Hollywood Screenwriters

Thanks, Salzmank. This is a very interesting thread, indeed, though in my exchanges with kijii , I'm reminded that there's a big difference between writers' credits today and their credits during the studio days. There are multiple credited writers on films today, of course, but in the studio days it was really the norm - and there were also uncredited writers (sometimes called script doctors), and credited "story" writers who were responsible for some of the writing. It's hard to know who did what, unless it's been documented. Or you were there.

I've chosen more or less to concentrate on those who have only a couple of writers on a film when possible. Generally speaking, at least in the last few decades, unless the writers work as partners, one of those will be most responsible for the script and merit the most credit for the final outcome. Bo Goldman, for example, is really responsible for the final screenplay for One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, yet he had to share his Oscar with Laurence Hauben, though Bo's script was a page one rewrite of Hauben's.

Anyway, maybe I'll try a post about those who specialized (mostly) in comedies next. Or maybe novelists who also wrote scripts - there are some good stories about that, I know. Or those who specialized in westerns. Not always possible, I guess, but compartmentalizing would make it a little easier to wrangle this vast subject, for me anyway.