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Lookhu Adapt is the clearest purpose-built option currently identified for turning eligible public-domain books into screenplays. Its published workflow runs from source material and story development through characters, scenes, screenplay drafting, production prompts, and release preparation. The listed U.S. plans are Free, Creator at $9.99 per month, and Studio at $29.99 per month; AI video generation uses separately purchased metered credits.
That makes it a sensible starting point, not proof that it produces the best script. No independent side-by-side quality test or evidence of reliable full-length-novel handling is established here. Treat the tool as an adaptation assistant: verify the source edition’s rights, make the important creative decisions yourself, check continuity scene by scene, and confirm the plan’s commercial-use and export terms before committing to a production.
What the best AI book-to-script tool must do
Adapting a novel is more than asking an AI system to summarize chapters. A usable screenplay workflow has to preserve the source’s dramatic spine while changing prose into visual action, dialogue, scenes, and production-ready structure. It also has to handle a long source without losing names, motivations, chronology, or setup-and-payoff details.
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- Long-document input: Can the service ingest the complete eligible text, or must you split it into chapters and maintain your own index?
- Source grounding: Can you point to a passage or chapter when correcting a hallucinated event, altered relationship, or invented quotation?
- Continuity control: Are character facts, locations, timelines, objects, and unresolved plot threads stored and reused across scenes?
- Scene-level direction: Can you set a scene objective, conflict, point of view, tone, length, rating, and required story beats before generation?
- Screenplay formatting: Does the output distinguish slug lines, action, character cues, dialogue, parentheticals, transitions, and revision notes in a format you can export and edit?
- Revision workflow: Can you rewrite one scene without unintentionally changing established facts elsewhere?
- Production handoff: Are there shot, location, casting, storyboard, or other production prompts, and are they included in the subscription or metered separately?
- Rights and retention: Who may use the generated material commercially, how is your source stored, and can you delete projects?
- Total cost: Include subscription fees, usage credits, extra seats, storage, export charges, and any costs for a separate screenwriting editor or legal review.
A tool that produces attractive paragraphs but cannot keep a 90-page story consistent is not a good adaptation tool. Conversely, a service with fewer creative flourishes may be more valuable if it lets you audit every scene against the source.
Current shortlist and pricing
Only one directly matched product with sufficiently clear official feature and price information is established for this comparison. It is therefore a transparent shortlist rather than a definitive ranking of the entire AI market.
| Candidate | Published fit | U.S. price checked October 25, 2026 | Important boundaries |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lookhu Adapt | Eligible public-domain classics; story, characters, scenes, screenplay, production prompts, and release workflow | Free; Creator $9.99/month; Studio $29.99/month | Free allows one active project and basic screenplay development. Creator adds the full workflow and commercial-use rights for eligible Adapt output. Studio includes five seats; additional seats are listed at $5/month. AI video generation is a separate metered-credit purchase. |
Prices and feature boundaries can change, so confirm the live plan page before paying. The published description establishes what Lookhu says the product does; it does not establish comparative script quality, performance on an entire full-length novel, or independent review results.
Why Lookhu Adapt is the closest fit
Lookhu Adapt is designed around the exact sequence an adapter needs: start with eligible public-domain material, develop the story and characters, plan scenes, generate a screenplay, and prepare production and distribution materials. That integrated path is more directly relevant than a generic chatbot that only supplies text in response to prompts.
Free plan
The Free plan lists one active project and basic screenplay development. It is useful for learning the interface or testing a short excerpt, but the listed limits make it a poor assumption for managing several books or a large adaptation slate. The plan should not be treated as including commercial rights unless the current terms explicitly say so.
Creator plan
Creator is listed at $9.99 per month. It adds the full workflow and commercial-use rights for eligible Adapt output. “Commercial use” applies within the product’s eligibility and terms; it does not make an uncleared source legal, transfer rights in a third-party translation, or guarantee that every AI-generated line is copyright-protected.
Studio plan
Studio is listed at $29.99 per month and includes five seats. Additional seats are listed at $5 per month. This tier is the practical choice when a writer, director, producer, and script editor need shared access, provided the current collaboration and permission settings meet your needs.
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Video credits are separate
AI video generation is sold through separately purchased metered credits. A screenplay subscription is therefore not a complete video-production budget. Price the credits only after you know how many shots, revisions, and resolution changes your project requires.
A rights-first workflow for adapting a public-domain book
Public-domain status belongs to a particular work, edition, country, and publication history. Complete these checks before uploading text or asking an AI system to generate scenes.
1. Identify the exact source edition
- Record the author’s name, title, original publication date, publisher, country, and language.
- Record the edition you actually plan to use, including translator, editor, annotator, introduction, footnotes, illustrations, maps, cover art, and any modernization of spelling or punctuation.
- Save a copy of the edition’s rights notice and the page or catalog record where it was obtained.
A novel may be public domain while a later translation, edited text, notes, illustrations, or cover remains protected. The Library of Congress warns that the presence of an item online does not by itself grant reuse permission: “Just because we’ve put a work online doesn’t mean that you can freely reuse it.” Check the item’s specific Rights and Access or Rights Advisory statement, and remember that library records can be incomplete or inaccurate.
