This document outlines a beat sheet template for planning a story or performance. It includes sections for the title, logline describing the protagonist's desire and goal, details about the protagonist, desire, goal, and necessity. The bulk of the template is dedicated to planning the act structure, with each act broken down into sequences and prompts to describe the sequence synopsis, movement quality, visual ideas, and genre. The performance will be composed of 3 acts broken down into sequences, scenes, and shots or beats to visualize the narrative structure.

1. Beat Sheet
Story/performance title:
Log line/ initial idea in 2 sentences:
“Someone (protagonist) wants (desire) something (goal) badly (necessity) and
is having difficulties getting it.” OR: “Someone badly wants to get away from
something but is having difficulties escaping.”
Protagonist: Who is the main character and how does he naturally move?
Desire: What is he looking for? Which movement quality is he looking for?
Goal: What should be the result of his actions? Which movement quality
corresponds with his goal?
Necessity: Why is it so important that he achieves his goal? Which movement
quality corresponds with the reasons?

2. Act Sequence
Title
Sequence synopsis Movement quality Visual ideas
1
E
X
P
O
S
I
T
I
O
N
1 (±1min)
Inciting
incident
2 (±1min)
2
C
O
N
F
R
O
N
T
A
T
I
O
N
3 (±1min)
4 (±1min)

3. Genre (underline your chosen genre/s):
action, adventure, comed, crime, documentary, drama, family, fantasy, horror,
mystery, romance, science fiction, sport, thriller, war, western
Key words:
Your performance will be composed of 3 acts; each act includes 2 - 4
sequences; sequences can be subdivided into scenes or e.g. movement
phrases; and scenes are built out of shots (e.g. dance moves if one is thinking
visually) or beats (if one is thinking in narrative or musical terms).
5 (±1min)
6 (±1min)
3
R
E
S
O
L
U
T
I
O
N
7 (±1min)
8 (±1min)