More and more I'm reading scripts that sneak exposition into the narrative descriptions rather than the dialogue. Some of this may be forgiven in the case of character introductions, but I see it creeping in other instances more and more. For example, when introducing say "Sally", there's a brief visual description and perhaps something giving the essence of the character, but then it goes into say she's so and so's sister or so and so's best friend. Is this lazy writing, or simply done for the economy of the script as it does convey pertinent information to the reader? My feeling is, it's written and it gives information, but now a director is going to look at this and ask themselves, ok, how am I going to dramatize this observation, especially if the writer hasn't done their part establishing it somewhere else in the story?

TBBB, that is a fair question. The fact is, we can editorialize about characters, especially when they are introduced. But it is something of a slippery slope where we need to remind ourselves, a screenplay is not a novel. How do we know what works and what doesn't? Well, how about some common sense. For example, here is a character introduction: INT. OFFICE - DAY Bob slumped at his desk, hungover in the worst way when -- MITCH (O.S.) Ooh, what have we here? Bob lurches awake as MITCH FURLONG, Bob's boss, waddles in. Mitch's life is one long bad pun. MITCH Lemme guess? This is your impersonation of "Night of the Living Dead." That little bit of business -- Bob's boss -- that speaks to your concern. But (1) because we are in an office, (2) we see Bob's nervous reaction when Mitch enters, and (3) what Mitch says will probably soon make apparent he is Bob's boss, you can probably get away with that description. This on the other hand, a no-no: EXT. CEMETERY - DAY Margaret stands weeping over an open gravesite -- BRENDA (O.S.) I'm so sorry... Margaret sets her eyes on BRENDA, Margaret's former college roommate and recent mistress of Brenda's deceased husband Rick. Brenda smirks -- BRENDA ...for your loss. How would we know any of this? If the information is important, reveal it through dialogue as exposition, but use some tricks of the trade -- revelation, mystery, fascination, humor, conflict or the like -- to make it compelling exposition. Common sense doesn't answer it fully, but it's a good starting point. And again -- here I am, Mr. Broken Record -- this is where reading scripts, written by professionals, can help. The more you read, the more you see how they handle this type of thing, the more you get a sense of the boundaries of what is acceptable.