Reading a screenplay benchmark
A classroom exercise from The PreList

Aim: distinguish a descriptive sample from advice about what a screenplay should do.
Use a script you have permission to study. No account or upload is needed for this exercise.

1. Choose pages or scenes. Read its definition, eligible sample and middle-half range in the study.
2. Count the same quantity in your script using that definition. For pages, include covers and front matter; for scenes, count scene headings. A different draft or counting method can give a different result.
3. Compare the result with the published median and range. Discuss what the comparison can and cannot tell you. Being outside the middle half is not evidence of poor writing.

Discussion: Why are the eligible samples different? Why can a detected speaking-character count differ from a cast list? Why does a produced-film sample not describe all submitted drafts?

Glossary
Median: the middle value after ordering the observations, or the average of the two middle values for an even sample.
Middle half: the interval from the lower quartile to the upper quartile; it describes the central half of this sample.
Eligible n: the number of usable observations for a particular measure.
Genre publication floor: cells below n=20 are withheld. Missing or withheld values are not zero.

The Anatomy of a Produced Screenplay
Published by The PreList

Current published release.
Sample: 428 produced feature screenplays, 2000-2026. Eligible samples vary by measure.

PDF pages: median 117; middle half 106 to 131; eligible n=428.
PDF pages include covers and other front matter.
https://www.theprelist.io/research/screenplay-length

Scenes: median 124; middle half 93 to 162; eligible n=401.
Scenes are detected from screenplay scene headings.
https://www.theprelist.io/research/screenplay-scenes

Dialogue lines per action line: median 1.13; middle half 0.77 to 1.59; eligible n=395.
This compares rendered lines, not words or screen time.
https://www.theprelist.io/research/screenplay-dialogue

Named locations: median 62; middle half 45 to 84; eligible n=401.
Normalised names in scene headings, not a count of filming sites.
https://www.theprelist.io/research/screenplay-locations

Detected speaking characters: median 42; middle half 31 to 54; eligible n=233.
Detected cues include minor speaking parts and can contain extraction errors.
https://www.theprelist.io/research/screenplay-characters

These findings describe this sample. They are not targets, quality scores or predictions of success.
Release: anatomy-of-a-produced-screenplay-2026-09-v5
Evidence: https://www.theprelist.io/research/versions/anatomy-of-a-produced-screenplay-2026-09-v5
Methods and limitations: https://www.theprelist.io/research/methodology
Credit: The PreList. Licensed CC BY 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Screenplay text and third-party imagery are excluded from this licence.
Research enquiries and corrections: enquiries@teamprelist.com