2. Apply the U.S. cutoff carefully
For U.S. works, the Copyright Office currently identifies works published in the United States before January 1, 1931, as public domain because copyright has expired. That is a U.S.-specific rule, not a worldwide cutoff. Publication history, renewals, later editions, foreign origin, and local law can change the result. If the source was first published elsewhere or has an unusual history, obtain jurisdiction-specific advice before commercial release.
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Copyright gives the owner the exclusive right to authorize derivative works, subject to statutory limitations. A screenplay that recasts a protected novel can therefore require permission even when the adapter writes every sentence. Public-domain status for the underlying original does not automatically clear a modern translation or an illustrator’s work.
4. Build a clean source package
Give the AI system the text you are entitled to use, divided into labeled chapters or sections. Keep a human-readable source index with chapter numbers, major events, characters, settings, dates, and quotations you intend to retain. Do not silently combine multiple editions; note every substitution so you can later explain which wording came from which source.
Step-by-step: turning the source into a screenplay
Step 1: Define the adaptation brief
Write a one-page brief before generating prose. State the intended format (feature, pilot, short film, or series episode), target audience and rating, approximate running time, language, period, tone, point of view, and what must remain faithful. Identify what may be condensed, rearranged, combined, or newly dramatized. This brief becomes the stable instruction set for every later pass.
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Step 2: Create a story map before scenes
Ask for a chapter-by-chapter map containing the protagonist’s goal, opposition, turning points, revelations, consequences, and unresolved threads. Require chapter references for each event. Review this map yourself; correcting structure here is cheaper than repairing a screenplay after dozens of dependent scenes have been generated.
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Step 3: Lock character and world facts
Maintain a continuity sheet with each character’s age or life stage, relationships, physical description, speech patterns, wants, fears, secrets, knowledge at each point in the story, and change over time. Add locations, period details, recurring objects, rules of the setting, and the chronology of travel or communications. Tell the system to flag conflicts instead of inventing a resolution.
Step 4: Convert prose into visual beats
For each chapter, select only the moments that can carry the film’s dramatic load. Convert internal narration into observable behavior, dialogue, images, or a deliberate voice-over decision. Mark exposition that can be removed, combined, or moved. Keep a “cut, combine, preserve” log so changes remain intentional rather than accidental.
Step 5: Generate a scene outline
Before requesting polished pages, ask for a numbered scene list. Each entry should include an interior or exterior slug line, location and time, characters present, scene objective, conflict, turning point, information revealed, and exit image. Require the source chapter or passage that supports the scene. Reject scenes that have no objective, conflict, or consequence.
Step 6: Draft in screenplay form
Generate a small batch of scenes at a time. Specify standard screenplay elements—slug lines, concise present-tense action, character cues, dialogue, and only necessary parentheticals—and set a page or word limit. Ask the system not to add camera directions, actor instructions, or production claims unless they serve a stated purpose. If the service’s export format is unclear, plan to move the text into a dedicated screenplay editor and perform a formatting pass there.
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Do not ask for “make it better” in one pass. Use distinct checks for plot causality, character motivation, period accuracy, dialogue differentiation, pacing, visual clarity, repeated information, and prohibited modern language. When revising, name the scene IDs that may change and instruct the system to preserve all other continuity facts.
Step 8: Perform a human source and script audit
Read the screenplay against the source index. Confirm that every retained quotation is accurate to the edition you cleared, every invented scene is labeled as an adaptation choice, and no character learns information before the story gives it to them. Then read the script without the source to test whether a viewer can follow the plot, stakes, and emotional turns.
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Step 9: Prepare production materials cautiously
Use production prompts, shot suggestions, or distribution preparation only after the script is stable. Treat generated casting, budget, location, safety, and historical claims as proposals requiring human verification. A production prompt is not a permit, rights clearance, insurance document, or final shooting plan.
How to compare a general-purpose AI tool with a dedicated adapter
A general-purpose model may be cheaper or more flexible, but you must supply the missing workflow. Run the same small, rights-cleared excerpt through each candidate and score the results using a written rubric rather than intuition.
The Tool Desk
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| Long-source handling | Maximum input, chapter batching, retrieval, and project memory | How many chapters remain available after several revisions; whether the system cites the correct passage |
| Continuity | Names, ages, relationships, objects, chronology, and knowledge state | Number and severity of contradictions in a fixed 10-scene sample |
| Adaptation control | Ability to preserve required beats while allowing specified changes | Whether the requested cut, combination, or new scene appears without unrelated alterations |
| Screenplay output | Slug lines, action, dialogue, page structure, and export | Formatting corrections required before an editor can work |
| Revision safety | Scene-level editing and protection of unchanged material | Unexpected changes outside the requested scene |
| Rights and privacy | Commercial-use language, retention, deletion, and training policies | Exact current terms and unanswered questions |
| Total cost | Subscription, usage, seats, exports, and video credits | Cost for one complete draft plus two revision cycles |
Keep the test fair: use the same excerpt, brief, output length, and revision requests. Do not call the result a benchmark. A small sample can reveal workflow friction, but it cannot establish that one system writes better scripts for every genre or novel.
