The one Spielbergian softening that comes to mind is in the almost rape scene. In the original, Anybods is present, and it depends on the production whether Anybodys joins in the taunting and crowding of Anita or whether she is horrified but doesn’t do anything about it. In this movie, Anybodys - who here isn’t just a tomboy but comes across as trans - leaves the store as Anita enters and so isn’t present when things go ugly. Graziella (Riff’s girl), who is present, protests and tries to defend Anita but gets quickly pushed out of the store. (The rest proceeds the same in all versions - Anita gets assaulted and is saved at the proverbial last minute by the arrival of Doc/Valentina, whereupon she strikes back by the lie that Maria is dead.) Now this scene is hands down the darkest (including the actual deaths) of the entire musical, and I conclude that Kushner, Spielberg or both did not want to show a woman complicit in the near-rape of another woman. Which I can understand, though I can also understand why Laurents put it in in the first place - no one is immune to the escalating hate and violence, and this is why as opposed to “Romeo and Juliet”, where Romeo doesn’t get the message about Juliet’s survival from Friar Lawrence in time by sheer accident, Tony gets the wrong message about Maria’s death as a direct result of the escalating hate and violence which is a main theme of the play.