Also known as description · stage direction
The descriptive prose of a screenplay — what the audience sees and hears, written in present tense. Also called description.
On the page
Action
She crosses to the window and waits.
Strong action is visual and economical: it shows behavior, not essays about feelings. Readers skim action for story momentum; directors and ADs skim it for what must be staged. If a paragraph could only live in a novel's interior monologue, rewrite it as behavior the camera can capture or cut it before a cold read stalls.
Dense blocks are a frequent pass trigger even when the information is good. Break beats into short paragraphs so the eye keeps moving; white space is part of pacing on a screenplay page. One image or move per chunk usually lands harder than a packed paragraph that tries to do five jobs at once.
Sounds the audience hears belong in action lines. Heavy camera direction belongs mainly in shooting drafts or director-driven material. In a spec, write what we see and hear unless the move itself is the story point -- a whip-pan joke, or a reveal that only works as that specific reveal on the page.
Short enough to keep the eye moving -- often one to three lines per beat. Dense blocks slow a read; white space is part of pacing on the page, not empty decoration.
Sounds the audience hears belong in action. Heavy camera direction is usually reserved for shooting drafts -- in a spec, write what we see, not a shot list, unless the move is the story point.
Some writers capitalize key sound effects or first appearances of important props as a production cue. Keep the habit consistent and light; shouting every noun in caps reads like a beginner production memo.
Yes for standard screenplay craft -- we watch events happen now. Past tense slips usually signal novel habits; they slow the read and look nonstandard to professional readers.
