Dialogue Is Behavior, Not Information

When a scene sags, the instinct is to add a line. The fix is almost always to remove three.

Dialogue is behavior. Characters talk to get something from the person across from them — permission, distance, forgiveness, a distraction. If a line only exists to inform the audience, the audience feels it.

One exercise: take your flattest scene and delete every line that contains a fact the audience already knows. Then delete every line answering a question directly. What's left is usually the scene.