Moonlight And Magnolias

By Ron Hutchinson.

Imagine the crazy scenario: five weeks into filming ‘Gone With The Wind', the most eagerly awaited and expensive movie of all time, producer David O Selznick, fires the director and halts filming.

With his reputation on the line and a determination to still make a great movie, he pulls director Victor Fleming off the set of the ‘Wizard of Oz’ and commissions script writer, Ben Hecht, to rewrite the screenplay.

Add to that the fact that they only have five days and the added complication that Hecht is the only person in Hollywood who hasn’t read he epic novel and you have all the ingredients for a great comedy.

The three are locked into an office with Selznick and Fleming reduced to hilariously re-enacting the story to a baffled Hecht. Fuelled only by bananas and peanuts, tension builds, exhaustion sets in but from amidst the chaos emerges the biggest blockbuster of all time.

Crazy? But the British Theatre guide said of it 'A sheer joy. It’s years since I laughed out loud so much to a play'.