We found a cool collection of 23 rarely seen photos taken behind-the-scenes during production of David O. Selznick’s Gone With the Wind (1939), starring Clark Gable and Vivien Leigh and directed by Victor Fleming and George Cukor.
The film has been criticized as historical revisionism glorifying slavery, but nevertheless, it has been credited for triggering changes to the way African-Americans are depicted on film. It was re-released periodically throughout the 20th century and became ingrained in popular culture. The film is regarded as one of the greatest films of all time; it has placed in the top ten of the American Film Institute’s list of top 100 American films since the list’s inception in 1998, and in 1989, the United States Library of Congress selected it for preservation in the National Film Registry
The production of the film was troubled from the start. Filming was delayed for two years due to Selznick’s determination to secure Gable for the role of Rhett Butler, and the “search for Scarlett” led to 1,400 women being interviewed for the part. The original screenplay was written by Sidney Howard, but underwent many revisions by several writers in an attempt to get it down to a suitable length. The original director, George Cukor, was fired shortly after filming had begun and was replaced by Fleming, who in turn was briefly replaced by Sam Wood while Fleming took some time off due to exhaustion.