The Last Picture Show northern Texas. McMurtry had renamed the town Thalia in his book; Bogdanovich renamed it Anarene for the film, a name chosen to correspond to the cowtown of Abilene, Kansas, in Howard Hawks' "Red River" (1948). "Red River", significantly, is the movie, indeed the last picture show, which Sonny and Duane watch at the end of the film. After shooting the film, Bogdanovich went back to Los Angeles to edit the film on a Moviola. Bogdanovich has said he edited the entire film himself but refused to credit himself as editor, reasoning that director and co-writer was enough. When informed that
The Last Picture Show make it into a picture, but it's a good book." Bogdanovich, McMurtry and some sources suggest an uncredited Polly Platt went through the book and wrote a script that tells the story chronologically. Stephen Friedman was a lawyer with Columbia Pictures but keen to break into film production and he had bought the film rights to the book, so Bogdanovich hired him as producer. After discussing the film with Orson Welles, his houseguest at the time, Bogdanovich decided to shoot the film in black and white. The film was shot in Larry McMurtry's small hometown of Archer City located in