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The Real History of Gone with the Wind

Posted 4-24-11

Excerpt from Vancouver Playhouse Theatre Company Moonlight and Magnolias Play Guide

David O. Selznick acquired the movie rights a month after the novel’s publication for the record sum of $50,000. It took two years to cast the movie. Clark Gable was Selznick’s first choice to play Rhett Butler, but Gable was under contract to MGM. Eventually, Selznick struck a deal with his father-in-law Louis B. Mayer: in return for financing half the production budget, MGM would get half the profits and MGM’s parent company Loew’s would receive the distribution rights and 15% of the gross profits. Casting Scarlett O’Hara was even more problematic. Selznick considered dozens of actresses over a two-year period, including Katherine Hepburn, Norma Shearer, Bette Davis, Barbara Stanwyck, Joan Crawford, and Carole Lombard. But Selznick finally narrowed the search down to Vivien Leigh, a little known British actress. He eventually cast her on December 25, 1938 to the initial displeasure of the book’s rabid fans.

Filming began in January 1939 with George Cukor as director. Unhappy with the dailies, Selznick removed him from the picture after only three weeks, though he continued coaching Leigh and Olivia de Haviland, who played Melanie Hamilton. The new director, Victor Fleming, was dissatisfied with the script and production was shut down while a new screenplay was written. The picture was finally completed in December 1939 and premiered on December 15, 1939 in Atlanta, Georgia. The movie went on to win ten Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Screenplay (awarded to Sidney Howard, who wrote the original draft), Best Actress, and two honorary awards.

Ron Hutchinson imagines what happened in the room between David O. Selznick, Victor Fleming and Ben Hecht as they worked to create the script for this legendary film in Moonlight and Magnolias.