A treatment consists of a written condensation of a proposed film or TV dramatic production. It covers the basic ideas and issues of the production as well as the main characters, locations, and story angles.

In part, its purpose is to sell the proposal to financial backers and major stars. Treatments should be attention-getting and interesting to read. They are written in the present tense, and often read like a short story.

Treatments cover the full story sequence. They typically contain some key scenes (script dialogue that is, or will be, in the script).

There is typically one treatment page for every two script pages. Using this rule a treatment for a feature-length (120 page) dramatic production would run about 60 pages. Even so, many treatments are much shorter than this.

In television production a program proposal plays a similar role.

TV Production Index

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