‘Moderns’ Credit

One wonders, finally, what prompts movie critics to continue to omit the name of the screenwriter from their reviews.

Who do these people think creates the story and characters they almost invariably credit solely to the director? The script supervisor or, as audiences of the ‘30s thought, the actors themselves? Is it merely naivete or, dare I say it, jealousy?

The latest atrocity of this nature occurred in Michael Wilmington’s review of Alan Rudolph’s “The Moderns” (“ ‘Moderns’--Creativity in Bloom,” May 19). For the record, Rudolph co-wrote the script of this movie, which Wilmington found “the most delightful” of the director’s films, with the late Jon Bradshaw.

Bradshaw was one of the most esteemed journalists of his time and the author of several wise and ironic books, a man, surely, to whom one could have ascribed some of the “rich jest” and “slivers of wit” of the movie.

ROGER L. SIMON

Los Angeles