Save The Date!
Nov. 5, 2010 – Nov. 7, 2010
"Gateway To The Wind" Weekend,
St. Louis, MO
Celebrating Author Margaret Mitchell's Birthday and the 70th Anniversary of the Premiere of GWTW in St. Louis. Special guest actors from the movie, Roundtable discussions and speakers covering GWTW and St. Louis Civil War connection Saturday night Gala Charity Ball to benefit Rainbows For Kids, a 501 (c)(3) charity for children with cancer. You won't want to miss this fun weekend.
For more information: info@GWTWbook.com
Gateway to the Wind -
Schedule of Events
Registration Form
About Vivien Leigh
Much has been written about the great actress Vivien Leigh, who was taken in death at such a young age. Vivien Leigh was born Vivian Mary Hartley in Darjeeling, India, on November 5, 1913 and died in 1967. Her stage name was derived from the first name of her first husband. Though best remembered as Scarlett O’Hara in Gone With The Wind, Leigh was a very accomplished actress. She lived most of her life in England and commuted to the United States and other parts of the world for her movie roles.
After Gone With The Wind, she had starring roles in Anna Karenina (1948),where she played Anna, and then in A Streetcar Named Desire (1951) where she won her second Academy Award for her portrayal of Blanche DuBois.
According to Leigh Mills, who runs the Vivien Leigh Fan Club and website, Vivien-Leigh.com, at one period in her life she owned 16 Siamese cats. She had her luggage monogrammed with VLO, the “O” standing for Laurence Olivier, the great love of her life. Even after they divorced she used the luggage. When she traveled to America, she had her Rolls Royce brought over. The license plate read “VLO.”
Vivien Leigh was a very emotional person and according to Mills, she “did not always enjoy watching Gone With The Wind. In fact, it became quite painful.”
Mills quoted Leigh as saying, “It makes me so sad to think of that picture…so many of its people are dead—Clark (Gable), Leslie (Howard), dear Hattie (McDaniel), Victor (Fleming), and even Margaret Mitchell…the last time I saw the film, I wept all the way through it.”
Strange she felt that way and then she died a few years later, at the all too young age of 53.
Throughout the years since Gone With The Wind was produced, legend had it that producer David O. Selznick “discovered” his “Scarlett O’Hara” on the night they filmed the big fire scene, that his brother Myron had brought her in at a most dramatic time and presented her to his brother saying something like, “I present to you your Scarlett O’Hara.”
Later on, a writer discredited the story and presented another one, but The Making Of A Masterpiece has the direct quotations from Selznick’s assistant Marcella Rabwin on the topic. Her sons, Mark and Paul had saved a tape recording of Rabwin’s from a speech she gave, and they shared the tape with author Sally Tippett Rains. Turns out Marcella remembers it pretty much the same as far as Myron Selznick presenting Vivien Leigh to his brother David that night.
Phone: 314.842.9724
Email: info@GWTWbook.com
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