The rather baffling Mr. Emory Wages: In March's novel and the original play, Mr. Wages is a bland, lifeless character who's there mostly so that Monica Breedlove will have someone to speak her dialogue to. He's only slightly more fun as portrayed in the film by perennial "Maytag Repairman" Jesse White. In the iTheatre Collaborative version of the play, director Robert X. Planet edited out much of Emory's hemming and hawing, replacing it with bits of dialogue from the movie and making the character into something of a goofy smart aleck. Excising Mr. Wages altogether might have worked, as well.
Monica Breedlove’s "affection" for her brother: In both the novel and the original play script, Mrs. Breedlove admits to being in love with her brother, which is perfectly all right, she explains, because Emory is a "larvated homosexual" (horrors!). In the film, Emory isn't gay, just boring (see above). In Planet's version, there's a strong suggestion that Emory and Reginald Tasker are more than "fishing buddies," as described in other versions of the story.
LeRoy’s burning desire for Mrs. Penmark: "In the novel, LeRoy is very pervy," Planet says. But both the film and the Anderson play script downplay LeRoy's desire to share his excelsior bed with Rhoda's mom. "I told Greg Lutz, who plays LeRoy in our version, to write dialogue that would tell us things that Anderson couldn't say," Planet confesses. "Greg made LeRoy much darker, and much scarier."
Little Missy’s comeuppance: Both Anderson and March love their Rhoda, but mid-'50s motion picture studios wanted more than good penmanship from make-believe girl killers. In the film version, Rhoda is struck by lightning in a terrible tacked-on ending that's followed by an onscreen curtain call(!) in which she gets a long-overdue licking from her screen mommy. Planet won't tell which parts of which Bad Seed denouement he's gone with. "Let's just say that different people are dead in our version," he demurs. "You'll have to come see it to find out who."
