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Brave Days on the Theater Front: The transformation of cranky editor Walter Burns in the classic newspapering play “The Front Page” into Wanda Burns by a Menlo Park, Calif. community theater prompted the play’s publisher, Samuel French, to complain. In fact, the estate of the play’s co-author, Charles MacArthur, heard about the company’s sex change and refused to let the 60-year-old play continue in its current form, said Randy Adams, the theater’s general manager. The solution? A hastily arranged audition for a Walter Burns to take over for Wanda Burns, who was played in Menlo Park by Pat Weaver. “(The director) thought Pat was the best person for the role and it would make for a new twist on an old classic,” said Adams.