Scarlett O’Hara, a Southern belle who will do anything to survive the Civil War and its aftermath, loves Ashley Wilkes — and is loved by Rhett Butler.
In Gone with the Wind (1939), Vivien Leigh plays Scarlett O’Hara, who grows up at Tara, her family’s plantation in Georgia. When the Civil War destroys her world, Scarlett refuses to give up: she works the land, she marries for money, and she rebuilds Tara, even as she loses the people she loves. Her great love, in the end, is Rhett Butler, played by Clark Gable, who leaves her in the film’s famous final scene.
Leigh plays Scarlett with a fierce energy that never lets the audience look away. She is selfish and brave, charming and ruthless, and she makes Scarlett’s survival feel both triumphant and sad. Her performance, in a film that became one of the most successful ever made, made her an international star overnight.
Gone with the Wind is a landmark of Hollywood, and Leigh’s Scarlett O’Hara is its enduring heart: a woman who, in the face of ruin, declares that tomorrow is another day.