The editor of one company suggests that it is best always to put your name and address on each sheet of the manuscript.  This is simply “making assurance doubly sure” that the script will not go astray or become mixed in the editorial office, for winds and dropped manuscripts sometimes play annoying tricks upon editors, it need hardly be said.  But at least write your name and address plainly in the upper left-hand corner of the first sheet of the synopsis; then write it in the same place on the first sheet of the scenario; and, provided you have room—­if the last scene of your scenario does not run clear to the bottom of the page—­also at the bottom of the last page of your scenario.  Then, further, write on every other page the title of your photoplay.  If it is a short title, write it in full.  If it should be a long title, such as “Where Love is, There God is Also,” a Selig release taken from Tolstoy’s story of the same name, simply write “Where Love is, etc.”  That will be ample to identify your work should one of the sheets become separated from the rest of the script.  Thus the editor has your name and address in three different places, and with all or part of your title on the other sheets of the script, there is little danger of any part going astray after it reaches his hands.

The following plan for the actual mechanical preparation of the three or four parts of the script has been approved by editors in general; nevertheless, it is here offered as a suggestion, not laid down as a rule.  To follow it, however, insures your having a neat, readable script, one which will catch the editor’s attention as soon as he opens it.

The scale-bar on most standard typewriters is numbered from 0 (the next figure, of course, being 1) to 75.  Each figure indicates one space.  When writing your name and address on the first page of both synopsis and scenario, set your left marginal stop at 5.  When the paper is pushed as far to the left of the paper-shield as it will go, this will give you a left-hand margin of about 1-3/16 inches—­which is quite wide enough for the margin on a photoplay script.  Write your name and address so that the top line will come about three-quarters of an inch from the top of the sheet, and, keeping it even with the left-hand margin, write the two or three lines of the name and address directly beneath each other, and the other material below, in the manner illustrated on the succeeding type-page.

Frank B. Stanwood, 392 W. 62nd St., New York City.

T H E R A J A H ’ S H E I R

Dramatic Photoplay in 27 Scenes;

6 Interior and 10 Exterior Settings

(Use only one line in Ms.)

S Y N O P S I S

The first sheet of the script being the one on which you commence to write your synopsis, first of all get your title neatly spaced.