John August

Formatting

Teenage girls and gay men

Formatting, QandA

questionmarkI have a quick question in regard to my current screenplay. I have a scene set at a concert and it contains the line:

  • The enthusiastic AUDIENCE is made up mostly of teenage girls and gay men.

Should I just capitalize “audience” (as I have at the moment) or should I also capitalize “teenage girls” and “gay men”? Or should I keep audience in lowercase and just capitalize teenage girls and gay men?

— Mason Fox
Long Island, NY

While it’s certainly not a make-or-break decision, I vote for your third option:

The enthusiastic audience is made up mostly of TEENAGE GIRLS and GAY MEN.

The reason screenplays capitalize groups of extras is to help the assistant director and casting coordinators figure out what types of people they’ll need for a given scene. In this case, you need TEENAGE GIRLS and GAY MEN.

In general, if I break a bigger group down into specific categories, I only capitalize the categories. But I’m sure that if you read through other scripts I’ve written, you’ll see counter-examples.

How to include abstract images

Formatting, QandA

questionmarkThere is one element that I have to include, as it is integral to the script. It is a recurring image of a curved line that reveals itself as a circle to the background of a high speed train.

How can I format this properly as there is no scene heading for it?

— John C.
via [IMDb](http://indie.imdb.com/Indie/Ask/)

Beginning screenwriters often get too nervous about formatting, scared that one missing scene header will make their scripts un-filmable. Or worse, un-commercial.

Get over it. If you need to write your curved train tracks, just write ’em. Images like this don’t need their own scene headers; just treat them as stand-alone sluglines, or little mini-scenes.

A CURVED LINE

slowly moves across the screen. We’re looking at something from a very high angle, but it’s not clear what.

TRANSITION TO:

EXT. SOMEWHERE ELSE

And a scene happens.

Later in the script, when you need to finally reveal what this image actually is, you might try something like this:

THE SAME CURVED LINE

stretches across the screen. Now, a high-speed train enters from the bottom of the frame, running along the arc — actually the tracks of the French TGV.

We RUSH IN closer, feeling the energy of the train as it races through mustard-yellow fields. We drop alongside the fourth car, looking in through the window to find Charlotte asleep, her head tilted against the glass.

Printing words on-screen

Formatting, QandA

questionmarkWhen you want a title to appear on the screen (i.e. “Two days later” or “September 1987”) how do you write it exactly?

— A. B.
via [IMDb](http://indie.imdb.com/Indie/Ask/)

Printing words on screen works much just the way you’d think. You write TITLE OVER, like this:

INT. JOHNSON FARM – DAY

Robin pulls open the curtains, so tattered they begin to rip from the rod. Bright light floods into the dusty room.

TITLE OVER:

21 HOURS AFTER ABDUCTION

With a trained eye, she surveys the dank livingroom. Her attention focuses on a chest of drawers, which has been pulled out slightly from the wall.

Note that many times, you simply want to provide clarifying information to the reader, and have no intention of showing an on-screen title. In these cases, it’s completely acceptable to append the info to the end of a scene header.

EXT. POLISH GETTO – DAY [1945]

INT. MARGE’S KITCHEN – NIGHT [WINTER]

EXT. CENTRAL PARK – [THE NEXT] DAY

Of course, only append this bracketed information if it really is crucial to helping the reader understand the scene — for instance, if your story moves back and forth between two timelines. Otherwise, you’re just adding clutter.

Intercutting

Formatting, QandA

questionmarkFollowing up on an [earlier question](http://johnaugust.com/archives/2004/avoid-cut-tos-in-a-busy-sequence#comments): Maybe I’m foolish for asking this.

For location changes I have been using scene headings, so that in a phone conversation I will have:

INT. MARIA’S KITCHEN – NIGHT

Maria paces the room, phone glued to her ear.

MARIA

I can’t believe you’d do that!

INT. SEAN’S KITCHEN – NIGHT

SEAN

Do what?

INT. MARIA’S KITCHEN – NIGHT

MARIA

That!

Is it correct to assume that by using slug lines, I could avoid the scene headings? If I were to do it that way, would I use a slug line that is essentially identical to my scene headings but without the “INT.”? or “EXT.”?

— Brock

This type of scene happens all the time. Think about [24](http://imdb.com/title/tt0285331/combined). If you put in a new slugline every time you changed speakers on a phone call, the script would be 180 pages.

Behold, the magic that is “INTERCUT.” Instead of your second “INT. MARIA’S KITCHEN”, just have a slug that says INTERCUT or INTERCUT MARIA / SEAN. Then you don’t have to keep doing the location sluglines. They’re really in one scene, even though it’s split between two places. It’s much easier for the reader to follow.

Your scene would end up looking like this:

INT. MARIA’S KITCHEN – NIGHT

Maria paces the room, phone glued to her ear.

MARIA

I can’t believe you’d do that!

INT. SEAN’S KITCHEN – NIGHT

SEAN

Do what?

INTERCUT MARIA/SEAN

MARIA

Mention my genital warts at a cocktail party!

SEAN

The guy was a doctor!

MARIA

He was a Ph. D! In philosophy!

SEAN

Rhetoric, actually.

MARIA

What’s the difference!

SEAN

There’s overlap, but rhetoric is a pretty narrow specialty.

Maria SLAMS DOWN the phone. We stay on her side of the scene. A beat, then she lets loose with a long-delayed, primal SCREAM.

The dog looks up at her with big, droopy eyes.

CUT TO:

EXT. SOMEWHERE ELSE – DAY

Next scene…