What Script Readers Love Most — 5 Key Things

What script readers love can be a very, very long list of things. But here we’ll break down just a few of the biggest.

Unlike paid script coverage services like ours, Screenplay Readers, where we’re paid to read every single word of a client’s submitted script, script readers at studios or agencies might not always do that, especially when they don’t have to.

That’s because their goal is to find good material for their producer or agent boss to develop, which typically means rummaging through an inbox of submitted screenplays, and they’re generally given the leeway to put down a script if they feel right away, within a few pages, that the script is not up to the standards set by their employer.

So what makes a script reader put down a script? Lots of things. But we’re going to focus on what keeps them reading it, or makes them recommend it to their boss and others.

Sure, anybody can grab a screenwriting app and bang out words on a page. But getting a reader to love your screenplay? That’s hard. Hard, but not impossible. So here are a few quick basics that most script readers (or anyone working in Hollywood) want to see in a screenplay that’s landed on their desk or in their inbox:

#5 What script readers love are pretty, easy-to-read screenplay pages

Getting a script reader to love your script is often dependent on making that first good impression. And with a screenplay, just like attraction between humans, sadly, it often comes down to one key factor: good looks. What script readers love is a properly formatted screenplay. That’s the first thing they see: the format. The spelling. The grammar. The look.

When a screenplay doesn’t look good — when it’s rife with typos, spelling glitches, sub-par formatting — it tells the script reader right away that the writer is probably not very good, and suggests that the story they’ve just started to read is probably not very good either. It might not be fair, but the vast majority of screenplays that have been made into movies and series over the years look professional, with relative few exceptions.

Make the effort to ensure your script is professionally presented. And that means that spelling, usage, grammar, format, and punctuation are 100% perfect. Use Grammarly or the spellcheck in Google Docs. Go through every sentence with a fine-toothed comb. Everybody makes mistakes. Mine are always the same: I tend to type “the” instead of “then,” and I’m always dropping commas. Write your screenplay, then let it sit for a few days, then read slowly, word for word. You’ll be surprised at how many mistakes even the most fastidious of us screenwriters make.

#4 What script readers love is a screenplay that makes them laugh or cry

Nothing’s worse than reading a script where you absolutely don’t feel a damn thing from page one through page 120. Not a laugh, not a tear, not a moment of surprise (we’ll talk about that later), nothing. What script readers love is feeling something. Anything. At any time.

Remember the origins of screenwriting. I’m talking the cave-painting days. Storytelling around a fire. Dark on all sides. The caveman audience rapt as the caveman storyteller weaves a tale of that days battle with the fierce saber-toothed tiger. Storytelling is not a vehicle for you to exercise your fingers as you pound on a keyboard. Nor is it a means for you to feel good about yourself by stringing some words together in screenplay format. Storytelling is about the other person. The audience. Making humans feel something. Learn to do that and learn to keep it as your focus.

#3 What script readers love is a screenwriter who has command over her story

Your screenplay, in addition to not scaring people with how it looks, and making people feel something, should also convey to the script reader that you are in absolute command of your story, your language, your execution. From characters to plot to conflict to tension and resolution and beyond: every single page needs to confirm that you are in control. What script readers love is when confidence exudes from your pages that tells them that they can have confidence in you and your story. And that keeps them turning the pages (more about that next).

So take every opportunity to make clear your wit, your craftsmanship, and your care for your audience. Hone your scenes. Hone your structure. Make your setups stronger and your payoffs more worthwhile. Prove to the script reader that you know your craft and they’ll feel they’re in good hands and they’ll be more open to what you’re saying, beat by beat, line by line.

If your confidence and eloquence doesn’t come through on the page, the reader’s eyes are more likely to glaze over. Once that happens, they’ll miss a beat or two, and then when they try to refocus, they’ll be lost, and they’ll blame you. And they won’t be wrong.

#2 What script readers love are scenes that keep them turning pages

When a script reader is feeling confident about the writer, and is feeling something, they keep turning pages. But make it your goal to keep them turning pages at all costs, beyond those categories. What script readers love is when your script is intriguing. Interesting. So be intriguing. Be interesting. Write with controversy, color, vibration. Suck the reader into wanting to know more about your characters and story. Better still, cause them to HAVE to know.

When you’re done formatting your script and making it perfect with regard to punctuation and spelling and grammar, etc., take another day or two off then come back to it and read it and see if YOU feel like turning pages. Every single page needs to entertain, make them feel something, surprise them…

#1 Script readers love to be surprised by a screenplay

Irony, shock, a new emotion, or just plain ole surprise — these are the building blocks of keeping a reader on her toes and interested. Look for ways to turn your scenes on their heads. If it’s a car chase, don’t stick to the tropes: give us some moments out of left field. Turn the car chase paradigm on its head. Have fun with it. Give us something we haven’t seen.

If it’s a break-up scene, take everything you know about break-up scenes and invert it. Shake it up. Make it new.

If a script reader can see where your scene is going, they can certainly tell where your entire screenplay is going, so don’t give them the same-old same-old.

Learn the tropes, then blow them up. With every single line of dialogue and every single scene and every single act in your screenplay.

Do those five things, or I should say live by them, and you’re in a good spot to grow stronger and better as a screenwriter.