Ransom Center Magazine

The Making of Gone With The Wind

Meet the Staff: Webmaster Daniel Zmud

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Meet the Staff is a Q&A series on Cultural Compass that highlights the work, experience, and lives of staff at the Harry Ransom Center. Daniel Zmud, who joined the Ransom Center in 2001, manages everything web-related and supervises the digitization of the Center’s archival sound recordings, videotapes, and motion picture films. He received a Bachelor’s degree in Radio-Television-Film from The University of Texas at Austin in 1996 and has led the Ransom Center through two major website redesigns, the latest of which launched in 2008.

 

Can you tell us a little about what you do here at the Ransom Center?

My responsibilities have grown over time. At first I was only producing the public website and online research tools, but since then I’ve also been supervising the audiovisual digitization lab and creating interactive installations for the exhibition galleries.

 

What do you like most about working at the Ransom Center?

I like being a part of activities that shine some light on our collections. They could sit on a dark shelf forever, but it’s much more enjoyable to take them out for exhibitions or research. I was lucky enough to be around when we were scanning the Gutenberg Bible. It’s almost never out of its display case, so it was a pretty rare opportunity to have it there on the scanning station, turning every page, and getting to see it up close. We had to have an armed guard on duty…it was an incredible experience.

 

I hear you have spent some time building the web exhibition for The Making of Gone With The Wind. How has that been going?

It has been a whirlwind of activity this spring and summer. The web exhibition will include Gone With The Wind content that we’ve previously published, but we’re also integrating a fan-mail database. People can search by name or topic and read actual correspondence that was sent to David O. Selznick’s film production company before, during, and after the making of the film. You’ll be able to type in your relatives’ names to see if they sent in any comments or applied for a job.

 

Do you have a favorite item or collection here at the Ransom Center?

I haven’t seen every collection, but I always want to tell people about the Norman Dawn collection. He was a special effects inventor for film projects in the early 1900s. We have over 150 display cards from him, and each one describes a different special effect. Special effects at that time were so new—directors didn’t want to spend money on them unless they knew that they were actually going to work. He used a variety of artistic techniques like sketching, watercolor, and painting to sell the special effects to whoever was making a movie, and then he went back after the fact and inserted film stills of the finished special effect. The skill and artistry involved is incredible.

 

Can you tell us about your car restoration hobby and the cars you’ve been working on lately?

Well, I go to antique malls pretty often, and one time around three years ago I came across this stack of car-customizing magazine from the ’50s and ’60s. They really showed me the creative element in repairing and customizing old cars. I never thought it was something I would be able to do, but flipping through those magazines, I realized that older cars are actually simple machines. So, I was going through Craigslist around that time, and I came across a 1965 Chevrolet Corvair that just intrigued me. It was in rough shape, and I thought to myself, “Here’s a blank slate!” With the help of many people giving me advice and directing me to spare parts, I was able to get that car looking really nice within a year, and I ended up reluctantly selling it. What I learned was that once you finish a project, you are eager to start another one. Right now, I’m working on two Mazda Miatas.

Below, watch Zmud drive the 1965 Chevrolet Corvair that he restored.

 

Where is your favorite place to travel?

Every year since 1988 I’ve gone to Taos, New Mexico for a week or two in the summer. I like to hit the reset button there. I’m with my family, and it’s not a typical trip where every minute is scheduled. I just get to relax, take in the scenery, and escape the heat.

 

Do you happen to collect anything?

I collect snapshots. You’ll find these buckets full of snapshots in antique stores, and I like flipping through every last one of them. When one sticks with me as interesting or artistic, I decide to take it home. People can be accidentally artistic, even when they are just taking a picture of their aunt and uncle, or the picture isn’t in focus.

 

Behind the scenes: Conserving the “Gone With The Wind” dresses

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Tomorrow, the Harry Ransom Center presents a panel discussion to answer the question “How do you care for some of the most iconic costumes in film history?” at 7 p.m. in the Center’s Prothro Theater.

Ransom Center Curator of Film Steve Wilson leads a discussion on the preservation of Gone With The Wind costumes, including the green curtain dress and burgundy ball gown, with independent textile conservator Cara Varnell, Ransom Center Assistant Curator of Costumes and Personal Effects Jill Morena, and independent scholar Nicole Villarreal.

This program is in conjunction with the current exhibition The Making of Gone With The Wind, which features five costumes from the film and is on view through January 4.

In 2010, the Ransom Center raised funds to conserve original costumes from Gone With The Wind, which are part of the Center’s David O. Selznick archive. Donors from around the world graciously contributed more than $30,000 to support the conservation work, which enabled the Ransom Center to display the costumes safely on custom-fitted mannequins in the current exhibition.

The Ransom Center’s detailed and careful conservation work took more than 180 hours and occurred between fall 2010 and spring 2012. A description of some of the conservation work conducted on these costumes is available.

Image: The conserved green curtain dress and hat worn by Vivien Leigh as Scarlett O’Hara in Gone With The Wind. Photo by Pete Smith.

In the Galleries: “Gone With The Wind” producer David O. Selznick demanded proper Southern accents from actors

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Letters poured into producer David O. Selznick’s office on the proper use of Southern accents in Gone With The Wind. One woman wrote, “Come South and study our dialect. I don’t know your people as you do, but it cuts deep when we see our lovely old Southern life ‘hashed up.’”

 

Clark Gable employed a dialog coach, but two days before filming, Selznick learned that Gable was refusing to use an accent. Selznick then had Will Price, from the casting department, and Susan Myrick, a technical advisor, work on coaching the actors in the use of an appropriate accent.

 

Price and Myrick, in a memo to Selznick and director George Cukor, wrote, “we find that the script includes innumerable attempts at written southern accent for the white characters. Both Miss Myrick and I strongly agree that this is extremely dangerous as it prompts the actors immediately to attempt a phony southern accent comprised merely of dropping final ‘ings’ and consonants. A phony southern accent is harder to eradicate than a British or western accent.” They then advise that the script should be retyped, without the written southern accents.

 

Filming went on hiatus as Selznick replaced director George Cukor with Victor Fleming. Selznick wrote to studio manager Henry Ginsberg about his concerns over the accent during this period: “We know that Leslie Howard has made little or no attempts in the direction of accent and since he is on our payroll there is little excuse for this…. I am particularly worried about Vivien Leigh since she has been associating with English people and more likely than not has completely got away from what was gained up to the time we stopped.” Leigh was already under fire from the media and many Southerners for being British, so it would have been doubly ruinous for the film if she were unable to employ an accent.

 

Memos related to the actors’ accents are on view through January 4 in the Ransom Center’s current exhibition The Making of Gone With The Wind. A fully illustrated exhibition catalog of the same title is available. Co-published by the Harry Ransom Center and University of Texas Press, the catalog includes a foreword written by Turner Classic Movies (TCM) host and film historian Robert Osborne.

 

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