screenplay
Americannoun
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screenplays
plural
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a motion-picture or television scenario.
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Older Use. a motion picture.
noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of screenplay
Explanation
Before a movie can be filmed, a writer has to come up with a screenplay, a written script that describes all the action and every line the actors will speak. How entertaining, thrilling, realistic, or fantastic a movie is depends on many variables, one of the most important being the screenplay. A truly great screenplay includes brilliant dialogue that develops the characters and moves the action forward. TV shows and elaborate video games also require screenplays. Some writers adapt books or older movies into new screenplays, while others come up with entirely original stories for their screenplays.
Vocabulary lists containing screenplay
Academy Awards, List 3
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myPerspectives 7.3
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Introduction to Drama
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Grinstein recalls working on a screenplay with his co-writer and using Claude, Anthropic’s AI assistant, to generate initial drafts for them to edit and refine.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 11, 2026
The Weitz brothers and their co-writer Peter Hedges were nominated for best adapted screenplay at the Academy Awards.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 7, 2026
ER launched in 1994, based on original screenplay written by Crichton.
From BBC ● Nov. 5, 2026
Although the movie was shot entirely in Hindi, the creators wrote an English-language screenplay for the global release.
From Barron's ● Nov. 5, 2026
“I would,” Nora says, “but I want to work on my screenplay before I do my homework. I came up with a good idea for a scene today. During gym, actually.”
From "A Soft Place to Land" by Janae Marks
The biography paints the director’s close collaboration with Robert Riskin, whose screenplays included “It Happened One Night,” “Mr. Deeds Goes to Town” and “Meet John Doe,” in idyllic terms.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 27, 2026
In Hollywood most writers cede control of their screenplays as soon as they sell them.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 26, 2026
Van Zandt has no signs of slowing down anytime soon, as Page Six recently reported that he is working on screenplays “set in the Garden State.”
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 14, 2026
Films like “They Will Kill You” and those in the “Ready or Not” franchise incorporate visual elements of the divine and satanic to distract from their mediocre screenplays and recycled ideas.
From Salon ● May 19, 2026
Unable to get work there, he moved to England, where he wrote screenplays under pseudonyms.
From "Spooked!" by Gail Jarrow
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Get a wordDefinitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
