To put the whole affair in a more timely perspective, one should consider the writing of the screenplay. Writing for the screen grew from the art of playwriting, and every experienced playwright knows that a play isn't written, it's rewritten. This is because theatre is a collaborative art which only begins with the writer's idea. A new play is often reshaped under the guiding hand of the director, adapted further to suit the original acting company's strengths and weaknesses, and sometimes even re-molded—as in the case of Arthur Miller's classic, A Death of a Salesman —by the set design. Writing for film is even more volatile, with script changes taking place as the film is being shot. For good, or for bad, many hands form the final script. However, the Writers' Guild requires that a person must have authored at least one third of the script to receive credit. Accordingly, the director or actor who changes a line here or there are not considered authors of the script. If Raymond's play were to premier now, as a film, the credits would probably read something like this:
Screenplay by
Samuel L. Clemens
Story by
Samuel L. Clemens
G. B. DensmoreFrom the novel by
Samuel L. Clemens
and
Charles Dudley Warner
