Recast Gone With the Wind

Cafe Society
1

So here’s the premise: imagine that HBO or some other premium channel has dedicated $100 million to a miniseries remake of Gone With the Wind. This time it’s going to cover the entire book- adding back in characters and sidelines not included in the original. It won’t be revisionist- it’s still going to be the same plot/dialogue/etc., but it will be closer- filmed on location, Tara’s a rambling farmhouse instead of a white columned mansion, Twelve Oaks is on a human scale, Scarlett becomes a mother in the first year of the war, etc…
If you’ve only seen the movie feel free to play along- you know the basic characters. If you’ve read the book feel free to cast any character (even those who need flashbacks like Gerald’s brothers and Philippe Robillard). Has to be someone who’s living and age appropriate, though.

Oh- the sequels never happened.

Who would you cast?

MY PICS (feel free to recast obviously):

Scarlett O’Hara- as an homage to the original, worldwide hunt for an unknown, though I might consider Mila Kunis.

Rhett Butler- George Clooney

Melody- hmmm… not sure

Ashley Wilkes- Orlando Bloom [pity Zac Efron isn’t older]

Gerald O’Hara- Brendan Gleeson

Ellen O’Hara- Mary Louise Parker

Charles Hamilton- Haley Joel Osment

Frank Kennedy- Matthew Modine

Grandma Fontaine- (probably my favorite character left out of the movie)- Carol Burnett (for those not familiar, she’s a great dramatic actress as well as comedienne)
Dr. Fontaine- Hal Holbrook

Mammy- I seriously doubt Oprah or Whoopi would ever do it, but they’d be my first choices and in that order, because I think either of them would really bring it to the role (and Whoopi might not have to gain as much weight as you’d think). Failing them, Mary Bond Davis.

Belle Watling- Jodie Foster

Big Sam- Michael Clarke Duncan (if you’re not familiar, his character has a more substantial role in the book [in the movie he’s almost a walk-on])

Will Benteen- Giovanni Ribisi

Jonas Wilkerson- Jason Lee
Lots and lots more but I’ll stop there for now.

Your turn.

2

OMG, I’m so loving those! Carol Burnett - YES!

Matthew Modine might be too cute for Frank - how about Anthony Edwards?

Tim Roth could play Wilkerson’s buddy, that pusillanimous Hilton.

For Scarlett’s middle sister Susan Elinor (i.e. Suellen) how about Britney Spears?

Mrs. Tarleton? Frances McDormand!

(Mrs. Tarleton was, actually, clearly played by my Grandmother, but she passed away a decade ago.)

Who should play Honey and India Wilkes?

3

One of my favorite lines from the book is Grandma talking about Mrs. Tarleton. This is after the war, of course.

Mitchell definitely had an ear for old women’s dialogue and for characterization. I also love that nobody in the book is all good or bad. For example, in the same passage as the above Grandma, a half indestructible old warhorse who’s survived an Indian massacre, droughts, numerous ups and downs of cotton prices and natural disasters, the Civil War (her plantation survived but barely), loss of several of her children and grandchildren, etc., and who basically tells Scarlett to grow the hell up and pick her own damned cotton rather than whining about the slaves running away, and who laments how many of her neighbors will flat line because they don’t have the gumption to remake a fortune, seems like the voice of reason and hope and social acceptance.

Then is mortified when Scarlett things she approves of Suellen’s marriage to Will Benteen! Grandma’s thinks Will’s not only a fine man but way too good for Suellen in character and ability, but at the same time she thinks it’s ridiculous for a “Cracker” to marry into a family of breeding. She’s disappointingly classist (though also pragmatic at heart).

The above quote’s a cut and paste from the full-text of the book online at the Aussie mirror of Gutenberg (GWTW’s out of copyright in Australia). It’s great to have a searchable version.

4

Isn’t Ashley closer in age to the 19-yr-old Tarleton brothers than 35-yr-old Rhett? Zac might be just right; Clooney ::sigh:: is a bit too old.

5

Nitpick: It’s Melanie.

I like a lot of your picks - Matthew Modine would be a great Frank Kennedy. Jodie Foster and Michael Clark Duncan would be good as well.

6

Melanie how about Jennifer Jason Leigh?

