You are more than just your title.
Have you ever heard that saying? It’s a nice sentiment, right? Now, let’s apply it to screenwriting:
Your title page is more than just your screenplay’s title.
That’s better! While the cover page of a script does include a title, there’s a whole slew of other details and formatting technicalities to consider. Let’s dig in.
How do you format a screenplay title page?
There’s a place for everything on a title page and everything should be in its place.
Title and author:
A screenplay’s title and author name go smack-bang in the (horizontal) center of the page. This information should start around 1/3 down the page to give space to other details.
You want your screenplay’s name to be capitalized and stacked on top of yours, with a written by or by sandwiched between a few line breaks. This will ensure there’s no confusion as to who’s written this masterpiece. Your author name might be your real name, or if you need to be anonymous – if you’re posting on a public forum for example – it could be your stage name, your pseudonym, your Reddit handle. Heck, maybe you don’t want your name on there at all. This is also fine, though you’d have to be really sure that you don’t want people to find you!
Contact details
Contact details go in the bottom-left corner of the page and are left-aligned. If you’re showing people your script, entering it into competitions or trying to get it produced, this information is crucial. Without it, you won’t be able to get the call from the major production studio that wants to buy your script for millions of dollars. Better keep that mobile number updated!
Any piece of contact information you put here is optional. It can include your full name, email address, home address, phone number, agent details, mail pigeon tracking number – whatever you want. An email address is generally more than enough as a direct line of contact, though.
Contact details
Did you have a writing partner on your project? If so, their name should be right next to yours, separated by an ampersand (&). If another writer joined the project after you, on the other hand, their name would be separated from yours by the word and.
Is your screenplay an adaptation of another work? You can go ahead and pop in a based on credit. Alternatively, if another writer came up with a story that you’ve now been hired to write, that’s is a story by credit.
The copyright symbol
Let’s talk about this for a second. It isn’t necessary to include this symbol, as copyright is automatic in most countries as per the Berne Convention. But if you want to make it extra obvious that you are the copyright holder of your screenplay, you can go ahead and put that fancy little C before your name in the contact details section.
Images and fonts
A different font for the title or a certain image may convey genre or tone. A lot of writers – auteurs and amateurs alike – do graphic title pages really well. But taste is subjective in this way; what you think looks great look silly to someone else. If you believe a certain image on your title page might make your reader roll their eyes, it’s not worth it. And hey, there’s nothing wrong with being plain, anyway!
In WriterDuet, you can easily create industry-standard title pages or upload one you’ve made on a different app. We’ll even let you put an image on it – as long as you promise to make it tasteful!
You can see the steps to create a title page at our Knowledgebase article here.
The best and easiest way to learn about how to format a title page – like everything with screenwriting – is to see. Here are some examples of title pages, all which follow the industry standard:
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