Screenwriter Rudolph Wurlitzer is considered "the individual most responsible for exploring this genre, having practically invented it himself in the late '60s and then helped to nurture it in the scripts of others", such as McBride's Glen and Randa, Hellman's Two-Lane Blacktop, Cox's Walker, and Sam Peckinpah's Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid. Wurlitzer worked on the script of Gone Beaver, which Rosenbaum describes as "a visionary script" for Jim McBride.
Rudolph Wurlitzer is viewed as "the central figure in examining this genre, having essentially created it himself in the late 1960s and then assisted in cultivating it through his collaborations with other writers", including those behind Glen, Two-Lane Blacktop, Walker, and Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid. Wurlitzer contributed to the script of Gone Beaver, which Rosenbaum describes as a visionary piece for Jim McBride.