10 Totally Confusing Hollywood Screenwriting Disputes

Though director Michael Bay’s movies are not often cited as examples of masterful screenwriting, the 1996 action blockbuster The Rock is still often brought up as a written movie. One of the reasons for that is because of the talented that was involved in writing the screenplay. Both Aaron Sorkin and Quentin Tarantino worked on it, though according to Bay the primary writer was Jonathan Hensleigh, who had previously written Die Hard With A Vengeance. Star Sean Connery even brought in two writers to specifically work on his character's dialogue.

However, none of those writers received on-screen credit for the screenplay. Writers David Weisberg and Douglas S. Cook, who originated the screenplay, received the “Story By” and “Screenplay By” credit. Of the other major contributors to the screenplay, which included producer Don Simpson who died during the production, only Mark Rosner also received credit from the WGA for the screenplay because he was the first to rewrite the film.

To make things worse, Hensleigh was the only writer to actually be on set during the shoot and actually rewrote most of the film's dialogue to make it more humorous. Bay later called the WGA's decision not to credit Hensleigh "a sham, a travesty."