Playscripts Digital · School theatre · Early access · July 2026
Director notes, blocking, and cuts — synced to every cast member’s device in seconds. Powered by a Hocuspocus + Yjs CRDT: the same conflict-free real-time sync engine that runs our own yearbook editor in daily school use. Works in any browser on any device — no app to install, no account required for actors. The promptbook UI surface is in active development; the sync substrate underneath it is in production.
How it works
The promptbook is designed around a simple premise: the director annotates once, and every device in the company sees the result. No email threads, no shared-drive confusion, no resent cut pages.
Step 1 · Director
Bring a script in from playscript.software, a Fountain file, or a plain PDF. The director’s workspace lays out the full text with scene-by-scene navigation, so you can move through French scenes and act breaks without thumbing pages. Assign characters, mark your cuts, rough in blocking, and drop rehearsal notes as you prep — the work you do at the kitchen table the week before is the same script the company opens at first read-through.
Step 2 · Cast member
Each role gets a link the actor opens on their own device — phone, tablet, school Chromebook, laptop. No install, no app store, no account for an actor to create and then forget the password to. They land straight on their character, highlighted, with every current director’s note and approved cut already in place: the same script the director is working from, minus the parts that are not theirs to carry.
Step 3 · Director
Cut a page at a note session, re-stage an entrance, add a line note after a run — the change is on every connected device within seconds, not sitting in an email the cast reads (or does not) before the next call. The company is never rehearsing three different versions at once. There is one script, it is the current one, and everyone in the room is holding it.
Step 4 · Stage manager
The stage manager’s book lives in the same place as everyone else’s script — blocking, cues, and line notes in a single promptbook instead of a binder, a cue sheet, and a group chat that disagree with each other. Through tech, the SM calls each standby and GO with one tap while the director tracks timing from their own view. When an actor goes up on a line, whoever is on book is already on the right page — no scramble to work out which version is in front of them.
Features
Every feature is described honestly: Sync engine in production means the underlying system is running in real schools today. In development means the promptbook surface for this feature is being built. We do not claim otherwise.
The director marks a cut, tightens a blocking note, or flips two speeches in the running order — and every cast member’s device catches up within seconds. No group-chat thread, no resent PDFs, no “which version are you using?” five minutes before a run. When an actor loses signal in the wings and rejoins, their script reconciles cleanly instead of stomping on the change that landed while they were dark — and that reconciliation is the genuinely hard part. It is already solved: sync runs on Hocuspocus + Yjs, a conflict-free replicated data type (CRDT) that merges edits from every device without a central referee deciding whose change wins. It is the same engine that runs our own yearbook editor in daily school use, not a prototype stood up for a demo.
Sync engine in production
Each actor opens a link on their own device and lands on their track — their lines highlighted, the cue line before each one in view, and every approved cut and director’s note already applied. Running a scene off-book? One tap hides their own lines so they can test themselves and catch where they have been paraphrasing. There is no “what page are we on”: the reader is always the rehearsal-current script, so nobody quietly memorises a speech that got cut on Tuesday. An understudy or cover can open the same track to study a role without another photocopied stack of sides.
In development
Actors can leave a short voice note on any line — their own reading to learn against, a director’s correction on a piece of pacing, a proper noun they keep mangling. A director can pin an audio note to a cue instead of shouting it across the house mid-run. For minor cast members this is consent-gated: a guardian must give explicit approval before any audio is stored or transmitted, and nothing is recorded without that consent on record. If a guardian declines, the actor simply works without the feature and nothing else about their promptbook changes. Recordings stay inside our own systems and are never shared outside the production.
In development · consent-gated for minor cast members
A working cue sheet for LX, sound, fly, deck, video, and any custom cue type the show needs — sequenced in script order with a standby, then a GO, for each. During a cue-to-cue the stage manager jumps cue to cue without scrolling through three separate PDFs; on a run they call the show from their own device while the director watches the same timing from theirs. It is built into the promptbook, not a separate cue-calling app to alt-tab into when a warning is thirty seconds out.
In development
Sketch blocking straight onto a plain overhead of the set, scene by scene — entrances and exits, crosses, end positions, spike marks. The instant it is set, that staging syncs to every actor’s reader for the scene, so no one burns the top of rehearsal copying the director’s pencil marks into their own script. When a cross gets re-staged on Thursday, the old version does not live on in six different photocopies: there is one drawing of the scene, and it is the current one.
In development
Any role’s pages can switch to large-print or high-contrast on that student’s own device — an 18-point layout for the actor who needs it, without reprinting the script or making the accommodation obvious to the rest of the company. A read-aloud option, for actors who take a script in faster by ear than by eye, is on the roadmap. The settings ride with the actor’s device profile rather than one printed copy, so the accommodation follows the student from the rehearsal room to the wings on opening night.
