Lawrence and Lee claim to have been influenced by playwrights such as Clifford Odets, Thornton Wilder, Lillian Hellman, Robert Sherwood, and others. Maxwell Anderson's work also had a significant impact on their work, particularly with Inherit the Wind. Anderson's play Winterset concerns the Sacco-Vanzetti trial in which two men are convicted of murder and sentenced to die, only to be found innocent after their executions. In Winterset, Anderson used dramatic license to add to the original case and to eliminate facts that he considered irrelevant to his play. He also made the conflict (social injustice) universal and timeless. Lawrence and Lee adapted this style when they wrote Inherit the Wind. Like Anderson, they used dramatic license to create a play based on a conflict that, at its heart, is both universal and timeless.
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