Use this template for a family drama built on secrets inside one house. Grace Miller hasn't spoken to her father in twenty years. At 2 a.m. on a Tuesday, an ambulance brings him into her ER.
She cuts open his shirt and finds her daughter's school ID photo in his pocket. Then her daughter walks into the ER calling him Grandpa.
Lily has been visiting Walter for a year, and Grace had no idea. That's the engine: three people, two secrets, and an old man who may not live long enough to explain either one.
What viewers expect from a family drama
- Secrets inside the house. Viewers want betrayal close to home: a hidden grandparent, a will, a second family, a paternity question.
- Small rooms, big feelings. Kitchens, hospital hallways, porches. You don't need a ballroom when there's a closed bedroom door.
- A reckoning with the past. Each block of episodes should drag one old event into the light.
- Clichés worth twisting: the evil relative. Walter left, but the reason is messier than abandonment, and Grace played her own part. Let every character be partly right.
Series structure at a glance
Aim for episodes of 60–90 seconds. In family drama, the cliffhanger (the hook at the end of an episode) is often one line of dialogue. Write that line first, then build the episode backward to it.
The table maps each block of episodes. The "Ends on" column is your list of big cliffhangers.
| Block | Episodes | What happens | Ends on |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hook | 1–3 | Walter in the ER; Lily calls him Grandpa | Walter tells Grace he has a month |
| Escalation | 4–9 | Grace bans Lily from seeing him; Lily keeps going anyway | Grace finds a check from Walter paying Lily's tuition |
| Paywall beat | 10 | Walter's lawyer reads a letter: he's leaving the house to Lily, not Grace | "He said you'd sell it." |
| Under one roof | 11–30 | Walter moves in to hospice at home; old rooms, old fights | Grace finds her mother's diary in his things |
| Midpoint reversal | 31–38 | The diary says Grace's mother asked Walter to leave, to protect Grace from something | The "something" is Grace's uncle, still in town |
| Old wounds | 39–55 | Grace confronts the past; Lily learns her mom's story for the first time | The uncle shows up at Walter's door |
| Dark moment | 56–63 | Walter collapses after the confrontation; Grace has to treat her own father | His heart stops |
| Finale | 64–70 | He's revived; the three of them on the porch; the house stays in the family | Lily's voice-over reading the last diary page |
Episode 10 is the paywall beat, where many apps start charging. The will reveal has to make viewers pay to see what Grace does next.
Beat sheet
The beat sheet is the story in order, one moment per line.
- Ep 1 2 a.m. in the ER. Grace recognizes her father on the gurney. Lily arrives.
- Ep 2 Hospital hallway. Lily admits she found him a year ago through an ancestry site.
- Ep 3 Walter wakes up and tells Grace he has a month. She walks out of the room.
- Ep 4–6 Grace forbids the visits. Lily sneaks out anyway. Grace follows her and watches through a window.
- Ep 7–9 A bank envelope. Walter has been paying Lily's private school tuition for a year.
- Ep 10 (paywall beat) The lawyer reads Walter's letter. The house goes to Lily, because "Grace would sell it."
- Ep 11–20 Walter comes home for hospice. Grace is his nurse, because no one else will be.
- Ep 21–30 Old photos, old fights, and a recipe Walter gets wrong on purpose to make Lily laugh.
- Ep 31–38 Her mother's diary. Walter didn't abandon them. He was asked to go, to keep someone away.
- Ep 39–48 That someone was Grace's uncle Roy. Grace remembers things she buried.
- Ep 49–55 Lily hears the whole story for the first time. Roy shows up at the door.
- Ep 56–63 Walter faces Roy and collapses. Grace does CPR on her own father on the kitchen floor.
- Ep 64–70 He survives the night. Three generations sit on the porch. Lily keeps the house, with her mom's name on the deed next to hers.
Sample Episode 1
Screen time is about 1:35. The timestamps in brackets show where each part should fall.
EPISODE 1 - "BAY FOUR"
[0:00–0:03 HOOK]
INT. ST. AGNES HOSPITAL - ER - BAY FOUR - NIGHT
Trauma shears slice up the front of a brown cardigan. GRACE
MILLER (45, navy scrubs, graying bun) peels it back, then
freezes.