In development
The substrate
The Hocuspocus + Yjs engine is the real-time collaboration layer that already powers our own yearbook editor — it is in active daily use by real schools, not a demo or a prototype. Yjs uses a CRDT (conflict-free replicated data type) structure: changes from different devices are merged correctly without a central authority deciding which edit wins, and offline changes sync cleanly when a device reconnects. Sub-100 ms latency figures are measured on local school networks; performance over mobile data will vary.
The promptbook surface — the director workspace, the actor reader, the blocking view, the cue list — is what is being built on top of that engine. Those interfaces are in active development as of July 2026. The distinction matters: the hardest part of building a live-sync tool (making the sync actually work, reliably, at scale) is done. The product work that remains is the theatre-specific interface on top of it.
Minors & consent
Most of the students using this tool are minors. The actor voice-note feature — recording a line for pronunciation, pacing, or a director note — requires explicit guardian approval before any audio is stored or transmitted. Specifically: a parent or guardian must grant permission for their minor child before the recording feature is available to that actor. If approval is not on record, the feature is not available to that student; every other part of the promptbook works without it.
Voice recordings are stored inside our own systems. They are not transmitted to third parties, not used to train models, and not shared outside the production. A guardian can revoke permission at any time, and existing recordings for that student are deleted.
Early access · Director invitations
The promptbook is in active development. We do demos that show the current state honestly: what works, what is in build, and what timeline looks realistic for a school production season. There is no pricing commitment and no signup. If it looks right for your programme, we will discuss what early access looks like.
To book: email [email protected].
FAQ
It can, but it does not have to. Many directors will run digital scripts during rehearsal blocks and still hand printed sides to cast for tech week or the run. The tool is built to fit whatever your programme needs — not to force a workflow.
Two honest answers. First, the sync layer is built for exactly this: a device that loses signal keeps working on its own copy and reconciles cleanly when it reconnects, because the CRDT merges what changed on both sides instead of picking a winner. Second, we do not pretend a school’s wifi is guaranteed — for tech week and the run, most stage managers will keep a printed promptbook and printed sides as a paper backup. The tool is designed to sit alongside paper, not to strand you if a router in the booth gives out mid-show. As for load, this is the same collaborative engine that already carries whole schools editing a yearbook at once; one production’s cast is well inside what it handles.
Before a minor cast member can record a voice note inside the app, a parent or guardian must give explicit written approval. No audio is stored or transmitted until that record is on file. If a guardian does not approve, the actor simply cannot use the recording feature — every other part of the promptbook works without it.
The school does. Your scripts, your blocking, your notes, and your cast list belong to your production — we are the tool you keep them in, not the owner of what you put there. Student information is handled under the same privacy posture as the rest of the Stanley Studios suite: minimal data, never sold, never used to train models, and voice recordings by minors kept behind guardian consent. When we open early access we will put the specifics in writing, so your district can read the terms before committing to anything.
That is a design goal, described honestly. Today: any role’s pages can be set to large-print or high-contrast on that student’s own device, without reprinting the script or making the accommodation visible to the rest of the company, and the setting follows their profile from the rehearsal room to the wings. On the roadmap: a read-aloud option for actors who take a script in by ear, and continued work toward screen-reader-friendly markup so the reader is navigable without a mouse. We would rather tell you what is in place now and what is still in build than claim a clean bill on accessibility we have not earned.
Yes. The promptbook runs in any modern browser with no installation and no app store. Chromebooks, Android phones, iPhones, iPads, and laptops all work. Cast members who only have a school Chromebook will see their part the same as cast members on anything else.
The Hocuspocus + Yjs CRDT engine is the same real-time system that already runs our own yearbook editor — it is in daily production use by real schools. The promptbook-specific interface (the actor reader, blocking view, cue list) is what is being built on top of that substrate. We say so plainly because we think it matters to know exactly what is real today and what is coming.
The promptbook surface is in active development as of July 2026. The best way to stay current is to book a demo — we show you exactly where things stand and can discuss what timeline works for your production season.
Yes. Scripts written in playscript.software can be brought directly into the promptbook without file conversion. Productions using plays from the Free School Plays library get attribution pre-populated automatically. The three tools are separate products but built on the same substrate so they pass data cleanly when a production moves from writing to rehearsal to ticketing.
We have not announced pricing. The promptbook is part of the Playscripts Digital early-access programme. Book a demo and we will be straight with you about where the product and the business model are headed.
Part of the Playscript suite
Playscripts Digital is one product in a connected suite. Playscript.software is the stage-play-first writing editor (browser-native, free, designed to surpass the incumbent formatters on stage format, collab, and school forms). Free School Plays is the library of scripts that are free to read, rehearse, and perform — no royalty, no per-performance fee, attribution required. School Box Office is the ticketing and show-management layer. A script written in Playscript.software moves into the promptbook without conversion; a production of a Free School Plays title gets attribution pre-populated. The three are separate products built on one substrate.