"Moonlight and Magnolias" is about what happened one week in 1939 when legendary producer David O. Selznick shut down his new epic, "Gone with the Wind," the film adaptation of Margaret Mitchell's Pulitzer prize-winning, best-selling novel.
The problem was that Sydney Howard's screenplay runs six hours.
So with all Hollywood abuzz, Selznick (Paul Waterman) pulls director Victor Fleming (Keith Shelbourn) from the set of "The Wizard of Oz" and calls famed screenwriter Ben Hecht (Nick Elias) to his office.
Selznick then locks the door, sends Miss Poppenghul (Cathy Berggren) out for a constant supply of bananas and peanuts, and cajoles Hecht into rewriting the screenplay over the course of five sleepless days.
Hecht was supposed to be writing "At the Circus" for the Marx Brothers, a key fact because that sort of comic romp is exactly what Ron Hutchinson's clever little play being performed at the Duluth Play Ground most resembles.
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The opening night audience was considerably less than the number of beaus that Scarlett had at the Twelve Oaks barbeque, which may indicate a reluctance of local playgoers to see a play that sort of requires you to have read a 1,037 page novel and see a 3 hour and 53 minute movie.
Granted, the more you know about "Gone with the Wind," the more jokes you are going to appreciate as they fly by. But you certainly do not need to know which Tarleton twin was played by George "Superman" Reeves in the movie (Brent) to enjoy the manic slapstick running amok on stage downtown.
Ultimately, all you really need to know is the punch line: "GWTW" is going to be the biggest movie in the history of the entire universe.
Director Bob Mitchell's casting for this show is certainly interesting, with the oldest actor playing the youngest character. Waterman and Shelbourn get to ham it up to great effect as they act out scenes from the book, with Selznick fluttering around as Scarlett and Fleming forced to give birth to Ashley's baby among other indignities.
Berggren basically has only a couple of lines, but she says them repeatedly and with myriad comic nuances over the course of the madness.
As Hecht, Elias hits his stride once his moral outrage erupts over writing the scene where Scarlett slaps Prissy. Some of the best moments in the show are Hecht's waves of indignation beating without effect against Selznick's insistence that the script stick to Mitchell's story.
By the time they get to the book's famous (and obvious) final line, Selznick's office is destroyed and Hecht's comic meltdown is complete. The rest is cinematic history.
LAWRANCE BERNABO teaches communication courses at UMD and is fully committed to the principle of never being hungry again.