GRACE
(barely)
Dad?
[0:03–0:30]
On the gurney: WALTER MILLER (70), oxygen mask, eyes closed. A
PARAMEDIC rattles off vitals. Grace doesn't hear any of it.
PARAMEDIC
Ma'am? Pressure's dropping.
Grace snaps back. Her hands move on autopilot.
GRACE
Two large-bore IVs. Get me a 12-lead.
(to the nurse beside her)
Somebody else chart this.
NURSE DANA
You know him?
GRACE
Used to.
[0:30–1:00]
A NURSE bags Walter's belongings. A small photo slides out of
his breast pocket onto the floor. Grace picks it up.
INSERT - THE PHOTO
A school ID photo. LILY MILLER, 16. Braces. Grace's daughter.
Grace turns it over. On the back, in shaky handwriting:
"Lily - Thursdays."
GRACE
(to herself)
What the hell...
[1:00–1:20]
INT. ER - CORRIDOR - CONTINUOUS
The sliding doors open. LILY (16, oversized hoodie, braces,
headphones around her neck) runs in, out of breath, a backpack
on one shoulder.
LILY
(to the desk clerk)
Walter Miller? Came in by ambulance?
His neighbor texted me--
Grace steps out of Bay Four. Mother and daughter see each
other down the length of the corridor.
[1:20–1:35 CLIFFHANGER]
GRACE
Lily. How do you know that name?
Behind Grace, through the curtain, Walter's eyes open. He
pulls the mask down an inch.
WALTER
(weak, but clear)
Hey, kiddo.
LILY
(past her mother)
Hi, Grandpa.
Grace turns slowly to look at her father.
SMASH CUT TO BLACK.
Adapting it to AI video
Plan on about 13 generations (one generation = one clip the model makes). The hospital is one location with three looks (bay, hallway, desk), so your reference images stay simple.
The hard part is acting. Grace goes from shock to calm nurse in under ten seconds, and AI faces tend to overact. So ask for restraint in your prompts: small movements, a held breath, no big gasps.
Use the table as your shot list. "Try" is the model we'd start with for each shot.
| # | Shot | Length | What happens | Dialogue | Try |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | insert | 3s | Trauma shears cut up a brown cardigan | no | Hailuo |
| 2 | close-up | 3s | Grace freezes: "Dad?" | yes | Veo |
| 3 | medium | 5s | Walter on the gurney, paramedic giving vitals | yes | Kling |
| 4 | close-up | 6s | Grace switches to autopilot, orders the IVs | yes | Seedance |
| 5 | over-the-shoulder | 4s | Dana: "You know him?" / "Used to." | yes | Veo |
| 6 | insert | 3s | Photo slides from the cardigan pocket to the floor | no | Hailuo |
| 7 | insert | 4s | Front and back of the photo | no | Wan |
| 8 | establishing | 3s | ER sliding doors at night, ambulance lights | no | Wan |
| 9 | tracking | 5s | Lily runs in and asks at the desk | yes | Kling |
| 10 | wide | 4s | Mother and daughter see each other down the corridor | no | Kling |
| 11 | close-up | 4s | Walter pulls the mask down: "Hey, kiddo." | yes | Seedance |
| 12 | close-up | 4s | Lily: "Hi, Grandpa." Grace turns | yes | Veo |
Make these reference images first. A reference image is a picture you give the model so it keeps copying the same look.
- Three character sheets where the ages read clearly: Grace at 45, Lily at 16, Walter at 70. Put "graying bun" and "braces" in every prompt for them, because small details carry age.
- Walter's brown cardigan and cane. He'll spend many episodes in bed, so his props are how viewers spot him.
- The ER bay and hallway as two 9:16 images with the same cool fluorescent light. Reuse them for every hospital scene.
- The school ID photo and handwriting as still images. Don't ask a video model for handwriting people can read.
Prompts to start from: Veo family prompts, Seedance family prompts, Kling family prompts.
Related guides: Writing a micro drama script · Storyboarding with AI · Character consistency · How to make an AI micro drama