"I COULDA BEEN A CONTENDER!" (23)

From Beneath the Hollywood Sign

EPISODE 23 - “I Coulda Been a Contender: Classic Casting That Almost Happened” - 02/19/2024

It is well documented that the film “Gone With The Wind” started filming before an actress was cast in the lead role of Scarlett O’Hara. Producer DAVID O. SELZNICK made a spectacle out of who would win the coveted role. It became a national obsession. He considered everyone from TALLULAH BANKHEAD to BETTE DAVIS to LUCILLE BALL. He eventually narrowed the field to three finalists: PAULETTE GODDARD, JOAN BENNETT, and JEAN ARTHUR. But in the eleventh hour, a new contender, an unknown Brit named VIVIEN LEIGH, swept in and won the role. Listen as we discuss, debate, and guffaw over other casting choices that almost happened in some of your favorite film classics.

SHOW NOTES:

Sources:

Hollywood’s First Choices: How The Greatest Casting Decisions Were Made (1994), by Jeff Burkhart and Bruce Stuart;

Casting Might Have Beens (2005), by Eila Mell;

Jean Arthur: The Actress Nobody Knew (2004), by John Oller;

George Raft: The Man Who Would Be Bogart (2015), by Stone Wallace;

Life is a Banquet (1974), by Rosalind Russell;

Joan Crawford: The Enduring Star (2009), by Peter Cowie;

Michael Curtiz: A Life in Film (2021), by Alan Rode;

Judy Holliday (1982), by Will Holtzman;

Close-up on Sunset Boulevard: Billy Wilder, Norma Desmond, and the Dark Hollywood Dream (2002), by Sam Staggs

Montgomery Clift: Beautiful Loser (1992), by Barney Hoskyns;

Mike Nichols: A Life (2021), by Mark Harris;

IMDBPro.com;

Wikipedia.com;

Movies Mentioned:

Scarface (1932), starring George Raft, Paul Muni, Ann Dvorak, and Boris Karloff;

Dead End (1937), starring Silvia Sidney, Joel McCrea, Humphrey Bogart, Wendy Barrie, and Claire Trevor;

The Maltese Falcon (1941), starring Humphrey Bogart, Mary Astor, Peter Lorre, Sydney Greenstreet, Elisha Cook, Jr, and Lee Patrick

The Maltese Falcon (1931), starring Ricardo Cortez and Bebe Daniels;

High Sierra (1941), starring Humphrey Bogart, Ida Lupino, Joan Leslie, Alan Curtis, Cornel Wilde, Arthur Kennedy, Willie Best, Elisabeth Risdon, and Henry Travers;

His Girl Friday (1940), starring Cary Grant, Rosalind Russell, and Ralph Bellamy;

Twentieth Century (1934), starring John Barrymore and Carole Lombard;

Mildred Pierce (1945), starring Joan Crawford, Ann Blyth, Jack Carson, Zachary Scott, Eve Arden, Bruce Bennett, and Lee Patrick;

Sunset Boulevard (1950), starring Gloria Swanson, William Holden, Erich von Stroheim, and Nancy Olson;

From Here To Eternity (1953); starring Burt Lancaster, Deborah Kerr, Montgomery Clift, Frank Sinatra, Donna Reed, and Ernest Borgnine;

Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolf (1966), starring Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton, George Segal, and Sandy Dennis;

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969), starring Paul Newman, Robert Redford, and Katharine Ross;#023: "I COULDA BEEN A CONTENDER!"

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