"Adaptation is a bit like translation. We can nit-pick certain words in a translation, but are the..."

“Adaptation is a bit like translation. We can nit-pick certain words in a translation, but are the essential narrative elements conveyed, including tone? Chekhov’s ‘The Lady with a Dog’ has also been translated as 'The Lady with the Little Dog,’ 'The Lady with the Pet Dog,’ and so on. But it’s always a dog, not a pig, and never a flying pig with a sub-machine gun.”

- Advice I gave my screenwriting students, who were then adapting short stories in the public domain. They also had a habit of introducing gun play into stories that didn’t need it.