eyed reader may prove me wrong, but in 30+ scripts, I don’t think I’ve ever had a block of text the audience needed to read. It’s something you can almost always write around.

1. Folks, try the Answer Finder.

– Adam
Toronto

I answered almost exactly this question back in 2005, and I’m happy to see that my suggestion then is still my best answer: consider italics.

I just think that it would make for a smoother read to NOT have explanations of each word as it comes up in the screenplay.

– Alejandro
Caracas/Los Angeles

My hunch is that you won’t need it. When you need to use the foreign term in action, put the translation in parentheses right after the word. When you’re using a bit of the language without subtitles, it’s still a good idea to provide a parenthetical to help the reader:

Have some English-speakers read your script, and if they’re truly perplexed, a glossary might be in order. If there are five really crucial terms, you could put it at the start of the script, right after the title page. If there are more, a glossary at the end might be better. In any case, keep it to less than a page.

This is a sample of Go, converted from pdf:

(I’ve gotten roughly the same results when sending it in Word format.)

Are you an unemployed coder? A wanna-be web entrepreneur? Are you Nima?

Consider this a call to adventure. I’m envisioning a web service to which you could submit (or email) a screenplay pdf (or text file) and have it sent to your Kindle, nicely formatted. Charge a nickel for it, or just do it for free until Amazon buys you out.

I’m told that if you want readers to know it’s foggy or stormy you tell them as “part of the story” in the action lines below. Yet in many of the spec scripts I’ve seen online, writers use CONTINUOUS, SAME, LATER etc in their slugs. Is it only solicited writers who’ve already been green lighted for production that have the privilege of writing beyond the binary of DAY or NIGHT? I find that hard to believe this when software like Final Draft allows you to be more expressive in your slugs, and still, I’m continually told otherwise.

It would be much appreciated if you could clear up this issue that has confused, infuriated and made me less confident in my writing now for far too long. I’m sure I’m not the only one.

– Tim
Ischia, Italy

Sluglines are there to help production, but they also help readers. If venturing slightly beyond the confines of DAY or NIGHT makes the read easier, do it.

All of the following are legit:

The first two are obvious and standard.

DAWN is okay, as long as there really is a reason the scene needs to be taking place close to sunrise, rather than just general DAY. For example, if you were following characters through a string of harrowing night scenes, and they bunkered down in an abandoned railway car, it might be important to really note when it’s dawn again. Same case for DUSK or SUNSET. In a vampire movie, that could be crucial.

Space has no day or night. Generally in science fiction there is a sense of what “day” and “night” feel like, however. So feel free to use it on a spaceship, for example, to indicate the daily routines.

I use brackets at the end of a slugline to highlight special conditions. Rain is a big deal, both for story and production purposes. And flagging a scene as a flashback helps both readers and assistant directors.

Comic book lettering has some grammatical and aesthetic traditions that are quite unique. What follows is a list that every letterer eventually commits to his/her own mental reference file. The majority of these points are established tradition, sprinkled with modern trends and a bit of my own opinion having lettered professionally for a few years now. The majority of these ideas have been established by Marvel and DC, but opinions vary from editor to editor, even within the same company.

Many of the examples, such as when to use ellipses verus dashes, have parallels in modern screenwriting. But as a former font nerd, I was surprised I never noticed the rule about crossbar I, or the existence of breath marks. They were always there, but when used properly, completely disappear.

(Thanks to Daring Fireball for the link.)

I want to create a scene where this spirit character is talking to two different characters at the same time, but in different places. In other words, the spirit is talking to both Alan in Cleveland and Betsy in Los Angeles, but it occurs at 2:00PM at the same time (ignoring the time zone changes). What would be the most effective way to do that?

– Kevin
Neptune, NJ

You’re confusing what happens inside the world of the movie with what the audience experiences. When we’re watching a movie, or reading a script, we don’t know or care what the clock says — unless you tell us that it is important.

If for story purposes two scenes need to be happening simultaneously, you’ll generally be cutting between them. Max runs up the stairs while Lisa sits down at her desk. Max reaches the fourth floor while Lisa wakes her computer. Max reaches Lisa’s door just as she’s about to open the email message. That’s six short scenes which play together as a sequence.

Alternately, you might sync up time after the fact by replaying a moment or giving some other signal to the audience about a shift in time. GO does this twice, repeating the scene in the break room to let the story fork in different directions. ¹

Split-screen is another possibility, though on the page you’d almost certainly write it as typical cross-cutting.

1. Go also features two sides of a phone conversation separated by half a movie, but it’s not crucial to line up those moments.

– Nic
Essex, England

When you have entire scenes that are animated, you can handle it in the slugline.

If animated characters cross into the real world à la Roger Rabbit, you’ll want to consistently label them as such.

Your goal should always be clarity. You want the reader to follow what you’re doing without dragging down the storytelling.