7

Honey Wilkes - Jessica Simpson

India Wilkes - Gabrielle Anwar

Emmy Slattery - Jamie Pressley

Dilcey (Prissy’s mother) - Halle Berry

If they could do Southern American accents, James and Oliver Phelps would be perfect for the Tarleton Twins. They’re even used to having their hair dyed red.

Miss Pittypat - Doris Roberts

Peter (Miss Pitty’s driver/butler/etc) - Morgan Freeman

8

Yeah, Sampiro, I’m smacking you upside the head for that one. I’m so ashamed.

Archie…hmmm…well, I was going to suggest Leo McKern but it appears he’s passed on.

Morgan Brittany has the eyes to pull off Scarlett (one of the myriad reasons I gave for not watching the egregious *Scarlett *was that they cast a brown-eyed Joanne Whaley-Kilmer-Whaley to place Scarlett) but I think she’s too old now.

9

Oh, yes, Morgan Freeman for Uncle Peter! The scene where he dresses down Scarlett for letting the Yankees insult him…oooohhhh.

10

Forgot to suggest Reese Witherspoon for Suellen. I think she could pull off whiny bitchy with no problem

And because I think she’s as cute as the buttons and going through a very hard break-up right now…Anne Hathaway for Melanie.

11

“Miss Pitty I’m s’posed to be drivin’ you to the store!”

Uncle Peter was a cool character. I love the way he “‘quired a hawse’” when he and Pitty were stuck in Macon after Sherman.

12

Let’s see, Rhet - Ashton Kutcher
Scarlett - Paris Hilton.
Brent - Owen Wilson

Oh, and Tara is in Miami, actually. Because.

13

Now THAT is the voice of a Hollywood studio!
Oh, and don’t forget to tweak the ending and make it “happier”…works better with the 20-25 year old demographic.

14

*Sampiro? Yes, this is HBO BigWig In Charge of Epic Mini-Series. Listen, babe, while I adore your choices for stars, I’m afraid you’re going to blow the whole budget on actor salaries. I mean, babe, these are some big names here. We still haven’t talked about sets, costumes, a choreographer for the Atlanta bazaar scene, and I’ve got lawyers already fielding calls from the ASPCA because of that dead horse after Scarlett gets back to Tara when Atlanta burns.

What? You think you can get them to work for scale because it’s GWTW? If you can, babe, I’ll deliver Ridley Scott AND Steven Spielberg as directors.

Oh, and a little birdie told me Gene Hackman for Uncle Henry and Diane Wiest for Aunt Pitty.

Let’s do lunch, babe, soon. *
:smiley:

Oh, and DMark?

You forgot the chase scene. Rig it up with buggies, but there has to be pyrotechnics.

15

I dunno… I have trouble seeing Jodie Foster as Frank Kennedy…

16

Do you think Julia Roberts can pull off Belle Watling?

And, for further speculation (and because Sampiro probably knows the answer)…

Does anyone know why GWTW has never been remade? Is it sort of Hollywood’s fear that you can’t catch lightning in a bottle twice, or are the rights tied up by the estate?

And secondly…Belle’s son…is Rhett the father? I always thought that he was helping out an old friend, but that he wasn’t the father.

17

The Mitchell heirs guard the rights like they were Mecca, so they’d probably never consent to a remake that they couldn’t micromanage. (Yet they allow mediocre sequel/companion novels.)

Implied but never said. He mentions a ward and Belle mentions a son so…

18

I like some of the suggestions for roles given here, but the problem is that most of the characters listed are far too old for the parts.

If we really want to make a mark with a new production of GWTW I would suggest screen unknowns, or at least little knowns. Cast really young people for the roles of Scarlett’s generation.

I know that a producer maybe couldn’t get a real sixteen year old to play Scarlett at the beginning of the war. But there must be someone no more than twenty years old who could pull it off. Ashley wasn’t thirty even. Rhett we could be more flexible on, if he was in his thirties.

19

He was the same age as Scarlett’s mother, which would make him 32 at the beginning of the book and 44 at the end. Gerald and Mammy are probably the oldest main characters, each about 60 at the beginning, while Scarlett ages from 16-28 and Melanie and Ashley are a few years older, and Frank Kennedy was about 25 years older than Scarlett (46 or so when killed).

20

Hugh Laurie for Ashley Wilkes!