Script formatting

This guide covers how to format your script so that ActOnCue understands who's speaking, when to pause, and how each line should be delivered.

Line types

Every line in your script has a type. You can change a line's type at any time: click on it in the editor to open it for editing, then use the type dropdown shown just below the text (it shows an icon and the current type's name). There are four types you can assign:

1. Act

Marks the start of a major section (for example, Act I). It sits one level above Scene, as a bold section header with no icon in the Contents outline.

This is optional and purely for structure. It won't be read aloud.

2. Scene

Scene lines mark the start of a new scene, and show up in the Contents outline beneath their Act. Write them starting with INT. or EXT.

This is optional and purely for structure. It won't be read aloud.

3. Direction

Direction lines describe what's happening in the scene, action, stage business, anything outside the dialogue itself. They are plain sentences placed between dialogue blocks and are not read aloud. For a short aside tied to a specific line of dialogue instead (like a beat or a mood), see inline directions below.

4. Dialogue

The spoken line. A dialogue line always pairs two things: the text that's said, and the character who says it. Whenever a line is (or becomes) a Dialogue line, a Choose character button appears above it, click it to open the character picker and pick who's speaking or add a new one by typing a name and pressing enter. A dialogue line can't be saved without a character assigned. Once set, click the character's name above the line any time to reassign it. See Adding new lines below for how to create a line in the first place.

While editing a dialogue line, a row of controls sits below the text:

• Audio preview - press Play to hear how the line will sound (generated on demand, then cached); the refresh icon regenerates it
• Voice direction (megaphone icon) - opens Speech instructions (Dramatic voices - describe the mood or context for delivery) or Audio reference (Consistent voices - record yourself to guide the voice's tone and pacing), depending on the assigned voice's type
• Advance - see Choosing how a line advances below
• Pause - set how many seconds this line waits before it plays

To change which voice reads this character (not just this one line, the character's voice throughout the script), click the voice chip next to their name, shown as Choose voice if none is assigned yet, and pick a different one.

For more on speech instructions and audio references, see voices.

Inline directions inside dialogue

Inside a dialogue line's own text, you can add short asides in parentheses without breaking into a separate line, for example (beat) or (to Alex). These render in a muted, italic style and are stripped out entirely before the voice speaks the line, so they're never read aloud.

You can also use square brackets for a speech tag, for example [sighs]. Like parentheticals, the bracketed text itself isn't read aloud.

Adding new lines

Hover over any line to reveal its [⋯] menu (on mobile, this menu is always visible), then choose Add line above or Add line below. This opens a new, empty line for you to type into, with its own type selector and, for a new Dialogue line, a Choose character button.

A newly added line starts empty, an empty line can't be saved, so type its text first (you can also change its type from the default before or after typing). Once it has content, press Enter or click Save.

The same [⋯] menu also lets you duplicate a line or use Turn into to convert it to a different type.

Pauses

You can add pauses between lines to control the pacing of your scene. There are two ways to do this:

Adding a pause to a line

Edit any dialogue line and click its Pause button (in the control row below the text, see Dialogue above) to set how many seconds that line waits before it plays, from 0 to 60. This is useful for adding breathing room, dramatic beats, or time to prepare before your cue.

Choosing how a line advances

By default, ActOnCue uses speech recognition to detect when you've finished speaking and triggers the next line automatically (with a choice of Default, Broad, or Strict detection strictness). But you can switch individual lines to timer-based turns instead.

With timer-based turns, that line waits for a set duration (1-60 seconds) before advancing, regardless of speech recognition. This is useful when:

• Speech recognition struggles with that specific line
• You're rehearsing in a noisy environment
• You want predictable, consistent timing between lines
• You're recording a self tape and need exact pacing

To set this per line, edit the line and click its Advance button (in the same control row as Pause, see Dialogue above). Choose Automatic (and a detection strategy) or Timer (and a duration in seconds), then apply.

This is separate from the Cue lines only setting in the Reader settings, which skips non-cue dialogue for a faster rehearsal but doesn't change how any single line advances.

Example structure

Here's how a cleanly formatted script looks:

Troubleshooting: script issues