2735
(0 votes, average 0 out of 5)
Written by Michael Muckian
Apr 21, 2011
Isn’t it obvious that tomorrow is another day?
It was to newspaperman Ben Hecht, who was hired by Hollywood producer David O. Selznick to rewrite a script based on a novel that Hecht disliked. In an attempt to save his high-profile, costly film version of that book, Selznick locked Hecht in his office with film director Victor Fleming until an acceptable version of the screenplay was completed.
As a result of their five-day marathon effort, “Gone With the Wind” went on to win 10 Academy Awards. The episode also became fodder for contemporary British playwright Ron Hutchinson, whose “Moonlight and Magnolias” imagines what occurred behind closed doors during those five days. Hutchinson’s comedy with a conscience is the final seasonal offering from Madison’s Forward Theater Company.
Recreating characters on stage who existed in real life required a different level of preparation, according to actor Mark Ulrich, who plays producer Selznick. But it’s how well the character was known that drives audience expectations of accuracy.
“To play a person who actually existed requires the actor to do a lot of research,” Ulrich says, “and to pray that the audience hasn’t done quite as much research.”
All three men were well known in 1939 Hollywood, a time when large studios dominated the landscape. Actors and directors were contract workers, and producers drove the movie industry. In this setting, it was perfectly acceptable for Selznick to make big demands of his employees. He made Hecht and Fleming subsist on bananas and peanuts – the producer called this combo “brain food” – while they adapted the most popular novel of the day for film.
“In real life, the events of the play actually took place, but there’s really no way to know what went on in the office while the three of them were together,” says actor Jim Buske, who plays director Fleming. “You have to go with what the playwright put down on the page and work out the character relationships from that.”
What playwright Hutchinson imagined was a comedic scenario of creating order from the chaos that was Sidney Howard’s original script, while creating chaos in Selznick’s otherwise orderly office. Throughout the two-hour production, the set becomes littered with crumpled typing paper, peanut shells and banana peels.
The creative process often isn’t pretty, and in this case it was awfully messy.
The characters also debate the various themes of both the novel and day. Hecht, played by actor Michael Herold, is initially appalled that he’s being asked to write a love letter to the Confederacy. An ardent Zionist, Hecht would rather turn the tale on its ear and condemn the slavery in the story, using human oppression as a platform to call attention to the growing anti-Semitism in Europe and Hollywood.
However, the friendship between Hecht, who attended the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and Selznick cements the relationship and carries the narrative. And Fleming, the “man’s director” who Selznick pulled off another film – “The Wizard of Oz” – to save “Gone With the Wind” after firing the original director George Cukor, rounds out what becomes a highly comedic trio.
“In playing comedy, you have to be aware of the jokes and how to time the delivery of the lines,” Herold says. “But you should always play the reality of the situation, and play it seriously. Humor comes from the characters’ sincerity, and not from the actor asking for a laugh.”
In the end, does it matter whether it’s fact or fancy that drives “Moonlight and Magnolias” to its successful conclusion?
Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn as long as it’s funny.
Forward Theater’s production of “Moonlight and Magnolias” runs April 28 to May 15 at The Playhouse at Madison’s Overture Center for the Arts. Go to www.forwardtheater.com.