Authorship and copyright in an AI-assisted script
AI assistance does not automatically make a script uncopyrightable, and it does not automatically make every generated passage protected. In its January 29, 2025 summary, the U.S. Copyright Office said protection may apply when a human author determines sufficient expressive elements; providing prompts alone is not enough. The Office also said that AI assistance or inclusion of AI material does not prevent protection for a larger human-authored work when the human contribution meets the required standard. Register of Copyrights Shira Perlmutter summarized the position this way: “Where that creativity is expressed through the use of AI systems, it continues to enjoy protection.”
For a defensible record, preserve your adaptation brief, outlines, scene decisions, rewrite history, source citations, and notes explaining what you selected, arranged, rewrote, or discarded. Make substantial human choices about structure, dialogue, characterization, sequencing, and visual storytelling. Do not represent an unedited model output as wholly human-written, and do not assume a plan’s “commercial rights” promise resolves authorship or third-party rights questions.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.Publishing an adaptation through KDP
If you plan to publish the script or a related book through Amazon KDP, treat KDP’s public-domain policy as a separate platform requirement. KDP may request proof that the work is public domain and may reject a version that is already freely available unless it is sufficiently differentiated. Its listed examples of differentiation include a new translation, original annotations, or at least 10 relevant original illustrations.
That threshold is an example of KDP’s policy, not a general copyright rule and not a requirement that makes an adaptation lawful. Keep evidence for the exact edition, explain your original contribution accurately in the submission, and review the current KDP page because platform rules can change.
Costs, rights, and project planning
For a solo proof of concept, start with the Free plan’s one active project and basic screenplay development, using a short public-domain excerpt you have cleared. Move to Creator at the listed $9.99 per month when you need the full workflow and the plan’s stated commercial-use rights for eligible Adapt output. For a five-person team, Studio’s listed $29.99 per month includes five seats; budget $5 per month for each additional listed seat. Add the cost of metered AI video credits only if you are actually generating video.
Also budget time rather than assuming the subscription replaces professional work. Rights verification, source preparation, continuity review, script editing, historical consultation, screenplay formatting, legal review, and production planning can remain necessary even when the AI handles first drafts.
Common failure modes and fixes
The AI adapts the wrong edition
Symptom: wording, characters, or chapter events do not match your cleared text. Fix: label the edition, provide chapter boundaries, retain a source index, and require passage references for every major beat.
The middle of the script loses continuity
Symptom: ages, relationships, props, or knowledge states change after several scenes. Fix: maintain a versioned continuity sheet, generate in small batches, and run a dedicated contradiction audit before drafting the next act.
The result is a synopsis, not a screenplay
Symptom: paragraphs summarize emotions and events without playable action or dialogue. Fix: return to the scene outline, require an objective and conflict for every scene, and specify screenplay elements and output limits.
Faithfulness produces a slow or unfilmable script
Symptom: the draft preserves every subplot, narrator aside, and location change. Fix: decide in the brief what is essential, combine characters only deliberately, and keep a cut-and-combine log so compression remains accountable.
Generated dialogue sounds identical
Symptom: every character uses the same vocabulary, rhythm, and exposition. Fix: define each character’s objective, status, knowledge, verbal habits, and subtext; then rewrite line by line rather than accepting a global style instruction.
The tool’s rights language is unclear
Symptom: a plan mentions commercial use without defining eligible output, source material, territories, or termination. Fix: save the current terms, ask the provider for written clarification, and do not publish until the source and output rights are separately understood.
Video-generation costs expand unexpectedly
Symptom: a screenplay subscription is mistaken for unlimited video creation. Fix: price metered credits per shot and revision, set a test limit, and approve visual generation only after the script and shot list are locked.
Which approach should you choose?
- Choose Lookhu Adapt first if you want one purpose-built workflow for an eligible public-domain classic, from story development through screenplay and production prompts, and you accept that output quality still requires testing.
- Start with the Free plan if you are learning the workflow or adapting a short excerpt and need one active project.
- Choose Creator when the full workflow and the plan’s stated commercial-use rights for eligible Adapt output matter to a solo project.
- Choose Studio when five people need seats and the collaboration cost is lower than coordinating separate accounts.
- Use a general-purpose model or another scriptwriting app only after it passes the same long-document, continuity, formatting, revision, privacy, and cost checks. Flexibility alone is not evidence of reliable adaptation.
- Pause and obtain rights advice when the edition, translation, publication history, territory, or intended release is uncertain.
Bottom line
For this specific job, Lookhu Adapt is the most directly matched option identified, with a published path from eligible public-domain source material to story planning, scenes, screenplay, production prompts, and release preparation. Its Free, Creator, and Studio tiers provide a clear way to trial or scale the workflow, but separate video credits and changing terms affect the real budget. The responsible process is rights-first and human-led: clear the exact edition, map the story, control continuity, revise every scene, document your creative contribution, and compare alternatives on evidence from your own small, repeatable test.
Quick Recap
Product prices and availability are accurate as of the date/time indicated and are subject to change. Any price and availability information displayed on Amazon at the time of purchase will apply.
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