In the original Broadway play, all the principle characters were Jewish. (In the early and mid 20th century, Catskill Mountain resorts like the one depicted in the story were vacation hot spots for East Coast Jews.) Because of anti-Semitism in America at the time, all references to Jewish-American culture (including the last names of many of the characters) were either removed or altered. For instance, in the adaptation process, the play's lead characters, Teddy Stern and Chick Kessler, were among a half dozen or so characters who were given names that were more Christian-sounding -- Teddy Shaw and Chick Kirkland. As Leonard Maltin puts it in his yearly movie guide: "[T]he original's satiric depiction of Jewish New Yorkers is completely homogenized."