PUTTING THE TWO-ACT ON PAPER
You have selected your theme, chosen your characters, thought out every angle of business, and mapped nearly all of your points, as well as your big laugh-lines: now you are ready to put your two-act on paper. Before "taking your pen in hand," stop for a moment of self-analysis.
You can now determine how likely you are to succeed as a writer of the two-act, by this simple self-examination:
How much of my two-act have I thought out clearly so that it is playing before my very eyes?
If you have thought it all out, so that every bit of business moves before your eyes, as every point rings in your ears, you are very likely to turn out an acceptable two-act—if you have not played a "chooser's" part, and your points are real points.
But do not imagine because you are positive that you have thought everything out beforehand, and now have come to writing it down, that your job of thinking is ended. Not at all; there are a few things still to be thought out, while you are writing.
I. WHERE TO BEGIN
As in the monologue—because your material is made up of points—you may begin nearly anywhere to write your two-act. And like the monologue, you need not have a labored formal introduction.
The Introduction
Still, your introduction is no less comprehensively informing because it has not the air of formality. If your characters by their appearance stamp themselves for what they are, you may trust complete characterization—as you should in writing every form of stage material—to what each character does and says.