I remember watching a TV movie many years ago called The Scarlett O'Hara Wars. It starred Tony Curtis as David O. Selznick and a bevy of not very well known actresses from the 1970's playing a bevy of extremely well known actresses from the 1930's, and as the title indicates, these actresses were all vying for the most coveted role of the decade (some might argue ever!), that of Scarlett O'Hara in Gone With The Wind.
The teleplay told the legendary story with a comedic, almost campy twist but the segment of the movie that always stuck out in my mind was each Scarlett candidate going to George Cukor during a Hollywood party to lobby for the role of the southern vixen only to be told by the director that he had a perfect part for her in a new project he was starting called The Women. Now whether or not this was the way the classic 1939 film was actually cast, I don't know, but almost every major role in The Women starred an ex-Scarlett wannabe.
Norma Shearer, Joan Crawford and Joan Fontaine were all in consideration (with varying degrees of seriousness) for the part of Scarlett and Paulette Goddard was the front runner until serious questions about the validity of her marriage to Charlie Chaplin surfaced. Each of these stars (along with Rosalind Russell, Mary Boland, Marjorie Main and others) came together to create one of the cleverest, snappiest, funniest films of its kind. They may not have been perfect as Scarlett but they sure were great as The Women.
The teleplay told the legendary story with a comedic, almost campy twist but the segment of the movie that always stuck out in my mind was each Scarlett candidate going to George Cukor during a Hollywood party to lobby for the role of the southern vixen only to be told by the director that he had a perfect part for her in a new project he was starting called The Women. Now whether or not this was the way the classic 1939 film was actually cast, I don't know, but almost every major role in The Women starred an ex-Scarlett wannabe.
Norma Shearer, Joan Crawford and Joan Fontaine were all in consideration (with varying degrees of seriousness) for the part of Scarlett and Paulette Goddard was the front runner until serious questions about the validity of her marriage to Charlie Chaplin surfaced. Each of these stars (along with Rosalind Russell, Mary Boland, Marjorie Main and others) came together to create one of the cleverest, snappiest, funniest films of its kind. They may not have been perfect as Scarlett but they sure were great as The Women.
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