I was formatting my screenplay, and I wondered how to specify that the speaker changes who they are addressing. I figured it would simply be stated in a parenthetical:
DUIRE
What? I'm not Dracula Why would
you say that? Do I look two-
thousand years old?
(to Ornan)
Do I?
Is this the right way of proceeding? Also, is it common to specify the person addressed or is there some other usual way of doing so?
What you have seems to be the common way to do it: a slight indent and then "to addressee" in parentheses. There may be other details there too, like "(to camera, in French)". That's what I'm seeing for scripts on The Internet Movie Script Database (IMSDb).
Looking at Thor Ragnarok:
THOR
Sure.
(to Loki:)
Start figuring out where he is.
In Joker:
SOPHIE
Jesus. Don't do that, GiGi! How many times have I told you that?
(to Joker)
This building is so awful, isn't it?
I looked at a few more scripts beyond that, and none of them had anything more than minor variations on this (e.g. some had the text in parentheses was in all caps and centered, underneath the name of the character).
This way I do it.
Mike turn toward John: "Do You think I am that stupid.?"
He raise a hand, to stop John from answer.
Mike then turns back to Ida: "Are You with John.?"
I do it this way, because I get lost in longer dialogues. This way I help the reader to know, who is speaking and to whom.
