London staging Gone With the Wind
Posted on Thursday, March 27, 2008
ATLANTA — Talk about holding a grudge.
One day you toss the tyrannical mother country’s load of tea into Boston Harbor. The next — give or take some 235 years — she retaliates by turning your beloved Gone With the Wind into a musical.
A musical where Melanie sings a ditty called “Desperate Times” after Scarlett kills that nasty Yankee soldier who tried to get into her pantaloons. Fingers crossed there’ll also be tap-dancing !
Gone With the Wind: The Musical, is the brainchild of a novice playwright from Southern California who spent two years creating songs before she even approached author Margaret Mitchell’s estate for rights to the book. It stars American actress Jill Paice (Broadway’s Curtains ) as Scarlett O’Hara and Scotsman Darius Danesh as South Carolina Lowcountry native Rhett Butler.
Directed by Mr. Cats himself, Sir Trevor Nunn, the show officially opens April 22 in London’s famed West End.
Television’s TCM is making an exclusive behind-the-scenes documentary about the musical to air April 20. Unfortunately, you’ll have to be watching television in England to see it.
Charlie Tabesh, senior vice president of programming for TCM in the United States, said “It [the documentary ] was pretty local to what was going on in the United Kingdom.” Little news has leaked out about the show, which was written by Margaret Martin, whose name and resume — she has a doctorate in public health from UCLA — are apt to cause double-takes. In an interview with John Wiley, editor of the Virginia-based fan quarterly The Scarlett Letter, Martin described Scarlett as “a stressed-out, teenage single mom.” She also promised songs from Mammy, Prissy, Pork and Rhett.
England’s adoption of this Southern classic might seem to make as much sense as serving shepherd’s pie at the Twelve Oaks barbecue.
Or maybe not.
“We got a Brit to play Scarlett in the movie,” said Wiley, referring to Oscar-winner Vivien Leigh. “Maybe they’re pulling the reverse.” Meanwhile, TCM’s Tabesh doesn’t totally rule out the documentary airing here someday.
“It will be available to be acquired if there’s interest,” he said. “I think there might be.” Translation: Tomorrow is another day.
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