I'm forced by conscience to admit right off that I've been a complete sap for Vivien Leigh since the moment I laid eyes on her sitting between the "Tarlton Twins" on the steps at Twelve Oaks in the opening seconds of GWTW. But in decades of looking to find that =particular= Vivien Leigh again, I was everlastingly frustrated.
I found over time that I had fallen for the Vivien the Vixen, the face that could send men happily off to (civil) war in delirious dreams of marching home to her and "happily ever after" ...and the cocksure certainty of precisely that effect upon any man who dared to gaze into that face for more than a few seconds.
One wonders how much she was aware of the thermonuclear force of that face in real life. Olivier is gone, and so is she, so we'll probably never know. But we do know this: Vivien's best friend as a youngster was the formidable -- and slightly older -- Maureen O'Sullivan, she of "Tarzan the Apeman," and no lightweight herself when it came to bowling men over.
While there are hints of Scarlet in Vivien in "Waterloo Bridge" and "That Hamilton Woman," none of the other films I know of allow her to be the manipulative, coercive, self-obsessed, narcissistic, pouting diva that she was as Libby and Scarlet.
Had Selznick seen rushes or scenes from "Sideawalks..." before or after he cast Leigh in her legend maker? Did he see Scarlet right there in black and white? One wonders. Because Libby =is= Scarlet O'Hara regardless of the surrounding scenery and cockney word-chewing.
The similarities do not end there. Virtually every expression and and mannerism is fully formed and on display in Libby the busker =and= Libby the diva. Harrison is a more sophisticated, straightforward and cynical version of Leslie Howard's Ashley Wilkes. And Thomas Mitchell's Gerald O'Hara looks and sounds a =lot= like Lawton's Charlie Staggers.
I'm forced to think that Selznick =did= see "Sidewalks..." and that he saw it far more than once. But in whatever event, those who caught the Viv bug as badly as I did years ago should be pleased to see her living right up to our expectations after so many other relative disappointments.
I found over time that I had fallen for the Vivien the Vixen, the face that could send men happily off to (civil) war in delirious dreams of marching home to her and "happily ever after" ...and the cocksure certainty of precisely that effect upon any man who dared to gaze into that face for more than a few seconds.
One wonders how much she was aware of the thermonuclear force of that face in real life. Olivier is gone, and so is she, so we'll probably never know. But we do know this: Vivien's best friend as a youngster was the formidable -- and slightly older -- Maureen O'Sullivan, she of "Tarzan the Apeman," and no lightweight herself when it came to bowling men over.
While there are hints of Scarlet in Vivien in "Waterloo Bridge" and "That Hamilton Woman," none of the other films I know of allow her to be the manipulative, coercive, self-obsessed, narcissistic, pouting diva that she was as Libby and Scarlet.
Had Selznick seen rushes or scenes from "Sideawalks..." before or after he cast Leigh in her legend maker? Did he see Scarlet right there in black and white? One wonders. Because Libby =is= Scarlet O'Hara regardless of the surrounding scenery and cockney word-chewing.
The similarities do not end there. Virtually every expression and and mannerism is fully formed and on display in Libby the busker =and= Libby the diva. Harrison is a more sophisticated, straightforward and cynical version of Leslie Howard's Ashley Wilkes. And Thomas Mitchell's Gerald O'Hara looks and sounds a =lot= like Lawton's Charlie Staggers.
I'm forced to think that Selznick =did= see "Sidewalks..." and that he saw it far more than once. But in whatever event, those who caught the Viv bug as badly as I did years ago should be pleased to see her living right up to our expectations after so many other relative disappointments.